Breathing Modes and Hidden Symmetry of Trapped Atoms in 2D

Atoms confined in a harmonic potential show universal oscillations in 2D. We point out the connection of these ''breathing'' modes to the presence of a hidden symmetry. The underlying symmetry SO(2,1), i.e. the two dimensional Lorentz group, allows pulsating solutions to be constructed for the interacting quantum system and for the corresponding nonlinear Gross-Pitaevskii equation. We point out how this symmetry can be used as a probe for recently proposed experiments of trapped atoms in 2D.Comment: 4 pages, small changes in title and text, references adde

Spin-3 Chromium Bose-Einstein Condensates

We analyze the physics of spin-3 Bose-Einstein condensates, and in particular the new physics expected in on-going experiments with condensates of Chromium atoms. We first discuss the ground-state properties, which, depending on still unknown Chromium parameters, and for low magnetic fields can present various types of phases. We also discuss the spinor-dynamics in Chromium spinor condensates, which present significant qualitative differences when compared to other spinor condensates. In particular, dipole-induced spin relaxation may lead for low magnetic fields to transfer of spin into angular momentum similar to the well-known Einstein-de Haas effect. Additionally, a rapid large transference of population between distant magnetic states becomes also possible.Comment: 4 pages, 3 eps figures. Error in the previous version correcte

High- and low-frequency phonon modes in dipolar quantum gases trapped in deep lattices

We study normal modes propagating on top of the stable uniform background in arrays of dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) droplets trapped in a deep optical lattice. Both the on-site mean-field dynamics of the droplets and their displacement due to the repulsive dipole-dipole interactions (DDIs) are taken into account. Dispersion relations for two modes, \textit{viz}., high- and low- frequency counterparts of optical and acoustic phonon modes in condensed matter, are derived analytically and verified by direct simulations, for both cases of the repulsive and attractive contact interactions. The (counterpart of the) optical-phonon branch does not exist without the DDIs. These results are relevant in the connection to emerging experimental techniques enabling real-time imaging of the condensate dynamics and direct experimental measurement of phonon dispersion relations in BECs.Comment: Physical Review A, in pres

Trapping atoms on a transparent permanent-magnet atom chip

We describe experiments on trapping of atoms in microscopic magneto-optical traps on an optically transparent permanent-magnet atom chip. The chip is made of magnetically hard ferrite-garnet material deposited on a dielectric substrate. The confining magnetic fields are produced by miniature magnetized patterns recorded in the film by magneto-optical techniques. We trap Rb atoms on these structures by applying three crossed pairs of counter-propagating laser beams in the conventional magneto-optical trapping (MOT) geometry. We demonstrate the flexibility of the concept in creation and in-situ modification of the trapping geometries through several experiments.Comment: Modifications: A) Reference I. Barb et al., Eur. Phys. JD, 35, 75 (2005) added. B)Sentence rewritten: We routinely capture more than 10^6 atoms in a micro-MOT on a magnetized pattern. C) The magnetic field strengths are now given in Teslas. D) The second sentence in the fourth paragraph has been rewritten in order to more clearly describe the geometry and purpose of the compensation coils.E) In the seventh paragraph we have rewritten the sentence about the creation of the external magnetic field for the magnetic-domain patterning. F) In the ninth paragraph, we clarify the way to shift the trap center. G) Caption of Fig. 4 changed. H) We have modified paragraph 12 to improve the description on the guiding of the trap center along a toroidal pattern. I) The last two sentences of the manuscript have been rewritte