https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2008-00420-6
Collective excitations of harmonically trapped ideal gases
Instituut voor Theoretische Fysica, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200 D, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
Corresponding author: a achilleas@itf.fys.kuleuven.be
Received:
30
June
2008
Revised:
22
September
2008
Published online:
20
November
2008
We theoretically study the collective excitations of an ideal gas confined in an isotropic harmonic trap. We give an exact solution to the Boltzmann-Vlasov equation; as expected for a single-component system, the associated mode frequencies are integer multiples of the trapping frequency. We show that the expressions found by the scaling ansatz method are a special case of our solution. Our findings are most useful in case the trap contains more than one phase: we demonstrate how to obtain the oscillation frequencies in case an interface is present between the ideal gas and a different phase.
PACS: 03.75.Ss – Degenerate Fermi gases / 03.75.Kk – Dynamic properties of condensates; collective and hydrodynamic excitations, superfluid flow / 67.85.-d – Ultracold gases, trapped gases
© EDP Sciences, Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag, 2008