Effect of anharmonicities in the critical number of trapped condensed atoms with attractive two-body interaction

TL;DR

This paper investigates how small anharmonic modifications to the trapping potential influence the maximum number of particles and other static properties in a Bose-Einstein condensate with attractive interactions, providing quantitative insights.

Contribution

It offers a quantitative analysis of anharmonic effects on the critical number of trapped condensate atoms with attractive interactions, extending previous models to include cubic and quartic potential terms.

Findings

Anharmonicities can significantly alter the maximum number of condensate particles.

The study provides a method to estimate anharmonic effects for various trap geometries.

Results are applicable to experimental setups with small potential deviations.

Abstract

We determine the quantitative effect, in the maximum number of particles and other static observables, due to small anharmonic terms added to the confining potential of an atomic condensed system with negative two-body interaction. As an example of how a cubic or quartic anharmonic term can affect the maximum number of particles, we consider the trap parameters and the results given by Roberts et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 86, 4211 (2001)]. However, this study can be easily transferred to other trap geometries to estimate anharmonic effects.