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Title: Impurity Crystal in a Bose-Einstein Condensate

Journal Article · · Physical Review Letters
 [1];  [2]
  1. Theoretical Division and Center for Nonlinear Studies, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545 (United States)
  2. Laboratoire de Physique Statistique, CNRS-Ecole normale superieure, 24 rue Lhomond, 75005 Paris (France)

We investigate the behavior of impurity fields immersed in a larger condensate field in various dimensions. We discuss the localization of a single impurity field within a condensate and note the effects of surface energy. We derive the functional form of the attractive condensate-mediated interaction between two impurities. Generalizing the analysis to N impurity fields, we show that within various parameter regimes a crystal of impurity fields can form spontaneously in the condensate. Finally, the system of condensate and crystallized impurity structure is shown to have nonclassical rotational inertia, which is characteristic of superfluidity; i.e., the system can be seen to exhibit supersolid behavior.

OSTI ID:
21180122
Journal Information:
Physical Review Letters, Vol. 102, Issue 2; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.102.025301; (c) 2009 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0031-9007
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English