Probing surface states with many-body wave packet scattering

TL;DR

This paper explores how many-body wave packet scattering can be used to probe and manipulate surface states in a 1D system, revealing the effects of interactions on bound states and their topological properties.

Contribution

It introduces a method to use matter wave solitons for probing surface states and demonstrates how interactions renormalize these states, enabling new ways to study topological features.

Findings

Interactions can transform virtual states into bound states.

Adiabatic switching off interactions reveals true noninteracting states.

Numerical results suggest experimental feasibility in 3D regimes.

Abstract

The scattering of 1D matter wave bright solitons on attractive potentials enables one to populate bound states, a feature impossible with noninteracting wave packets. Compared to noninteracting states, the populated states are renormalized by the attractive interactions between atoms and keep the same topology. This renormalization can even transform a virtual state into a bound state. By switching off adiabatically the interactions, the trapped wave packets converge towards the true noninteracting bound states. Our numerical studies show how such scattering experiments can reveal and characterize the surface states of a periodic structure whose translational invariance has been broken. We provide evidence that the corresponding 3D regime should be accessible with current techniques.