2007/01/31 by Gentaro Watanabe, C. J. Pethick · 3 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Cold Atom Physics and Bose-Einstein Condensates #Quantum, superfluid, helium dynamics #Strong Light-Matter Interactions #cond-mat.mes-hall #nucl-th #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physreva.76.021605
published as Phys. Rev. A 76, 021605(R) (2007) · 5 pages, 5 figures; published in Phys. Rev. A, Rapid Communications
openalex publication_date 2007/08/28 · arxiv created 2007/09/04 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
We study the quantum dynamics of a model for a vortex in a Bose gas with repulsive interactions in an anisotropic, harmonic trap. By solving the Schr"odinger equation numerically, we show that the circulation of the vortex can undergo periodic reversals by quantum-mechanical tunneling. With increasing interaction strength or particle number, vortices become increasingly stable, and the period for reversals increases. Tunneling between vortex and antivortex states is shown to be described to a good approximation by a superposition of vortex and antivortex states (Schr"odinger cat state), rather than the mean-field state, and we derive an analytical expression for the oscillation period. The problem is shown to be equivalent to that of the two-site Bose-Hubbard model with attractive interactions.