Matter wave solitons at finite temperatures

TL;DR

This paper investigates how dark solitons in elongated Bose-Einstein condensates decay at finite temperatures, revealing that they decay quickly even at low temperatures, with decay rates increasing as temperature rises.

Contribution

It combines coupled Gross-Pitaevskii and N-body simulations to analyze finite temperature effects on soliton dynamics in BECs, providing new insights into thermal dissipation.

Findings

Dark solitons decay rapidly at low temperatures.

Decay rate increases with temperature.

Thermal cloud significantly influences soliton stability.

Abstract

We consider the dynamics of a dark soliton in an elongated harmonically trapped Bose-Einstein condensate. A central question concerns the behavior at finite temperatures, where dissipation arises due to the presence of a thermal cloud. We study this problem using coupled Gross-Pitaevskii and $N$-body simulations, which include the mean field coupling between the condensate and thermal cloud. We find that the soliton decays relatively quickly even at very low temperatures, with the decay rate increasing with rising temperature.