Management of matter waves in optical lattices by means of the Feshbach resonance

Abstract

The mean-field dynamics of Bose-Einstein condensates loaded in an optical lattice, confined by a parabolic potential, and subjected to a change of scattering length by means of the Feshbach resonance is considered. The system is described by the Gross-Pitaevskii (GP) equation with varying nonlinearity, which in a number of cases is reduced to one-dimensional (1D) perturbed nonlinear Schr\"odinger (NLS) equations, the particular form of which depends on the relation among the parameters of the problem. We analytically describe the adiabatic dynamics of periodic solutions of the respective NLS equations, provide a numerical study of 1D models confined by a parabolic trap, and carry out numerical simulations of the matter-wave dynamics within the framework of the radially symmetric 3D GP equation. Special attention is paid to processes of generation of trains of bright and dark matter solitons from initially periodic waves. The results of the 1D approximation are compared with direct numerical simulation of the original 3D GP eqation, showing remarkable coincidence for definite regions of parameters.