Philos Trans A Math Phys Eng Sci. 2010 May 13;368(1918):2163-77. doi: 10.1098/rsta.2010.0027.

How to characterize the dynamics of cold atoms in non-dissipative optical lattices?.

Philosophical transactions. Series A, Mathematical, physical, and engineering sciences

D Hennequin, Ph Verkerk

PMID: 20368239 DOI: 10.1098/rsta.2010.0027

Abstract

We examine here the classical dynamics of cold atoms in square optical lattices, i.e. lattices obtained with two orthogonal stationary plane waves. Contrary to many of the past studies in this domain, the potential here is time independent and non-dissipative. We show that, as a function of the experimental parameters, very different behaviours are obtained, both for the dynamics of atoms trapped inside individual sites and for atoms travelling between sites: inside the sites, chaos may be the main regime or, on the contrary, it may be negligible; outside the sites, chaos sometimes coexists with other regimes. We discuss the consequences of these differences on the macroscopic behaviour of the atoms in the lattice, and we propose experimental measurements able to characterize these dynamics and to distinguish between the different cases.

Publication Types

• Journal Article