Tunneling in the self-trapped regime of a two-well BEC

TL;DR

This paper develops a Bohr-Sommerfeld quantization method to accurately estimate tunneling frequencies in a Bose-Einstein condensate dimer, highlighting its importance in dissipative systems and experimental observation.

Contribution

It introduces closed-form tunneling frequency approximations for the BEC dimer using a Bohr-Sommerfeld approach, improving accuracy over previous methods.

Findings

Derived more accurate tunneling frequency formulas.

Highlighted the role of tunneling in dissipative BEC systems.

Discussed experimental prospects for observing tunneling.

Abstract

Starting from a mean-field model of the Bose-Einstein condensate dimer, we reintroduce classically forbidden tunneling through a Bohr-Sommerfeld quantization approach. We find closed-form approximations to the tunneling frequency more accurate than those previously obtained using different techniques. We discuss the central role that tunneling in the self-trapped regime plays in a quantitatively accurate model of a dissipative dimer leaking atoms to the environment. Finally, we describe the prospects of experimental observation of tunneling in the self-trapped regime, both with and without dissipation.