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Excitation spectrum of vortex lattices in rotating Bose-Einstein condensates

S. Choi, L. O. Baksmaty, S. J. Woo, and N. P. Bigelow
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York 14627, USA Received 21 June 2003; published 29 September 2003 Using the coarse-grain averaged hydrodynamic approach, we calculate the excitation spectrum of vortex lattices sustained in rotating Bose-Einstein condensates. The spectrum gives the frequencies of the commonmode longitudinal waves in the hydrodynamic regime, including those of the higher-order compressional modes. Reasonable agreement with the measurements taken in a recent experiment is found, suggesting that one of the longitudinal modes reported in the experiment is likely to be the n 2,m 0 mode. DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.68.031605 PACS number s : 03.75.Kk, 03.75.Lm

Quantized vortices constitute one of the major topics in the study of Bose-Einstein condensates BECs 1 . Following the demonstration of the nucleation of quantized vortices in BECs 2 , vortex lattices have since been produced experimentally 3,4 . Very recently, both the transverse Tkachenko and the longitudinal hydrodynamic excitations of the vortex lattices have been observed at JILA 5 . The transverse modes are the elastic excitations of the vortex lattice, while the longitudinal modes are macroscopic oscillations of the bulk uid in the Thomas-Fermi regime. Vortex lattices in type-II superconductors and in superuid 4 He have been studied extensively in the past, resulting in a large number of important theoretical studies 6,7 . Theoretical investigations of the new BEC vortex lattices have also been gaining momentum 8,9 . In particular, Anglin and Crescimanno have studied the long-wavelength transverse Tkachenko excitations for a dense vortex lattice at slow rotation taking full account of the nite geometry 10 , while Baym 11 has calculated the frequencies of Tkachenko waves at general rotation speeds up to the mean-eld quantum Hall regime, with the calculated frequencies in good agreement with the observations at JILA. In addition, Cozzini, Chevy, and Stringari have recently studied the hydrodynamic excitations of the surface, scissors, and Kelvin modes 12 . In this paper we calculate the frequencies of the longitudinal excitations of vortex lattices by following the procedure used by Svidzinsky and Fetter to study low-lying modes of a single vortex line in BECs 13 . This enables us to write the excitation frequencies in terms of the frequencies of a vortex-free condensate, and as a corollary we are able to estimate the frequencies of the higher-order compressional modes as well as the surface excitations. Although a vortex lattice is signicantly more complicated than a single vortex, the concept of diffused vorticity, v 2 , of a vortex lattice provides an effective coarsegrain averaged description that greatly simplies the formalism by smoothing out the effect of individual vortices 7,14 . The density of vortex lines per unit surface is n 2 /k, where is the angular velocity of the containing vessel and k h/M is the circulation. From the area per vorb 2 , one may dene the intervortex separation tex, n 1 /M , which provides a characteristic length scale for b 1/ 8 na, where n the vortex lattice. The healing length is the density of the gas and a is the s-wave scattering length, provides an estimate of the size of the vortex core. The func1050-2947/2003/68 3 /031605 4 /$20.00

tional dependence of n on implies that the vortex lines rotate with the containing vessel. With the self-consistent rotation in place, it has been observed that the condensate essentially takes on a pancake geometry, closely approximating a two-dimensional 2D system with vortex lines vertical except right at the surface 5 ; we therefore consider a 2D BEC in this paper. The free energy in the rotating frame can be written in the following form 9 :
2

dV
1 2

2M

V trap r
2
1 2

1 2

g ,

M v vsb

2 2

where V trap (r) is the harmonic conning potential of the 1 2 form V trap (r) 2 M trap r 2 and g 4 a 2 /M is the interparticle coupling constant. vsb denotes the velocity of solid1 2 2 r; r represents an effecbody rotation, vsb 2M tive repulsive centrifugal potential. From the Gross-Pitaevskii equation GPE associated with the free energy, one can write the Thomas-Fermi TF prole (0) 2 2 2 for the vortex lattice as TF (r) TF (r) u (r) where (0) 2 is the TF density in the absence of a vortex lattice, TF
(0) TF 2

2 trap

r2

and u 2 (r) 1 M (v vsb ) 2 /(2 ), with the chemical po2 /( trap ) 2 where 0 is tential in 2D given as 0 1 the chemical potential in the absence of rotation. u 2 (r) provides the periodic vortex lattice structure; in any given unit cell of the vortex lattice, assuming a circular Wigner-Seitz 2 2 cell, u 2 (r) has the local form u 2 ( r) 1 /r 2 2 /b 2 2 2 4 r /b , where r b 9,15 . In the dense vortex limit b, i.e., the case of large condensate with many vortices, one may approximate u 2 1. The diffused vorticity approximation for the velocity eld works well in this small vortex core limit, since the deviation of the velocity eld from that of the solid-body rotation occurs mainly near the vortex cores. We therefore write the TF prole with vortex (0) 2 2 lattice as TF (r) TF (r) , Eq. 2 . It is noted that the net effect of a vortex lattice is as if the trapping potential has
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been modied by that with an -dependent spring constant. b also implies a regime in which phonon The assumption velocities are large in relation to the rotation frequency . Using the GPE under the zero-temperature approximation, one can write the corresponding hydrodynamic equations of motion with the substitution nexp iS(r) , where 2 , and S is the n is the condensate particle density, n condensate phase from which the condensate velocity is dened v S(r)/M . The resulting hydrodynamic equations in the TF approximation in which the quantum pressure term of the form ( 2 /2m n) 2 n is ignored are the well-known continuity and Euler equations of uid dynamics 16 . When transformed to the rotating frame, the equations take the form 7 n nv 0, 3 t M v t Mv 1 M v 2 V trap r 2 2 v gn

modes are proportional to e im : n exp(im ), exp(im ). Integrating Eq. 8 with respect to r, we then get i n i i 1 rn 0 r r g n M g n M n 0m 2 r 1 r r r2 dr, . , 10 11 12

2 im 2 r im

1 M 2 r2 , 4 2 is the chemical potential and the terms M v 2 where 1 and 2 M 2 r2 provide, respectively, the Coriolis and the centrifugal forces experienced by the uid. These force terms vanish in the nonrotating frame. Writing n n 0 n and v v0 v where n 0 and v0 are the equilibrium values, we linearize these hydrodynamic equations to determine the harmonic uctuations in the particle density n e i t and the velocity v e i t . Under the diffused vorticity approximation the equilibrium velocity eld in the laboratory frame is that of the solid-body rotation; in the corotating frame the equilibrium velocity eld is static v0 0 and the equilibrium density is given from Eq. 4 1 2 2 2 )r . by gn 0 2 M ( trap Following the steps in Ref. 16 , the linearized equations for n and v are 5 i n n 0 v , i v g n M 2 v , 6

, Equating the time derivatives of the velocity potential (1/r) dr from Eqs. 11 and 12 , one gets where we have used the notation n / r n (r/m 2 ) r n 2 2 r . This may be rewritten as a Cauchy equation r r 2 ( ) r r m 0 with a solution c exp(m ln r) c( )exp( m ln r), where c ( ) and c ( ) are arbitrary congives the vestants. The derivative with respect to r of (m/r) c ( ) exp(m ln r) locity in the radial direction r c( )exp( m ln r) , and since the radial velocity cannot diverge as r0, c ( ) 0 for m 0, and c ( ) 0 for m 0. (m/r)c ( ) exp( m ln r) (m/r) This gives r where we have explicitly specied the existence of the positive and negative m values. The equation obeyed by the veconsistent with the assumptions that we locity potential have made is, nally, i g n M 2i . 13

Rearranging Eq. 13 and substituting in Eq. 10 , one obtains n g 1 rn 0 M r r r m2 r2 n 0n 2 n 0. 14

We now introduce the dimensionless units / trap , r r/R , where R 2 2 /M ( Making the substitutions in Eq. 14 , we get 1 2 m2 r
2 2 2

trap , 2 2 ). trap

1 r

n
2

1 r

r
2

3r

n r n 0. 15

where we have used the fact that velocity uctuations are irrotational, v 0. Equations 5 and 6 may be written in terms of the veas follows: locity components v r and v of v v r r v i n n0 v r r i vr n0
vr

1 r

1 v r

g n M r g 1 n M r

2 v ,

i v

2 vr .

where v , and We introduce the velocity potential assume that, in our coarse-grained description, the normal

In order to calculate the eigenvalues, the positiondependent density uctuation n (r) needs to be specied. The real-space representation for the excitation of a vortexfree 2D condensate in the hydrodynamic regime, which we shall denote as n 0 (r), has a functional form n 0 r m P ( m ,0) (1 2r 2 ) where P (a,b) (x) is a Jacobi polynon n mial of the order of n and the scaled position variable r 2 r/R 0 , with R 0 2 0 /M trap 17 . Since n n 0 as 0, i.e., the wave function n should tend to that for the vortex-free case as the rotational frequency tends to zero, and assuming the net effect of a coarse-grain averaged vortex lattice on the wave functions to be a modication of the

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effective trapping potential similar to Eq. 2 for the TF ground state, we shall use as our ansatz that n (r ) r m P ( m ,0) (1 2r 2 ). n The equation obeyed by n 0 is known to be 1 2
2

1 r

n0
2

1 r

r
0 2

3r

n0 r

m2 r
2

1 r

n0 16

n 0 0,

0 with the eigenvalues given by ( mn ) 2 m 2n(n m 1) 17 . With our ansatz for n (r ), the expectation value of Eq. 15 implies

2n n

17
FIG. 1. Excitation spectrum, vs m. The excitation frequency is given in units of the trap frequency tra p . Points with the same radial quantum numbers n are joined by a solid line. The top graph is for 0, i.e., in the absence of rotation and hence no vortex lattice; the bottom graph is for a rotating condensate with 0.25 tra p .

which may be solved to give the eigenfrequencies for the vortex lattice of a 2D BEC in the rotating frame:
n, m

2n n

. 18

The solution indicates that energy degeneracy is removed for all m in the rotating frame, with the frequency separation of 2 . By calculating the spectrum in the rotating frame, the excitation energy is given relative to the metastable ground state of rotating vortex lattice. As to be expected, the spectrum reduces to the well-known result for a vortex-free BEC 0. One may also proceed in the laboratory frame for as comparison with experiments; the corresponding rotational hydrodynamic equations in the laboratory frame are given by Eqs. 3 and 4 but with the right-hand side of Eq. 4 having only the M v ( v) term, and v denoting the velocity eld in the laboratory frame. Following through with the calculation one obtains the spectrum in the laboratory frame:
n, m

2n n .

m 1

19

This is as expected since the free energy in the rotating frame, F, is related to the energy in the laboratory frame, H, where L z r p is the z-component via F H L z angular-momentum operator. The frequency of the m 0 modes is identical in both the rotating and nonrotating frames, and energy degeneracy is restored for the m 1 modes in the laboratory frame. It should be noted that, due to the nature of the hydrodynamic calculation, the frequencies predicted by Eq. 19 correspond to those of the commonmode longitudinal wave of the vortex lattice rather than the transverse Tkachenko waves. Also the Kelvin modes, i.e., modes along the vortex lines are not included in the spectrum. It is straightforward to see from Eq. 19 that one can write for the surface (n 0) modes 0, m m ( m 1) 2 (m 1) , in agreement with the result of Ref. 12 . In particular, the dipole or the center-of, and the quadrupole mass mode gives 0, 1 1 for all 2 2 which accurately predicts mode gives 0, 2 the experimental value of the quadrupole (n 0,m 2) excitations 4 . In Ref. 5 , experimental measurements of the frequencies

of the common-mode longitudinal waves have been reported for the condensate rotating at 0.95. Of the three distinct m 0 modes that have been observed, the nature of the two of the modes have been identied while the third mode could not be classied conclusively. The two modes that could be identied were the Tkachenko s-bend mode at and a radial breathing mode at (2.0 0.072 trap /2 0.1) trap /2 . The third mode, which was presumed likely to be another longitudinal mode, was found to occur at 0.95, one of the frequencies (2.2 0.1) trap /2 . For predicted by Eq. 19 for the n 1,m 0 radial breathing mode is 1,0 2.09 while the frequency for the n 2,m 0 mode is predicted to be 2,0 2.39. These values differ from the reported experimental values by 5% and 7%, respectively, or even less when the experimental error bars are taken into account. We believe therefore that the third m 0 mode observed in Ref. 5 is the n 2,m 0 compres-

FIG. 2. Fractional shift in the squared frequency as a function of the rotation frequency for n 0,1,2 and m 0, 1, 2. The rotation frequency is given in units of the trap frequency tra p . The three panels give the plots for different n. The corresponding values of m for each curve are indicated in the gure.

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sional mode. A further numerical simulation based on the Bogoliubovde Gennes equations 18 indicates that this 2,0 bulk mode displays a fast bending motion of the lattice as reported in Ref. 5 .

vs m, is presented in Fig. 1 for The dispersion curve, 0,0.25, n 0,1,2, and m: m 0, 1, 2, . . . , 10 in the laboratory frame. In addition, it is convenient to dene the fractional shift of the squared frequency:

2 0 2

0 2 2

2 m 1

2n n m

1 1 2n n m

m 1

20

The fractional shift as a function of the rotation frequency in , for n 0,1,2 and m 0, 1, 2 is the laboratory frame, presented in Fig. 2. In summary, we have presented the excitation frequencies of the hydrodynamic shape oscillations in a BEC supporting a vortex lattice. The methodology we used is similar to that originally applied by Svidzinsky and Fetter 13 for the single-vortex excitations; our result may therefore be viewed as an application of their result to the case of vortex lattices. The most pronounced effect of the presence of a vortex lattice is clearly the dependence of the excitation spectrum. It is noted that the hydrodynamic uctuations may also be written in terms of the amplitudes u and v of the Bogoliubov 2 *u ( /2M i )( * u equations, as n v and v ), and the linearized Euler and the continuity equations may be derived from the equivalent GPE 13 . The equations derived in this paper are general; the approximations that we have made in order to model a vortex lattice, and also to solve the equations, are in the uid veloc-

ity eld and the TF density proles of the ground and the excited states. By rening each of these three approximations one may expect to improve on the result obtained. For instance, it should be noted that, although the TF density is rotationally symmetric, a real vortex lattice state is not strictly an eigenstate of L z . In fact, the only vortex state which is an angular-momentum eigenstate is the case of a single vortex at the symmetry axis, and if the single vortex is moved off-axis it gives a value of L z which is not an integer 19 . It is noted that our analytical result, Eq. 19 , still holds for noninteger values of m since the Jacobi polynomials 1, and P (a,b) (x) are well dened for all values of a,b n a m and b 0 in our ansatz for n . The excitation spectra presented in Fig. 1 would therefore be modied accordingly when all such renements are taken into account. As is, our solutions are best applicable to low-energy excitations of a large condensate with small . This work was supported by NSF, DOE, ONR, ARO, and the University of Rochester.

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