Perturbation theory for Bose–Einstein condensates on bounded space domains

Abstract

Bose–Einstein condensates (BECs), first predicted theoretically by Bose and Einstein and finally discovered experimentally in the 1990s, continue to motivate theoretical and experimental physics work. Although experiments on BECs are carried out in bounded space domains, theoretical work in the modelling of BECs often involves solving the Gross–Pitaevskii equation on unbounded domains, as the combination of bounded domains and spatial heterogeneity render most existing analytical approaches ineffective. Motivated by a lack of theory for BECs on bounded domains, we first derive a perturbation theory for both ground and excited stationary states on a given bounded space domain, allowing us to explore the role various forms of the self-interaction, external potential and space domain have on BECs. We are able to show that the shape and curvature of a space domain strongly influence BEC structure, and may be used as control mechanisms in experiments. We next derive a non-autonomous perturbation theory to predict BEC response to temporal changes in an external potential. In certain cases, our approach can be extended to unbounded domains, and we conclude by constructing a perturbation theory for bright solitons within external potentials on unbounded domains.