Published August 15, 2010 | Version v1
Journal article

Two faces of quantum sound

  • 1. Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia (IAA-CSIC), Glorieta de la Astronomia, 18008 Granada (Spain)
  • 2. King's College London, Department of Physics, Strand, London WC2R 2LS (United Kingdom)
  • 3. Instituto de Estructura de la Materia (IEM-CSIC), Serrano 121, 28006 Madrid (Spain)
  • 4. Departamento de Fisica Teorica II, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 28040 Madrid (Spain)
  • 5. Universite de Nice Sophia Antipolis, Laboratoire J.-A. Dieudonne, UMR CNRS-UNS 6621, Parc Valrose, 06108 Nice Cedex 02 (France)

Description

Fluctuations around a Bose-Einstein condensate can be described by means of Bogolubov theory leading to the notion of quasiparticle and antiquasiparticle familiar to nonrelativistic condensed-matter practitioners. On the other hand, we already know that these perturbations evolve according to a relativistic Klein-Gordon equation in the long-wavelength approximation. For shorter wavelengths, we show that this equation acquires nontrivial corrections which modify the Klein-Gordon product. In this approach, quasiparticles can also be defined (up to the standard ambiguities due to observer dependence). We demonstrate that--in the low-energy as well as in the high-energy regimes - both concepts of quasiparticle are actually the same, regardless of the formalism (Bogolubov or Klein-Gordon) used to describe them. These results also apply to any barotropic, inviscid, irrotational fluid, with or without quantum potential. Finally, we illustrate how the quantization of these systems of quasiparticles proceeds by analyzing a stationary configuration containing an acoustic horizon. We show that there are several possible choices of a regular vacuum state, including a regular generalization of the Boulware vacuum. Issues such us Hawking radiation crucially depend on this vacuum choice.

Additional details

Publishing Information

Journal Title
Physical Review. D, Particles Fields
Journal Volume
82
Journal Issue
4
Journal Page Range
p. 044042-044042.12
ISSN
0556-2821
CODEN
PRVDAQ

Optional Information

Notes
(c) 2010 American Institute of Physics