Vortex excitation in a stirred toroidal Bose-Einstein condensate

Abstract

Motivated by a recent experiment [K. C. Wright et al., Phys. Rev. A 88, 063633 (2013)], we investigate the microscopic mechanism for excitation of vortices and formation of a persistent current in an annular BEC stirred by a narrow blue-detuned optical beam. In the framework of a two-dimensional mean-field model, we study the dissipative dynamics of the condensate with parameters that reflect realistic experimental conditions. Vortex-antivortex pairs appear near the center of the stirrer in the bulk of the condensate for slow motion of the stirring beam. When the barrier angular velocity is above some critical value, an outer edge surface mode develops and breaks into the vortices entering the condensate annulus. We determine the conditions for creation of vortex excitations in the stirred toroidal condensate and compare our results with experimental observations.