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arXiv:cond-mat/0012491 · Physical Review A

Periodic instanton method and macroscopic quantum tunneling between two weakly linked Bose-Einstein condensates

Yunbo Zhang, Harald J W Müller-Kirsten

Published Jul 18, 2001• 8 citations
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Abstract

An alternative method is used to investigate the tunneling between two weakly linked Bose-Einstein condensates confined in double-well potential traps. The nonlinear interaction between the atoms in each well contributes to a finite chemical potential, which, with consideration of periodic instantons, leads to a remarkably high tunneling frequency. This result can be used to interpret the newly found macroscopic quantum self-trapping effect. Also an alternative kind of first-order crossover between different regions is predicted.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.64.023608

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An alternative method is used to investigate the tunneling between two weakly linked Bose-Einstein condensates confined in double-well potential traps. The nonlinear interaction between the atoms in each well contributes to a finite chemical potential, which, with consideration of periodic instantons, leads to a remarkably high tunneling frequency. This result can be used to interpret the newly found macroscopic quantum self-trapping effect. Also an alternative kind of first-order crossover between different regions is predicted.
It is well known that increasing the nonlinearity due to repulsive atomic interactions in a double-well Bose-Einstein condensate suppresses quantum tunneling between the two sites. Here we find analogous behavior in the dynamical tunneling of a Bose-Einstein condensate between period-one resonances in a single driven potential well. For small nonlinearities we find unhindered tunneling between the resonances, but with an increasing period as compared to the noninteracting system. For nonlinearities above a critical value we generally observe that the tunneling shuts down. However, for certain regimes of modulation parameters we find that dynamical tunneling reemerges for large enough nonlinearities, an effect not present in spatial double-well tunneling. We develop a two-mode model in good agreement with full numerical simulations over a wide range of parameters, which allows the suppression of tunneling to be attributed to macroscopic quantum self-trapping.
In this thesis, I present the first experimental implementation of a Josephson junction for Bose-Einstein condensates. The weak link between two BECs constitutes the nonlinear generalization of the well known Josephson junction of weakly-coupled superconductors that are separated by a thin insulating barrier. In our experiment, the required overlap of two macroscopic wavefunctions is provided by loading a BEC into an optical double well potential. It is realized by a superposition of a one-dimensional optical lattice with a focused laser beam optical dipole trap. The tunneling dynamics between the two potential wells exhibits two distinct dynamical regimes. For small initial population imbalances of the two wells we observe nearly sinusoidal Josephson tunneling oscillations, which are characterized by an oscillating population and relative phase. The situation changes drastically, if the initial population imbalance is chosen above a critical value. In this case, resonant tunneling between the two wells is prohibited because the difference between the on-site particle interaction energies in the two wells exceeds the tunneling energy splitting. As a consequence, the atomic distribution becomes self-locked and the relative phase evolves unbound in time. This regime of prohibited tunneling, which has no analogon in superconducting Josephson junctions, is called “macroscopic quantum self-trapping”.
We analyze the periodic tunneling of a Bose-Einstein condensate in a double-well potential which has an oscillating energy barrier. We show that the dynamics of the Bose condensate critically depends on the frequency ωωω of the oscillating energy barrier. In the regime of periodic macroscopic quantum tunneling (PMQT) with frequency ωJω_JωJ​, the population imbalance of the condensate in the two wells can be enhanced under the condition of parametric resonance ω=2ωJω= 2 ω_Jω=2ωJ​. Instead, in the regime of macroscopic quantum self-trapping (MQST), we find that MQST can be reduced or suppressed under the condition of parametric resonance between the frequency ωωω of the energy barrier and the frequency ωSTω_{ST}ωST​ of oscillation through the barrier of the very small fraction of particles which remain untrapped during MQST.
We report on the first realization of a single bosonic Josephson junction, implemented by two weakly linked Bose-Einstein condensates in a double-well potential. In order to fully investigate the nonlinear tunneling dynamics we measure the density distribution in situ and deduce the relative phase between the two condensates from interference fringes. Our results verify the predicted nonlinear generalization of tunneling oscillations in superconducting and superfluid Josephson junctions. Additionally we confirm a novel nonlinear effect known as macroscopic quantum self-trapping, which leads to the inhibition of large amplitude tunneling oscillations.
With phase space analysis approach, we investigate the self-trapping phenomenon for two weakly coupled Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) in a symmetric double well potential. We identify two kinds of self-trapping by their different relative phase behavior. By applying a periodic modulation on the energy bias of the system we find that the self-trapping can be controlled, in other words, the transition parameters can be adjusted effectively by the periodic modulation. Analytic expressions for the dependence of the transition parameters on the modulation parameters are derived for high- and low-frequency modulations. For an intermediate-frequency modulation, we find the resonance between the periodic modulation and nonlinear Rabi oscillation dramatically affect the tunneling dynamics and demonstrate many phenomena. Finally, we study the effects of many-body quantum fluctuation on the self-trapping and discuss the possible experimental realization.
A Bose-Einstein condensate in a modulated, one-dimensional, anharmonic potential can exhibit dynamical tunneling between islands of regular motion in phase space. With increasingly repulsive atomic interactions, dynamical tunneling is predicted to cease due to self-trapping [S. Wüster ]. This suppression of tunneling oscillations is related to the same phenomenon that occurs in the two-mode dynamics of a repulsively interacting Bose-Einstein condensate in a double-well potential. Here we present a two-mode model for dynamical tunneling based on nonlinear Floquet states and examine the range of validity of the approximation. We characterize nonlinear dynamical tunneling for different trap strengths, modulation amplitudes, and effective Planck constants. Using the linear Floquet states we derive an expression for the critical nonlinearity beyond which tunneling ceases. Finally we demonstrate the dynamical instability of selected nonlinear Floquet states and show how to initialize some Floquet states in experiments. Our detailed survey will enable experiments to target accessible parameter regimes for the study of nonlinear dynamical tunneling.