Stationary states and rotational properties of spin–orbit-coupled Bose–Einstein condensates held under a toroidal trap

Abstract

We consider a pseudospin-1/2 Bose–Einstein condensate with Rashba spin–orbit coupling in a two-dimensional toroidal trap. By solving the damped Gross–Pitaevskii equations for this system, we show that the system exhibits a rich variety of stationary states, such as vehicle wheel and flower-petal stripe patterns. These stationary states are stable against perturbation with thermal energy and can survive for a long time. In the presence of rotation, our results show that the rotating systems have exotic vortex configurations. These phenomenon originates from the interplay among spin–orbit coupling, trap geometry, and rotation.