Vortex dynamics in superfluids governed by an interacting gauge theory

Abstract

We study the dynamics of a vortex in a quasi two-dimensional Bose gas consisting of light-matter coupled atoms forming two-component pseudo spins. The gas is subject to a density dependent gauge potential, hence governed by an interacting gauge theory, which stems from a collisionally induced detuning between the incident laser frequency and the atomic energy levels. This provides a back-action between the synthetic gauge potential and the matter field. A Lagrangian approach is used to derive an expression for the force acting on a vortex in such a gas. We discuss the similarities between this force and the one predicted by Iordanskii, Lifshitz and Pitaevskii when scattering between a superfluid vortex and the thermal component is taken into account.

Keywords

• superfluids
• quantised vortices
• synthetic gauge fields