We perform collective spin measurements to study the buildup of two-body correlations between $\approx10^4$ spin $s=3$ chromium atoms pinned in a 3D optical lattice. The spins interact via long range and anisotropic dipolar interactions. From the fluctuations of total magnetization, measured at the standard quantum limit, we estimate the dynamical growth of the connected pairwise correlations associated with magnetization. The quantum nature of the correlations is assessed by comparisons with short and long time expansions, and numerical simulations. Our work shows that measuring fluctuations of spin populations provides new ways to characterize correlations in quantum many-body systems, for $s>1/2$ spins
We study the statics and dynamics of a dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) droplet bound by inter-species contact interaction in a trapped non-dipolar BEC. Our findings are demonstrated in terms of stability plots of a dipolar 164Dy droplet bound in a trapped non-dipolar 87Rb BEC with a variable number of 164Dy atoms and the inter-species scattering length. A trapped non-dipolar BEC of a fixed number of atoms can only bind a dipolar droplet containing atoms less than a critical number for the inter-species scattering length between two critical values. The shape and size (statics) as well a…
We study the scissors modes of dipolar boson and fermion gases trapped in a spherically symmetric potential. We use the harmonic oscillator states to solve the time-dependent Gross-Pitaevskii equation for bosons and the time-dependent Hartree-Fock equation for fermions. It is pointed out that the scissors modes of bosons and fermions can be of quite different nature.
Trapped degenerate dipolar Bose and Fermi gases of cylindrical symmetry with the polarization vector along the symmetry axis are only stable for the strength of dipolar interaction below a critical value. In the case of bosons, the stability of such a dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is investigated for different strengths of contact and dipolar interactions using variational approximation and numerical solution of a mean-field model. In the disk shape, with the polarization vector perpendicular to the plane of the disk, the atoms experience an overall dipolar repulsion and this fact sho…
We investigated the ground state wave function and free expansion of a trapped dipolar condensate. We find that dipolar interaction may induce both biconcave and dumbbell density profiles in, respectively, the pancake- and cigar-shaped traps. On the parameter plane of the interaction strengths, the density oscillation occurs only when the interaction parameters fall into certain isolated areas. The relation between the positions of these areas and the trap geometry is explored. By studying the free expansion of the condensate with density oscillation, we show that the density oscillation is de…
We consider dipolar fermions in a two-dimensional square lattice and a harmonic trapping potential. The anisotropy of the dipolar interaction combined with the lattice leads to transitions between phases with density order of different symmetries. We show that the attractive part of the dipolar interaction results in a superfluid phase which is suppressed by density order. The trapping potential is demonstrated to make the different phases co-exist, forming ring and island structures. The phases with density and superfluid order can overlap forming regions with supersolid order.
We study a harmonically trapped Bose-Einstein condensate with dipole-dipole interactions in a regime where a roton spectrum emerges. We show that the roton spectrum is clearly revealed in the static and dynamic structure factors which can be measured using Bragg spectroscopy. We develop and validate a theory based on the local density approximation for the dynamic structure factor.
Thanks to their immense purity and controllability, dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates are an exemplar for studying fundamental non-local nonlinear physics. Here we show that a family of fundamental nonlinear waves - the dark solitons - are supported in trapped quasi-one-dimensional dipolar condensates and within reach of current experiments. Remarkably, the oscillation frequency of the soliton is strongly dependent on the atomic interactions, in stark contrast to the non-dipolar case. The failure of a particle analogy, so successful for dark solitons in general, to account for this behaviour i…
We develop a practical Hartree-Fock theory for trapped Bose and Fermi gases that interact with dipole-dipole interactions. This theory is applicable at zero and finite temperature. Our approach is based on the introduction of local momentum distortion fields that characterize the exchange effects in terms of a local effective potential. We validate our theory against existing theories, finding excellent agreement with full Hartree-Fock calculations.
The collective excitations of a zero-temperature, spin-polarized, harmonically trapped, two-dimensional dipolar Fermi gas are examined within the Thomas-Fermi von Weizsäcker hydrodynamic theory. We focus on repulsive interactions, and investigate the dependence of the excitation frequencies on the strength of the dipolar interaction and particle number. We find that the mode spectrum can be classified according to bulk modes, whose frequencies are shifted upward as the interaction strength is increased, and an infinite ladder of surface modes, whose frequencies are {\em independent} of the int…
We study a system of dipolar molecules confined in a two-dimensional trap and subject to an optical square lattice. The repulsive long-range dipolar interaction $D/r^3$ favors an equilateral triangular arrangement of the molecules, which competes against the square symmetry of the underlying optical lattice with lattice constant $b$ and amplitude $V$. We find the minimal-energy states at the commensurate density $n = 1/b^2$ and establish the complete square-to-triangular transformation pathway of the lattice with decreasing $V$ involving period-doubled, solitonic, and distorted-triangular conf…
We introduce a confocal shift-interferometer based on optical fibers. The presented spectroscopy allows measuring coherence maps of luminescent samples with a high spatial resolution even at cryogenic temperatures. We apply the spectroscopy onto electrostatically trapped, dipolar excitons in a semiconductor double quantum well. We find that the measured spatial coherence length of the excitonic emission coincides with the point spread function of the confocal setup. The results are consistent with a temporal coherence of the excitonic emission down to temperatures of 250 mK.
We consider the non-condensate density and density fluctuations of a trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate, focusing on the regime where a roton-like excitation spectrum develops. Our results show that a characteristic peak in the non-condensate density occurs at trap center due to the rotons. In this regime we also find that the anomalous density becomes positive and peaked, giving rise to enhanced density fluctuations. We calculate the non-condensate density in momentum space and show that a small momentum halo is associated with the roton excitations.
We consider two separated pancake-shaped trapped gases interacting with a dipolar (either magnetic or electric) force. We study how the center of mass motion propagates from one cloud to the other as a consequence of the long-range nature of the interaction. The corresponding dynamics is fixed by the frequency difference between the in-phase and the out-of-phase center of mass modes of the two clouds, whose dependence on the dipolar interaction strength and the cloud separation is explicitly investigated. We discuss Fermi gases in the degenerate as well as in the classical limit and comment on…
We consider the quasi-particle excitations of a trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate. By mapping these excitations onto radial and angular momentum we show that the roton modes are clearly revealed as discrete fingers in parameter space, whereas the other modes form a smooth surface. We examine the properties of the roton modes and characterize how they change with the dipole interaction strength. We demonstrate how the application of a perturbing potential can be used to engineer angular rotons, i.e. allowing us to controllably select modes of non-zero angular momentum to become the lowes…
We calculate the stability diagram for a trapped normal Bose gas with dipole-dipole interactions. Our study characterizes the roles of trap geometry, temperature, and short-ranged interactions on the stability. We predict a robust double instability feature in oblate trapping geometries arising from the interplay of thermal gas saturation and the anisotropy of the interaction. Our results are relevant to current experiments with polar molecules and will be useful in developing strategies to obtain a polar molecule Bose-Einstein condensate.
We develop a finite temperature Hartree theory for the trapped dipolar Bose gas. We use this theory to study thermal effects on the mechanical stability of the system and density oscillating condensate states. We present results for the stability phase diagram as a function of temperature and aspect ratio. In oblate traps above the critical temperature for condensation we find that the Hartree theory predicts significant stability enhancement over the semiclassical result. Below the critical temperature we find that thermal effects are well described by accounting for the thermal depletion of …
By means of the Boltzmann-Vlasov kinetic equation we investigate dynamical properties of a trapped, one-component Fermi gas at zero temperature, featuring the anisotropic and long-range dipole-dipole interaction. To this end, we determine an approximate solution by rescaling both space and momentum variables of the equilibrium distribution, thereby obtaining coupled ordinary differential equations for the corresponding scaling parameters. Based on previous results on how the Fermi sphere is deformed in the hydrodynamic regime of a dipolar Fermi gas, we are able to implement the relaxation-time…
We calculate the stability diagram for a trapped normal Fermi or Bose gas with dipole-dipole interactions. Our study characterizes the roles of trap geometry and temperature on the stability using Hartree-Fock theory. We find that exchange appreciably reduces stability, and that, for bosons, the double instability feature in oblate trapping geometries predicted previously is still predicted by the Hartree-Fock theory. Our results are relevant to current experiments with polar molecules and will be useful in developing strategies to obtain a polar molecule Bose-Einstein condensate or degenerate…
Using the time-dependent density matrix renormalization group method, we calculate transport properties of an interacting Fermi gas in an optical lattice with a confining trap after a sudden displacement of the trap center. In the regime of attractive interactions, the dipolar motion after the displacement can be classified into underdamped oscillations and overdamped relaxations, depending on the interaction strength. These numerical calculations are consistent with experimental results. In the regime of repulsive interactions, we predict a revival of the oscillations of the center of mass wh…
Strongly interacting systems of dipolar bosons in three dimensions confined by harmonic traps are analyzed using the exact Path Integral Ground State Monte Carlo method. By adding a repulsive two-body potential, we find a narrow window of interaction parameters leading to stable ground- state configurations of droplets in a crystalline arrangement. We find that this effect is entirely due to the interaction present in the Hamiltonian without resorting to additional stabilizing mechanisms or specific three-body forces. We analyze the number of droplets formed in terms of the Hamiltonian paramet…
We investigate the superfluid properties of a dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) in a fully three-dimensional trap. Specifically, we calculate a superfluid critical velocity for this system by applying the Landau criterion to its discrete quasiparticle spectrum. We test this critical velocity by direct numerical simulation of condensate depletion as a blue-detuned laser moves through the condensate. In both cases, the presence of the roton in the spectrum serves to lower the critical velocity beyond a critical particle number. Since the shape of the dispersion, and hence the roton minimum,…
We present a general method for obtaining the exact static solutions and collective excitation frequencies of a trapped Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) with dipolar atomic interactions in the Thomas-Fermi regime. The method incorporates analytic expressions for the dipolar potential of an arbitrary polynomial density profile, thereby reducing the problem of handling non-local dipolar interactions to the solution of algebraic equations. We comprehensively map out the static solutions and excitation modes, including non-cylindrically symmetric traps, and also the case of negative scattering lengt…
We investigate long-range effects of the dipolar interaction in Bose-Einstein condensates by solving the time-dependent 3D Gross-Pitaevskii equation. We study the propagation of excitations between non-overlapping condensates when a collective mode is excited in one of the condensates. We obtain the frequency shifts due to the long-range character of the dipolar coupling for the bilayer and also the trilayer system when the dipolar mode is excited in one condensate. The propagation of the monopolar and quadrupolar modes are also investigated. The coupled-pendulum model is proposed to qualitati…
We develop a meanfield treatment of a polarized trapped Fermi gas with dipole-dipole interactions. Our approach is based on self-consistent semiclassical Hartree-Fock theory that accounts for direct and exchange interactions. We discuss our procedure for numerically implementing the calculation. We study the thermodynamic and the first and second order correlation properties of the system. We find that the system entropy depends on the trap geometry, allowing the system to be cooled as the trap aspect ratio is increased, and that exchange interactions cause the correlation functions to be anis…
We examine the magnetostrictive position and momentum space distortions that occur in harmonically confined dipolar Bose and Fermi gases. Direct interactions give rise to position space magnetostriction and exchange interactions give rise to momentum space magnetostriction. While the position space magnetostriction is similar in Bose and Fermi systems, the momentum space magnetostriction is markedly different: the Bose gas momentum distribution distorts in the opposite sense to that of the Fermi gas. By relating exchange effects to short range correlations between the particles we discuss the …
We study theoretically Bose-Einstein condensates with polarized dipolar interactions in anisotropic traps. We map the parameter space by varying the trap frequencies and dipolar interaction strengths and find an irregular-shaped region of parameter space in which density-oscillating condensate states occur, with maximum density away from the trap center. These density-oscillating states may be biconcave (red-blood-cell-shaped), or have two or four peaks. For all trap frequencies, the condensate becomes unstable to collapse for sufficiently large dipole interaction strength. The collapse coinci…
We study the dynamics of dipolar bosons in an external harmonic trap. We monitor the time evolution of the occupation in the natural orbitals and normalized first- and second-order Glauber's correlation functions. We focus in particular on the relaxation dynamics of the Shannon entropy. Comparison with the corresponding results for contact interactions is presented. We observe significant effects coming from the presence of the non-local repulsive part of the interaction. The relaxation process is very fast for dipolar bosons with a clear signature of a truly saturated maximum entropy state. W…
We develop a variational theory for a dipolar condensate in an elongated (cigar shaped) confinement potential. Our formulation provides an effective one-dimensional extended meanfield theory for the ground state and its collective excitations. We apply our theory to investigate the properties of rotons in the system comparing the variational treatment to a full numerical solution. We consider the effect of quantum fluctuations on the scattering length at which the roton excitation softens to zero energy.
We study ultra-cold dipolar excitons confined in a 10$μ$m trap of a double GaAs quantum well. Based on the local density approximation, we unveil for the first time the equation of state of excitons at pure thermodynamic equilibrium. In this regime we show that, below a critical temperature of about $1$ Kelvin, a superfluid forms in the inner region of the trap at a local exciton density $n \sim 2-3 \, 10^{10} \text{cm}^{-2}$, encircled by a more dilute and normal component in the outer rim of the trap. Remarkably, this spatial arrangement correlates directly with the concentration of defects …
We consider a bilayer of dipolar bosons in which the polarization of dipoles are perpendicular to the planes. Using accurate static structure factor $S(q)$ data from hypernetted-chain calculation for single layer dipolar bosons we construct effective screened interactions for intralayer particles. We adopt the random-phase approximation for interlayer interactions. We study the instability of the homogeneous bilayer system against the formation of density waves by investigating the poles of the density-density response function. The dispersion of collective modes of this system also signals th…
We describe the emergence of superfluid phases of ultracold dipolar fermions in optical lattices for two-dimensional systems. Considering the many-body screening of dipolar interactions at intermediate and larger filling factors, we show that several superfluid phases with distinct pairing symmetries naturally arise in the singlet channel: local s-wave $(sl)$, extended s-wave $(se)$, d-wave $(d)$ or time-reversal-symmetry breaking $(sl + se \pm id)$-wave. We obtain the temperature versus filling factor phase diagram and show that d-wave pairing is favored near half-filling, that $(sl + se)$-wa…
We study the interplay between the long- and short-range interaction of a one-dimensional optical lattice system of two-component dipolar fermions by using the density matrix renormalization group method. The atomic density profile, pairing-pairing correlation function, and the compressibility are calculated in the ground state, from which we identify the parameter region of the Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO) pairing state, half-metal (HM) state, FFLO-HM state, and the normal polarized state, and thus the phase diagram in the coordinates of the long- and short-range interaction streng…
We consider a trapped quasi2D dipolar Bose Einstein condensate (q2D DBEC) with a polariza- tion tilted into the plane of motion. We show that by tilting the polarization axis, the coherence properties are anisotropic. Such a system will have density fluctuations whose amplitude strongly depend on their trap location relative to the polarization axis. Additionally, interference contrast will also be anisotropic despite an isotropic density profile. The anisotropy is related to a roton like mode that becomes unstable and supports local collapse along the polarization axis.
We theoretically investigate the spectrum of elementary excitations of a trapped dipolar quantum gas across the BEC-supersolid phase transition. Our calculations reveal the existence of distinct Higgs and Nambu-Goldstone modes that emerge from the softening roton modes of the dipolar BEC at the phase transition point. On the supersolid side of the transition, the energy of the Higgs mode increases rapidly, leading to a strong coupling to higher-lying modes. Our study highlights how the symmetry-breaking nature of the supersolid state translates to finite-size systems.
We investigate the dynamical properties of a trapped finite-temperature normal Fermi gas with dipole-dipole interaction. For the free expansion dynamics, we show that the expanded gas always becomes stretched along the direction of the dipole moment. In addition, we present the temperature and interaction dependences of the asymptotical aspect ratio. We further study the collapse dynamics of the system by suddenly increasing the dipolar interaction strength. We show that, in contrast to the anisotropic collapse of a dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate, a dipolar Fermi gas always collapses isotrop…
We calculate the collective excitations of a dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate in the regime where it self-binds into droplets stabilized by quantum fluctuations. We show that the filament-shaped droplets act as a quasi-one-dimensional waveguide along which low angular momentum phonons propagate. The evaporation (unbinding) threshold occurring as the atom number $N$ is reduced to the critical value $N_c$ is associated with a monopole-like excitation going soft as $ε_0\sim(N-N_c)^{1/4}$. Considering the system in the presence of a trapping potential, we quantify the crossover from a trap-bound c…
We study the collective excitations of polarized single-component quasi-two-dimensional dipolar fermions in an isotropic harmonic trap by solving the collisional Boltzmann-Vlasov (CBV) equation. We study the response to both monopole and quadrupole perturbations of the trap potential and investigate the character of excitations in each case. Simple analytic formulas are provided based on the linearized scaling ansatz and accurate numerical results are obtained by satisfying the first eight moments of the CBV equation. Except for the lowest lying monopole mode that exhibits a negligible damping…
Under the framework of the semiclassical theory, we investigate the equilibrium-state properties of a spin polarized dipolar Fermi gas through full numerical calculation. We show that the Fermi surfaces in both real and momentum spaces are stretched along the attractive direction of dipolar interaction. We further verify that the deformed Fermi surfaces can be well approximated by ellipsoids. In addition, the deformation parameters slightly depend on the local real- and momentum-space densities. We also study the interaction strength dependence of the energy and real- and momentum-space densit…
Systems with long-range interactions show a variety of intriguing properties: they typically accommodate many meta-stable states, they can give rise to spontaneous formation of supersolids, and they can lead to counterintuitive thermodynamic behavior. However, the increased complexity that comes with long-range interactions strongly hinders theoretical studies. This makes a quantum simulator for long-range models highly desirable. Here, we show that a chain of trapped ions can be used to quantum simulate a one-dimensional model of hard-core bosons with dipolar off-site interaction and tunnelin…
Recently, a seminal STIRAP experiment allowed the creation of 40K-87Rb molecules in the rovibrational ground state [K.-K. Ni et al., Science 322, 231 (2008)]. In order to describe such a polarized dipolar Fermi gas in the hydrodynamic regime, we work out a variational time-dependent Hartree-Fock approach. With this we calculate dynamical properties of such a system as, for instance, the frequencies of the low-lying excitations and the time-of-flight expansion. We find that the dipole-dipole interaction induces anisotropic breathing oscillations in momentum space. In addition, after release fro…
We report on measurements of the dynamics of the collective spin length (total magnetization) and spin populations in an almost unit filled lattice system comprising about 10^4 spin S=3 chromium atoms, under the effect of dipolar interactions. The observed spin population dynamics is unaffected by the use of a spin echo, and fully consistent with numerical simulations of the S=3 XXZ spin model. On the contrary, the observed spin length decays slower than in simulations, and surprisingly reaches a small but nonzero asymptotic value within the longest timescale. Our findings show that spin coher…
We systematically develop a density functional description for the equilibrium properties of a two-dimensional, harmonically trapped, spin-polarized dipolar Fermi gas based on the Thomas-Fermi von Weizsäcker approximation. We pay particular attention to the construction of the two-dimensional kinetic energy functional, where corrections beyond the local density approximation must be motivated with care. We also present an intuitive derivation of the interaction energy functional associated with the dipolar interactions, and provide physical insight into why it can be represented as a local fun…
Motivated by recent experimental advances in creating polar molecular gases in the laboratory, we theoretically investigate the many body effects of two-dimensional dipolar systems with the anisotropic and $1/r^3$ dipole-dipole interactions. We calculate collective modes of 2D dipolar systems, and also consider spatially separated bilayer and multilayer superlattice dipolar systems. We obtain the characteristic features of collective modes in quantum dipolar gases. We quantitatively compare the modes of these dipolar systems with the modes of the extensively studied usual two-dimensional elect…
Roton excitations constitute a key feature of dipolar gases, connecting these gases with superfluid helium. We show that the density dependence of the roton minimum results in a spatial roton confinement, particularly relevant in pancake dipolar condensates with large aspect ratios. We show that roton confinement plays a crucial role in the dynamics after roton instability, and that arresting the instability may create a trapped roton gas revealed by confined density modulations. We discuss the local susceptibility against density perturbations, which we illustrate for the case of vortices. Ro…
We theoretically investigate the ground states and the spectrum of elementary excitations across the superfluid to droplet crystallization transition of an oblate dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate. We systematically identify regimes where spontaneous rotational symmetry breaking leads to the emergence of a supersolid phase with characteristic collective excitations, such as the Higgs amplitude mode. Furthermore, we study the dynamics across the transition and show how these supersolids can be realized with standard protocols in state-of-the-art experiments.
We derive rigorous one- and two-dimensional mean-field equations for cigar- and pancake-shaped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates with arbitrary polarization angle. We show how the dipolar interaction modifies the contact interaction of the strongly confined atoms. In addition, our equations introduce a nonlocal potential, which is anisotropic for pancake-shaped condensates. We propose to observe this anisotropy via measurement of the condensate aspect ratio. We also derive analytically approximate density profiles from our equations. Both the numerical solutions of our reduced mean-field equat…
We explore the phase diagram of a finite-sized dysprosium dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate in a cylindrical harmonic trap. We monitor the final state after the scattering length is lowered from the repulsive BEC regime to the quantum droplet regime. Either an adiabatic transformation between a BEC and a quantum droplet is obtained or, above a critical trap aspect ratio $λ_{\rm c}=1.87(14)$, a modulational instability results in the formation of multiple droplets. This is in full agreement with the predicted structure of the phase diagram with a crossover region below $λ_{\rm c}$ and a multista…
We investigate effects of three-body contact interactions on a trapped dipolar Bose gas at finite temperature using the Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov approximation. We analyze numerically the behavior of the transition temperature and the condensed fraction. Effects of the three-body interactions, anomalous pair correlations and temperature on the collective modes are discussed.
We examine collective modes, stability, and BCS pairing in a quasi-two-dimensional gas of dipolar fermions aligned by an external field. By using the (conserving) Hartree-Fock approximation, which treats direct and exchange interactions on an equal footing, we obtain the spectrum of single-particle excitations and long wavelength collective modes (zero sound) in the normal phase. It appears that exchange interactions result in strong damping of zero sound when the tilting angle between the dipoles and the normal to the plane of confinement is below some critical value. In particular, zero soun…
We study normal modes propagating on top of the stable uniform background in arrays of dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) droplets trapped in a deep optical lattice. Both the on-site mean-field dynamics of the droplets and their displacement due to the repulsive dipole-dipole interactions (DDIs) are taken into account. Dispersion relations for two modes, \textit{viz}., high- and low- frequency counterparts of optical and acoustic phonon modes in condensed matter, are derived analytically and verified by direct simulations, for both cases of the repulsive and attractive contact interactions…
We have measured the effect of dipole-dipole interactions on the frequency of a collective mode of a Bose-Einstein condensate. At relatively large numbers of atoms, the experimental measurements are in good agreement with zero temperature theoretical predictions based on the Thomas Fermi approach. Experimental results obtained for the dipolar shift of a collective mode show a larger dependency to both the trap geometry and the atom number than the ones obtained when measuring the modification of the condensate aspect ratio due to dipolar forces. These findings are in good agreement with simula…
