Superfluidity and Critical Velocities in Nonequilibrium Bose-Einstein Condensates

Year: 2010

Authors: Wouters M., Carusotto I.

Autors Affiliation: Institute of Theoretical Physics, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland;
INO-CNR BEC Center and Dipartimento di Fisica, Universita` di Trento, I-38123 Povo, Italy

Abstract: We theoretically study the superfluidity properties of a nonequilibrium Bose-Einstein condensate of exciton polaritons in a semiconductor microcavity under incoherent pumping. The dynamics of the condensate is described at mean-field level in terms of a generalized Gross-Pitaevskii equation. The drag force on a small moving object and the onset of fringes in the density profile are shown to have a sharp threshold as a function of the velocity; a generalized Landau criterion is developed to explain this behavior in terms of the dispersion of elementary excitations. Metastability of supercurrents in multiply-connected geometries is shown to persist up to higher flow speeds.

Journal/Review: PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS

Volume: 105 (2)      Pages from: 20602-1  to: 20602-4

KeyWords: Semiconductor Microcavities; Polariton Condensate; Quantized Vortices
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.105.020602

Citations: 109
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