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CRC Press eBooks

Topological Excitations in Superfluids with Internal Degrees of Freedom

Yuki Kawaguchi, Masahito Ueda

Published Nov 2, 2010• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Yuki Kawaguchi Department of Physics, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan Masahito Ueda Department of Physics, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan Macroscopic Quantum Control Project, ERATO, JST, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 1138656, Japan The defining character of a topological object is that it can move and deform freely in space and time, yet retains its identity, characterized by a set of discrete numbers called topological charges. This ability to deform without changing its fundamental character lends a particular importance to the notion of topological excitations that is independent of specific material properties. Such topological excitations are spontaneously generated under classical and quantum phase transitions. This chapter is devoted to an overview of topological excitations with an emphasis on spinor Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs).

DOI
10.1201/b10273-17

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Reports on Progress in Physics•Nov 27, 2014•54 citations
Yuki Kawaguchi Department of Physics, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan Masahito Ueda Department of Physics, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan Macroscopic Quantum Control Project, ERATO, JST, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 1138656, Japan The defining character of a topological object is that it can move and deform freely in space and time, yet retains its identity, characterized by a set of discrete numbers called topological charges. This ability to deform without changing its fundamental character lends a particular importance to the notion of topological excitations that is independent of specific material properties. Such topological excitations are spontaneously generated under classical and quantum phase transitions. This chapter is devoted to an overview of topological excitations with an emphasis on spinor Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs).
Since the discovery of Bose-Einstein condensation in dilute atomic vapours in 1995, there has been a monumental increase in the research effort in the field of atomic physics due to the unforeseen opportunities and challenges that the degenerate quantum gases present. In particular, quantum gases can emulate complicated models that arise in solid state and high energy physics, allowing realisations of exotic phenomena that have proven to be elusive in their original context. An outstanding example is the existence of various topological defects in degenerate quantum gases with internal degrees of freedom. Topological excitations such as skyrmions and several types of monopoles can be shown to take place in Bose gases with a hyperfine spin degree of freedom as a result of a coupling to an external field or due to thermal fluctuations. A central question in the context of dilute Bose gases is the relation between superfluidity and Bose-Einstein condensation. The dimensionality of the underlying space as well as the internal degrees of freedom have a direct impact on the existence and the nature of the Bose-Einstein condensate. For example, any uniform Bose gas in two spatial dimensions or an antiferromagnetic spinor Bose gas can give rise to a superfluid state which does not involve a conventional Bose-Einstein condensate corresponding to a single macroscopically occupied quantum state. In this Thesis, properties of different topological defects and their relation to superfluidity in dilute Bose gases are investigated. Stability and creation of coreless vortices are first studied and a method to cyclically increase the angular momentum of the condensate is introduced. Subsequently, the properties and creation of different types of monopoles are investigated and an experimentally feasible method to create a Dirac monopole is presented. Finally, finite temperature phase transitions in quasi-two-dimensional Bose gases with a spin degree of freedom are analysed and, as a related subject, the stability of vortex clusters formed by vortices and antivortices is studied.
The problem of understanding how a coherent, macroscopic Bose- Einstein condensate (BEC) emerges from the cooling of a thermal Bose gas has attracted significant theoretical and experimental interest over several decades. The pioneering achievement of BEC in weakly interacting dilute atomic gases in 1995 was followed by a number of experimental studies examining the growth of the BEC number, as well as the development of its coherence. More recently, there has been interest in connecting such experiments to universal aspects of nonequilibrium phase transitions, in terms of both static and dynamical critical exponents. Here, the spontaneous formation of topological structures such as vortices and solitons in quenched cold-atom experiments has enabled the verification of the Kibble-Zurek mechanism predicting the density of topological defects in continuous phase transitions, first proposed in the context of the evolution of the early universe. This chapter reviews progress in the understanding of BEC formation and discusses open questions and future research directions in the dynamics of phase transitions in quantum gases. Introduction The equilibrium phase diagram of the dilute Bose gas exhibits a continuous phase transition between condensed and noncondensed phases. The order parameter characteristic of the condensed phase vanishes above some critical temperature T c and grows continuously with decreasing temperature below this critical point. However, the dynamical process of condensate formation has proved to be a challenging phenomenon to address both theoretically and experimentally. This formation process is a crucial aspect of Bose systems and of direct relevance to all condensates discussed in this book, despite their evident system-specific properties. Important questions leading to intense discussions in the early literature include the time scale for condensate formation and the role of inhomogeneities and finite-size effects in “closed” systems. These issues are related to the concept of spontaneous symmetry breaking, its causes, and implications for physical systems (see, for example, Chapter 5 by Snoke and Daley). In this chapter, we give an overview of the dynamics of condensate formation and describe the present understanding provided by increasingly well-controlled cold-atom experiments and corresponding theoretical advances over the past twenty years. We focus on the growth of BECs in cooled Bose gases, which, from a theoretical standpoint, requires a suitable nonequilibrium formalism.
Bose-Einstein (BE) condensation is a phenomenon in which a macroscopic number of particles occupy a single-particle state. Once a system undergoes BE condensation, a significant fraction of particles behave in lockstep, leading to a number of spectacular macroscopic quantum phenomena. This article delineates fundamental aspects of BE condensates with an emphasis on spin degrees of freedom. Here the gauge and spin degrees of freedom are coupled to produce a rich variety of spinor superfluidity and topological excitations.
A rich variety of order parameter manifolds of multicomponent Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) admit various kinds of topological excitations, such as fractional vortices, monopoles, skyrmions, and knots. In this paper, we discuss two topological excitations in spinor BECs: non-Abelian vortices and knots. Unlike conventional vortices, non-Abelian vortices neither reconnect themselves nor pass through each other, but create a rung between them in a topologically stable manner. We discuss the collision dynamics of non-Abelian vortices in the cyclic phase of a spin-2 BEC. In the latter part, we show that a knot, which is a unique topological object characterized by a linking number or a Hopf invariant [π3 (S2) = Z], can be created using a conventional quadrupole magnetic field in a cold atomic system.
Phase transitions abound in the physical world, from the subatomic length scales of quark condensation to the decoupling forces in the early universe. In the Bose-Einstein condensation phase transition, a gas of trapped bosonic atoms is cooled to a critical temperature. Below this temperature, a macroscopic number of atoms suddenly starts to occupy a single quantum state; these atoms comprise the Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). The dynamics of the BEC phase transition are the focus of this dissertation and the experiments described here have provided new information on the details of BEC formation. New theoretical developments are proving to be valuable tools for describing BEC phase transition dynamics and interpreting new experimental results. With their amenability to optical manipulation and probing along with the advent of new microscopic theories, BECs provide an important new avenue for gaining insight into the universal dynamics of phase transitions in general.Spontaneous symmetry breaking in the system's order parameter may be one result of cooling through a phase transition. A potential consequence of this is the spontaneous formation of topological defects, which in a BEC appear as vortices. We experimentally observed and characterized the spontaneous formation of vortices during BEC growth. We attribute vortex creation to coherence length limitations during the initial stages of the phase transition. Parallel to these experimental observations, theory collaborators have used the Stochastic Gross-Pitaevski Equation formalism to simulate the growth of a condensate from a thermal cloud. The experimental and theoretical statistical results of the spontaneous formation of vortex cores during the growth of the condensate are in good quantitative agreement with one another, supporting our understanding of the dynamics of the phase transition. We believe that our results are also qualitatively consistent with the Kibble-Zurek mechanism, a universal model for topological defect formation.Ultimately, our understanding of the dynamics of the BEC phase transition may lead to a broader understanding of phase transitions in general, and provide new insight into the development of coherence in numerous systems.