ABSTRACT
We study the normal modes of a two-dimensional rotating Bose-Einstein condensate confined in a quadratic plus quartic trap. Hydrodynamic theory and sum rules are used to derive analytical predictions for the collective frequencies in the limit of high angular velocities Omega where the vortex lattice produced by the rotation exhibits an annular structure. We predict a class of excitations with frequency sqrt[6]Omega in the rotating frame, irrespective of the mode multipolarity m, as well as a class of low energy modes with frequency proportional to |m|/Omega. The predictions are in good agreement with results of numerical simulations based on the 2D Gross-Pitaevskii equation. The same analysis is also carried out at even higher angular velocities, where the system enters the giant vortex regime.
ABSTRACT
The dynamics of vortices in trapped Bose-Einstein condensates are investigated both analytically and numerically. In axially symmetric traps, the critical rotation frequency for metastability of an isolated vortex coincides with the largest vortex precession frequency (or anomalous mode) in the Bogoliubov excitation spectrum. The number of anomalous modes increases for an elongated condensate. The largest mode frequency exceeds the thermodynamic critical frequency and the nucleation frequency at which vortices are created dynamically. Thus, anomalous modes describe both vortex precession and the critical rotation frequency for creation of the first vortex in an elongated condensate.
ABSTRACT
Based on the method of matched asymptotic expansions and on a time-dependent variational analysis, we study the dynamics of a vortex in a three-dimensional disk-shaped nonaxisymmetric condensate in the Thomas-Fermi limit. Both methods show that a vortex in a trapped Bose-Einstein condensate has formally unstable normal mode(s) with positive normalization and negative frequency, corresponding to a precession of the vortex line around the center of the trap. In a rotating trap, the solution becomes stable above an angular velocity Omega(m), characterizing the onset of metastability with respect to small transverse displacements of the vortex from the central axis.
