Dynamics of Bose-Einstein condensates in a one-dimensional optical lattice with double-well potential

Sven Burger, F. S. Cataliotti, C. Fort +3 more

Hanlei Zheng, Qiang Gu

We study dynamical behaviors of the weakly interacting Bose-Einstein condensate in the one-dimensional optical lattice with an overall double-well potential by solving the time-dependent Gross-Pitaevskii equation. It is observed that the double-well potential dominates the dynamics of such a system even if the lattice depth is several times larger than the height of the double-well potential. This result suggests that the condensate flows without resistance in the periodic lattice just like the case of a single particle moving in periodic potentials. Nevertheless, the effective mass of atoms is increased, which can be experimentally verified since it is connected to the Josephson oscillation frequency. Moreover, the periodic lattice enhances the nonlinearity of the double-well condensate, making the condensate more “self-trapped” in the π -mode self-trapping regime.

Sarah B. McKinney

Robert Saers

This thesis includes both experimental and theoretical investigations, presented in a series of eight papers. The experimental part ranges from the construction procedures of an apparatus for Bose-Einstein condensates, to full scale experiments using three different set-ups for ultracold atoms in optical lattices. As one of the main themes of the thesis, an experimental apparatus for production of Bose-Einstein Condensates is under construction. A magneto-optically trapped sample, hosting more than 200 million 87Rb atoms, have successfully been loaded into a magnetic trap with high transfer rate. The lifetime of the sample in the magnetic trap is in the range of 9 s, and the atoms have been shown to respond to evaporative cooling. The experiment is ready for optimization of the magnetic trap loading, and evaporative cooling parameters, which are the final steps for reaching Bose-Einstein condensation. The set-up is designed to host experiments including variable geometry optical lattices, and includes the possibility to align laser beams with high angular precision for this purpose. The breakdown of Bloch waves in a Bose-Einstein condensate is studied, attributed to the effect of energetic and dynamical instability. This experimental study is performed using a Bose-Einstein condensate in a moving one-dimensional optical lattice at LENS, Florence Italy. The optical lattice parameters, and the thermal distribution of the atomic sample required to trigger the instabilities, are detected, and compared with a theoretical model developed in parallel with the experiments. In close connection with these one-dimensional lattice studies, an experimental survey to characterize regimes of superradiant Rayleigh scattering and Bragg scattering is presented. Tunneling properties of repulsively bound atom pairs in double well potentials are characterized in an experiment at Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz Germany. A three-dimensional optical lattice, producing an array of double wells with tunable properties is let to interact with a Bose-Einstein condensate. Pairs of ultracold atoms are produced on one side in the double wells, and their tunneling behavior, dependent on potential barrier and repulsion properties, is studied. A theoretical study of the crossover between one- and two-dimensional systems has been performed. The simulations were made for a two-dimensional array of atoms, where the behavior for different tunneling probabilities and atom-atom repulsion strengths was studied. Scaling relations for systems of variable sizes have been examined in detail, and numerical values for the involved variables have been found.

D. Ananikian

Barun Halder, Suranjana Ghosh, Pradosh Basu +3 more

We address dynamics of Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) loaded into a one-dimensional four-color optical lattice (FOL) potential with commensurate wavelengths and tunable intensities. This configuration lends system-specific symmetry properties. The analysis identifies specific multi-parameter forms of the FOL potential which admits exact solitary-wave solutions. This newly found class of potentials includes more particular species, such as frustrated double-well superlattices, and bichromatic and three-color lattices, which are subject to respective symmetry constraints. Our exact solutions provide options for controllable positioning of density maxima of the localized patterns, and tunable Anderson-like localization in the frustrated potential. A numerical analysis is performed to establish dynamical stability and structural stability of the obtained solutions, which makes them relevant for experimental realization. The newly found solutions offer applications to the design of schemes for quantum simulations and processing quantum information.