Effective 1D Model Research Articles

Controlling the order of wedge filling transitions: the role of line tension

We study filling phenomena in three-dimensional (3D) wedge geometries paying particular attention to the role played by a line tension associated with the wedge bottom. Our study is based on transfer matrix analysis of an effective 1D model of 3D filling which accounts for the breather-mode excitations of the interfacial height. The transition may be of first-order or continuous (critical) depending on the strength of the line tension associated with the wedge bottom. Exact results are reported for the interfacial properties near filling with both short-ranged (contact) forces and also van der Waals interactions. For sufficiently short-ranged forces we show the lines of critical and first-order filling meet at a tricritical point. This contrasts with the case of dispersion forces for which the lines meet at a critical end-point. Our transfer matrix analysis is compared with generalized random-walk arguments based on a necklace model and is shown to be a thermodynamically consistent description of fluctuation effects at filling. Connections with the predictions of conformal invariance for droplet shapes in wedges are also made.

Velocity of sound in a Bose-Einstein condensate in the presence of an optical lattice and transverse confinement

We study the effect of the transverse degrees of freedom on the velocity of sound in a Bose-Einstein condensate immersed in a one-dimensional optical lattice and radially confined by a harmonic trap. We compare the results of full three-dimensional calculations with those of an effective 1D model based on the equation of state of the condensate. The perfect agreement between the two approaches is demonstrated for several optical lattice depths and throughout the full crossover from the 1D mean-field to the Thomas Fermi regime in the radial direction.

On the modelling of dynamic problems for plates with a periodic structure

The subject of analysis is the bending of elastic plates exhibiting a nonhomogeneous periodic structure and/or a periodically variable thickness in a certain direction parallel to the plate's midplane. The fundamental modelling problem is how to obtain an effective 2D-model of a plate under consideration, i.e., a 2D-model represented by PDEs with constant coefficients. This problem for periodic plates has been solved independently in [5] and [10], using asymptotic homogenization. However, homogenization neglects dynamic phenomena related to the plate's rotational inertia and cannot be applied to the analysis of higher-order vibration frequences. The main aim of this contribution is to formulate a new non-asymptotic effective 2D-model of a periodic plate which is free from the mentioned drawbacks and describes the dynamic behaviour of plates having the thickness of the order of the period length. The proposed model is applied to the analysis of some vibration problems.

Role of transverse excitations in the instability of Bose-Einstein condensates moving in optical lattices

The occurrence of energetic and dynamical instabilities in a Bose-Einstein condensate moving in a one-dimensional (1D) optical lattice is analyzed by means of the Gross-Pitaevskii theory. Results of full 3D calculations are compared with those of an effective 1D model, the nonpolynomial Schrodinger equation, pointing out the role played by transverse degrees of freedom. The instability thresholds are shown to be scarcely affected by transverse excitations, so that they can be accurately predicted by effective 1D models. Conversely, transverse excitations turn out to be important in characterizing the stability diagram and the occurrence of a complex radial dynamics above the threshold for dynamical instability. This analysis provides a realistic framework to discuss the dissipative dynamics observed in recent experiments.

Loss and revival of phase coherence in a Bose–Einstein condensate moving through an optical lattice

We investigate the phase coherence of a trapped Bose–Einstein condensate that undergoes a dynamical superfluid–insulator transition in the presence of a one-dimensional optical lattice. We study the evolution of the condensate after a sudden displacement of the harmonic trapping potential by solving the Gross–Pitaevskii equation, and comparing the results with the prediction of two effective 1D models. We show that, owing to the 3D nature of the system, the breakdown of the superfluid current above a critical displacement is not associated with a sharp transition, but there exists a range of displacements for which the condensate can recover a certain degree of coherence. We also discuss the implications on the interference pattern after the ballistic expansion as measured in recent experiments at LENS.

Search for effective models of stripes in the cuprates

We argue that effective 1D models of stripes in the cuprate superconductors can be constructed by studying ground states and elementary excitations of domain walls in 2D model antiferromagnets. This method, applied to the t-J model with Ising anisotropy, yields two such limiting cases: an ordinary 1D electron gas and a 1D gas of holons strongly coupled to transversal fluctuations of the stripe.