Shell-shaped hollow Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) exhibit behavior distinct from their filled counterparts and have recently attracted attention due to their potential realization in microgravity settings. Here we study distinct features of these hollow structures stemming from vortex physics and the presence of rotation. We focus on a vortex-antivortex pair as the simplest configuration allowed by the constraints on superfluid flow imposed by the closed-surface topology. In the two-dimensional limit of an infinitesimally thin shell BEC, we characterize the long-range attraction between the vortex-antivortex pair and find the critical rotation speed that stabilizes the pair against energetically relaxing towards self-annihilation. In the three-dimensional case, we contrast the bounds on vortex stability with those in the two-dimensional limit and the filled sphere BEC, and evaluate the critical rotation speed as a function of shell thickness. We thus demonstrate that analyzing vortex stabilization provides a nondestructive means of characterizing a hollow sphere BEC and distinguishing it from its filled counterpart.
The annihilation of vortex-antivortex pairs is a key event in two-dimensional Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs). It is known that dissipation or a catalyst vortex is required for the annihilation of the pairs in one-component BECs. We numerically confirmed in two-component BECs that the pairs can be annihilated even without any dissipation or catalyst vortices when the intercomponent interaction is strong. In addition, the pair is recreated alternately in two components under certain conditions, which we call the recurrence.
The study of superfluid and Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless phases in exciton-polaritons requires an understanding of vortex dynamics in a dissipative unconfined condensate. In this article we study the motion of dynamic vortex-antivortex pairs and show that vortex pair stability defined as ordered motion as opposed to rapid separation or recombination is the result of balance between dissipative velocities in the condensate and interaction with thermal polaritons. The addition of a trapping potential is further shown to considerably enhance the lifetime of a single vortex pair in this system.…
Polariton condensates have proved to be model systems to investigate topological defects, as they allow for direct and non-destructive imaging of the condensate complex order parameter. The fundamental topological excitations of such systems are quantized vortices. In specific configurations, further ordering can bring the formation of vortex lattices. In this work we demonstrate the spontaneous formation of ordered vortical states, consisting in geometrically self-arranged vortex-antivortex pairs. A mean-field generalized Gross-Pitaevskii model reproduces and supports the physics of the obser…
In a homogeneous two-dimensional system at non-zero temperature, although there can be no ordering of infinite range, a superfluid phase is predicted for a Bose liquid. The stabilization of phase in this superfluid regime is achieved by the formation of bound vortex-antivortex pairs. It is believed that several different systems share this common behaviour, when the parameter describing their ordered state has two degrees of freedom, and the theory has been tested for some of them. However, there has been no direct experimental observation of the phase stabilization mechanism by a bound pair. …
We investigate the phase structure of two-component Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) with repulsive intra- and interspecies interactions in the presence of respective vortex-antivortex superposition states (VAVSS). We show that different winding numbers of vortex and antivortex and different intra- and interspecies interaction strengths may lead to different phase configurations, such as fully separated phases, inlaid separated phases, asymmetric separated phase, and partially mixed phases, where the density profile of each component displays a petal-like (or modulated petal-like) structure. A…
Topological defects such as quantized vortices are one of the most striking manifestations of the superfluid nature of Bose-Einstein condensates and typical examples of quantum mechanical phenomena on a macroscopic scale. Here we demonstrate the formation of a lattice of vortex-antivortex pairs and study, for the first time, its properties in the non-linear regime at high polarion-density where polariton-polariton interactions dominate the behaviour of the system. In this work first we demonstrate that the array of vortex-antivortex pairs can be generated in a controllable way in terms of size…
In strongly nonequilibrium Bose-Einstein condensates described by the generalized Gross-Pitaevskii equation, vortex motion becomes self-accelerated while the long-range vortex-antivortex interaction appears to be repulsive. We numerically study the impact of these rather unusual vortex properties on the dynamics of multivortex systems. We show that at strong nonequilibrium the repulsion between vortices and antivortices leads to a dramatic slowdown of their annihilation. Moreover, in finite-size samples, relaxation of multivortex systems can lead to the formation of metastable vortex-antivorte…
In ferromagnetic Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs), the quadratic Zeeman effect controls magnetic anisotropy, which affects on magnetic domain pattern formation. While the longitudinal magnetization is dominant (similar to the Ising model) for a negative quadratic Zeeman energy, the transverse magnetization is dominant (similar to the XY model) for a positive one. When the quadratic Zeeman energy is positive, the coarsening dynamics is driven by vortex-antivortex annihilation in the same way as the XY model. However, due to superfluid flow of atoms, there exist several combinations of vortex-an…
We study the Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless mechanism for vortex-antivortex pair formation in two-dimensional superfluids for nonequilibrium condensates. Our numerical study is based on a classical field model for driven-dissipative quantum fluids that is applicable to polariton condensates. We investigate the critical noise needed to create vortex-antivortex pairs in the systems, starting from a state with uniform phase. The dependence of the critical noise on the nonequilibrium and energy relaxation parameters is analyzed in detail.
A mechanism of a pinning of the quantized matter wave vortices by optical vortices in a specially arranged optical dipole traps is discussed. The vortex-antivortex optical arrays of rectangular symmetry are shown to transfer angular orbital momentum and form the "antiferromagnet"-like matter waves. The separable Hamiltonian for matter waves in pancake trapping geometry is proposed and 3D-wavefunction is factorized in a product of wavefunctions of the 1D harmonic oscillator and 2D vortex-antivortex quantum state. The 2D wavefunction's phase gradient field associated via Madelung transform with …
We investigate the equilibrium properties of a quasi-two-dimensional degenerate boson-fermion mixture (DBFM) with a bosonic vortex-antivortex superposed state (VAVSS) using a quantum-hydrodynamic model. We show that, depending on the choice of parameters, the DBFM with a VAVSS can exhibit rich phase structures. For repulsive boson-fermion (BF) interaction, the Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) may constitute a petal-shaped "core" inside the honeycomb-like fermionic component, or a ring-shaped joint "shell" around the onion-like fermionic cloud, or multiple segregated "islands" embedded in the dis…
Very recently quasi two-dimensional (2D) systems made of attractive fermionic alkali-metal atoms with a widely tunable interaction due to Fano-Feshbach resonances have been realized. In this way it has been achieved the 2D crossover from the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer regime of weakly-interacting Cooper pairs to the Bose-Einstein condensate regime strongly bound dimers. These experiments pave the way to the investigation of 2D strongly-interacting attractive fermions during the Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) transition from a low-temperature superfluid phase characterized by quasi-conden…
We investigate the initiation and subsequent evolution of Crow instability in an inhomogeneous unitary Fermi gas using zero-temperature Galilei-invariant non-linear Schrödinger equation. Considering a cigar-shaped unitary Fermi gas, we generate the vortex-antivortex pair either by phase-imprinting or by moving a Gaussian obstacle potential. We observe that the Crow instability in a unitary Fermi gas leads to the decay of the vortex-antivortex pair into multiple vortex rings and ultimately into sound waves.
Understanding quantum dynamics in a two-dimensional Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) relies on understanding how vortices interact with each others microscopically and with local imperfections of the potential which confines the condensate. Within a system consisting of many vortices, the trajectory of a vortex-antivortex pair is often scattered by a third vortex, an effect previously characterised. However, the natural question remains as to how much of this effect is due to the velocity induced by this third vortex and how much is due to the density inhomogeneity which it introduces. In this w…
We theoretically and numerically investigate the generation of fractional-charge vortex dipoles in spinor condensates with non-zero magnetization. We find that in the antiferromagnetic phase of spin-1 and spin-2 and the cyclic phase of spin-2 condensate with non-zero magnetization coupling of the density (phonon) and a spin-excitation mode results in two critical speeds for vortex-antivortex pair creation in the condensate. As a result, a Gaussian obstacle potential moving across the antiferromagnetic spin-1 or spin-2 and cyclic spin-2 spinor condensates with non-zero magnetization can lead to…
Engineering of the orbital angular momentum (OAM) of light due to interaction with photonic lattices reveals rich physics and motivates potential applications. We report the experimental creation of regularly-distributed quantized vortex arrays in momentum space by probing the honeycomb and hexagonal photonic lattices with a single focused Gaussian beam. For the honeycomb lattice, the vortices are associated with Dirac points and mimic the Berry curvature sources. However, we show that the resulting spatial patterns of vortices are strongly defined by the symmetry of the wave packet evolving i…
We investigate the Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) transition in a two-dimensional (2D) Fermi gas with spin-orbit coupling (SOC), as a function of the two-body binding energy and a perpendicular Zeeman field. By including a generic form of the SOC, as a function of Rashba and Dresselhaus terms, we study the evolution between the experimentally relevant equal Rashba-Dresselhaus (ERD) case and the Rashba-only (RO) case. We show that in the ERD case, at fixed non-zero Zeeman field, the BKT transition temperature $T_{BKT}$ is increased by the effect of SOC for all values of the binding energ…
We present a theoretical study of the finite-temperature Kosterlitz-Thouless (KT) and vortex-antivortex lattice (VAL) melting transitions in two-dimensional Fermi gases with $p$- or $d$-wave pairing. For both pairings, when the interaction is tuned from weak to strong attractions, we observe a quantum phase transition from the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) superfluidity to the Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) of difermions. The KT and VAL transition temperatures increase during this BCS-BEC transition and approach constant values in the deep BEC region. The BCS-BEC transition is characterize…
In a two-dimensional (2D) classical fluid, a large-scale flow structure emerges out of turbulence, which is known as the inverse energy cascade where energy flows from small to large length scales. An interesting question is whether this phenomenon can occur in a superfluid, which is inviscid and irrotational by nature. Atomic Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) of highly oblate geometry provide an experimental venue for studying 2D superfluid turbulence, but their full investigation has been hindered due to a lack of the circulation sign information of individual quantum vortices in a turbulent …
We map the infrared dynamics of a relativistic single component ($N=1$) interacting scalar field theory to that of nonrelativistic complex scalar fields. The Gross-Pitaevskii (GP) equation, describing the real time dynamics of single component ultracold Bose gases, is obtained at first nontrivial order in an expansion proportional to the powers of $λϕ^2/m^2$ where $λ$, $ϕ$ and $m$ are the coupling constant, the scalar field and the particle mass respectively. Our analytical studies are corroborated by numerical simulations of the spatial and momentum structure of overoccupied scalar fields in …
We study the ground-state configurations and spin textures of rotating two-component Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) with Rashba-Dresselhaus spin-orbit coupling (RD-SOC), which are confined in a two-dimensional (2D) optical lattice plus a 2D harmonic trap. In the absence of rotation, a relatively small isotropic 2D RD-SOC leads to the generation of ghost vortices for initially miscible BECs, while it gives rise to the creation of rectangular vortex-antivortex lattices for initially immiscible BECs. As the strength of the 2D RD-SOC enhances, the visible vortices or the 2D vortex-antivortex cha…
Static and dynamic properties of vortices in a two-component Bose-Einstein condensate with Rashba spin-orbit coupling are investigated. The mass current around a vortex core in the plane-wave phase is found to be deformed by the spin-orbit coupling, and this makes the dynamics of the vortex pairs quite different from those in a scalar Bose-Einstein condensate. The velocity of a vortex-antivortex pair is much smaller than that without spin-orbit coupling, and there exist stationary states. Two vortices with the same circulation move away from each other or unite to form a stationary state.
We have studied the merging of two $^4$He droplets at zero temperature, caused by their Van der Waals mutual attraction. During the early stages of the merging, density structures appear which closely match the experimental observations by Vicente et al. [J. Low Temp. Phys. 121, 627 (2000)]. When the droplets are merging, quantized vortex-antivortex ring pairs nucleate at the surface and annihilate inside the merged droplet producing a roton burst. We also observe the nucleation of quantized vortex-antivortex rings that wrap the droplet surface and remain localized on the surface until they ev…
We have studied computationally the collision dynamics of spin-2 Bose--Einstein condensates initially confined in a triple-well trap. Depending on the intra- and inter-component relative phases of the initial state spinor wave function, the collision of the three condensate segments produces one of many possible vortex-antivortex lattices after which the system transitions to quantum turbulence. We find that the emerging vortex lattice structures can be described in terms of multi-wave interference. We show that the three-segment collisions can be used to systematically produce staggered vorte…
We report on the creation of three-vortex clusters in a $^{87}Rb$ Bose-Einstein condensate by oscillatory excitation of the condensate. This procedure can create vortices of both circulation, so that we are able to create several types of vortex clusters using the same mechanism. The three-vortex configurations are dominated by two types, namely, an equilateral-triangle arrangement and a linear arrangement. We interpret these most stable configurations respectively as three vortices with the same circulation, and as a vortex-antivortex-vortex cluster. The linear configurations are very likely …
We study the dynamics of a Rashba spin-orbit coupled spin-1 ferromagnetic Bose-Einstein condensate under a linear Zeeman magnetic field(ZF) disturbed by a moving obstacle. The Bogoliubov excitation spectrums and corresponding critical excitations in different situations are analyzed. The structure of the coreless vortex or antivortex generated by the moving obstacle has been investigated. When the ZF is applied along x direction, the vortex cores for the three components of a(an) vortex(antivortex) could be arranged into a vertical line, and their order would be reversed as the spin-orbit coup…
We carry out extensive direct numerical simulations (DNSs) to investigate the interaction of active particles and fields in the two-dimensional (2D) Gross-Pitaevskii (GP) superfluid, in both simple and turbulent flows. The particles are active in the sense that they affect the superfluid even as they are affected by it. We tune the mass of the particles, which is an important control parameter. At the one-particle level, we show how light, neutral, and heavy particles move in the superfluid, when a constant external force acts on them; in particular, beyond a critical velocity, at which a vort…
We show theoretically that elongated vortex-antivortex dipoles can be created controllably in trapped Bose-Einstein condensates, using known experimental techniques. Vortex dipoles of sufficient length are unstable and cascade into slow vortex rings which ultimately decay via sound emission. This instability of antiparallel vortex line elements, which self-generates Kelvin waves on vortex loops and in trapped atomic gases, may play a role in bridging the Kelvin-wave and Kolmogorov-Richardson cascades of quantum turbulence.
We investigate the ground-state properties of spin-orbit-coupled pseudo-spin-1/2 dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) in a two-dimensional harmonic trap and an in-plane quadrupole field. The effects of spin-orbit coupling (SOC), dipole-dipole interaction (DDI) and the in-plane quadrupole field on the ground-state structures and spin textures of the system are systematically analyzed and discussed. For fixed SOC and DDI strengths, the system shows a quadrupole stripe phase with a half-quantum vortex, or a quadrupole Thomas-Fermi phase with a half-quantum antivortex for small quadrupole fiel…
We consider a model of the exciton-polariton condensate based on a system of two Gross-Pitaevskii equations coupled by the second-order differential operator, which represents the spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in the system. Also included are the linear gain, effective diffusion, nonlinear loss, and the standard harmonic-oscillator trapping potential, as well as the Zeeman splitting. By means of combined analytical and numerical methods, we identify stable two-dimensional modes supported by the nonlinear system. In the absence of the Zeeman splitting, these are mixed modes, which combine zero and …
It is known that the loss of phase coherence of Cooper pairs in two-dimensional (2D) superconductivity corresponds to the unbinding of vortex-antivortex pairs with the quasi-long-range order (quasi-LRO) in the order-parameter phase field, described by the Berezinskii-Kosterlizt-Thouless (BKT) transition of a 2D XY model. Here we show that the second-order Josephson coupling can induce an exotic superconducting phase in a bilayer system. By using tensor-network methods, the partition function of the 2D classical model is expressed as a product of 1D quantum transfer operator, whose eigen-equati…
