Ultracold atomic gases have been used extensively in recent years to realize textbook examples of condensed matter phenomena. Recently, phase transitions to ordered structures have been predicted for gases of highly excited, "frozen" Rydberg atoms. Such Rydberg crystals are a model for dilute metallic solids with tunable lattice parameters, and provide access to a wide variety of fundamental phenomena. We investigate theoretically how such structures can be created in four distinct cold atomic systems, by using tailored laser-excitation in the presence of strong Rydberg-Rydberg interactions. We study in detail the experimental requirements and limitations for these systems, and characterize the basic properties of small crystalline Rydberg structures in one, two and three dimensions.
We present a comprehensive theoretical study of vortex lattice formation in atomic Bose-Einstein condensates confined by a rotating elliptical trap. We consider rotating solutions of the classical hydrodynamic equations, their response to perturbations, as well as time-dependent simulations. We discriminate three distinct, experimentally testable, regimes of instability: ripple, interbranch, and catastrophic. Under symmetry-breaking perturbations these instabilities lead to lattice formation even at zero temperature. While our results are consistent with previous theoretical and experimental results, they shed new light on lattice formation.
We calculate the hydrodynamic solutions for a dilute Bose-Einstein condensate
with long-range dipolar interactions in a rotating, elliptical harmonic trap,
and analyse their dynamical stability. The static solutions and their regimes
of instability vary non-trivially on the strength of the dipolar interactions.
We comprehensively map out this behaviour, and in particular examine the
experimental routes towards unstable dynamics, which, in analogy to
conventional condensates, may lead to vortex lattice formation. Furthermore, we
analyse the centre of mass and breathing modes of a rotating dipolar
condensate.Comment: 4 pages, including 2 figure
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