Two atoms in a harmonic trap with spin-orbital-angular-momentum coupling

Abstract

We study the problem of two harmonically trapped atoms in the presence of spin-orbital-angular-momentum (SOAM) coupling. The two-body energy spectrum is numerically calculated by utilizing the exact diagonalization method. We analyze how the degeneracy of energy levels is lifted under the interplay between the interatomic interaction and SOAM coupling. The exact numerical results show excellent agreement with that of perturbation theory in the weak-interaction limit as well as that in the absence of SOAM coupling. The properties of correlations between the two atoms are also discussed with respect to the interaction strength. The findings in this paper may provide valuable insights into few-body physics subjected to SOAM coupling and the possible experimental detection of spectrum functions in many-body systems, such as radiofrequency spectroscopy.