Vortex arrays in nanoscopic superfluid helium droplets

Abstract

We have studied the appearance of vortex arrays in a rotating helium-4 nanodroplet at zero temperature within density functional theory. Our results are compared with those for classical rotating fluid drops used to analyze the shape and vorticity in recent experiments [L.F. Gomez et al., Science 345, 906 (2014)], where vortices have been directly seen in superfluid droplets for the first time. In agreement with the experiments, we have found that the shape of the droplet changes from pseudo-spheroid, oblate-like for a small number of vortices to a peculiar "wheel-like" shape, delimited by nearly flat upper and lower surfaces, when the number of vortices is large. Also in agreement with the experiments, we have found that the droplet remains stable well above the stability limit predicted by classical theories.

5 pages, 5 figures

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• Polygonal excitations of spinning and levitating droplets
• Freezing of He-4 and its liquid-solid interface from Density Functional Theory
• Pinning of quantized vortices in helium drop by dopant atoms and molecules
• Energetics and Possible Formation and Decay Mechanisms of Vortices in Helium Nanodroplets
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• Vortex arrays in a rotating superfluid He-4 nanocylinder
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Cited by in corpus (18)

• Cold Physics and Chemistry: Collisions, Ionization and Reactions inside Helium Nanodroplets Close to Zero K
• Density Functional Theory of doped superfluid liquid helium and nanodroplets
• Vortices in self-bound dipolar droplets
• Coherent diffractive imaging of single helium nanodroplets with a high harmonic generation source
• Three-Dimensional Shapes of Spinning Helium Nanodroplets
• Angular momentum in rotating superfluid droplets
• Spinning superfluid helium-4 nanodroplets
• Shapes of rotating normal fluid 3He versus superfluid 4He droplets in molecular beams
• Vortices in quantum droplets of heteronuclear Bose mixtures
• Inelastic scattering of xenon atoms by quantized vortices in superfluids
• Static and dynamic properties of heavily doped quantum vortices
• Kohn-Sham theory of rotating dipolar Fermi gas in two dimensions
• Diffraction imaging of light induced dynamics in xenon-doped helium nanodroplets
• Coexistence of vortex arrays and surface capillary waves in spinning prolate superfluid He-4 nanodroplets
• Rotating He-3 droplets
• Theoretical framework bridging classical and quantum mechanics for the dynamics of cryogenic liquid helium-4 using smoothed-particle hydrodynamics
• Pair interactions of heavy vortices in quantum fluids
• Rotating mixed ${}^3$He-${}^4$He nanodroplets