Dynamics of Bloch Oscillations in Disordered Lattice Potentials

TL;DR

This paper investigates how disorder and interactions affect Bloch oscillations in Bose-Einstein condensates within lattice potentials, revealing complex damping behaviors that can be observed experimentally.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the interplay between disorder and interactions on Bloch oscillations, highlighting novel damping mechanisms.

Findings

Disorder causes dephasing and damping of oscillations.

Interactions can both enhance and reduce damping.

Damping behaviors depend on interaction strength and disorder.

Abstract

We present a detailed analysis of the dynamics of Bloch oscillations of Bose-Einstein condensates in disordered lattice potentials. Due to the disorder and the interparticle interactions these oscillations undergo a dephasing, reflected in a damping of the center of mass oscillations, which should be observable under realistic experimental conditions. The interplay between interactions and disorder is far from trivial, ranging from an interaction-enhanced damping due to modulational instability for strong interactions, to an interaction-reduced damping due to a dynamical screening of the disorder potential.