Peter  Schmelcher

Prof. Peter Schmelcher


Research Focus & Metrics

Academic Career Length

24Years (2003-Present)

(Calculated once Scilit publication data is synced: current year − year of first publication + 1)

Representative Publications

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29 January 2008 in Physical Review Letters
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SZSascha Zöllner
Sascha Zöllner
HMHans-Dieter Meyer
Hans-Dieter Meyer
PSPeter Schmelcher
Peter Schmelcher
We investigate few-boson tunneling in a one-dimensional double well, covering the full crossover from weak interactions to the fermionization limit of strong correlations. Based on exact quantum-dynamical calculations, it is found that the tunneling dynamics of two atoms evolves from Rabi oscillations to correlated pair tunneling as we increase the interaction strength. Near the fermionization limit, fragmented-pair tunneling is observed and analyzed in terms of the population imbalance and two-body correlations. For more atoms, the tunneling dynamics near fermionization is shown to be sensitive to both atom number and initial configuration.


23 October 2019 in Molecular Physics
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Journal Article
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CFChristian Fey
Christian Fey
FHFrederic Hummel
Frederic Hummel
PSPeter Schmelcher
Peter Schmelcher
We review ultralong-range Rydberg molecules (ULRMs), which are bound states between a Rydberg atom and one or more ground-state atoms with bond lengths on the order of thousands of Bohr radii. The binding originates from multiple electron-atom scattering and leads to exotic oscillatory potential energy surfaces that reflect the probability density of the Rydberg electron. This unconventional binding mechanism opens fascinating possibilities to tune molecular properties via weak external fields, to study spin-resolved low-energy electron-atom scattering as well as to control and to probe interatomic forces in few- and many-body systems. Here, we provide an overview on recent theoretical and experimental progress in the field with an emphasis on polyatomic ULRMs, field control and spin interactions.

10 September 2021 in Physical Review Letters
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KKK. Kwon
K. Kwon
KMKoushik Mukherjee
Koushik Mukherjee
SHS. J. Huh
S. J. Huh
KKK. Kim
K. Kim
SMSimeon Mistakidis
Simeon Mistakidis
JCJ.-Y. Choi
J.-Y. Choi
We observe experimentally the spontaneous formation of star-shaped surface patterns in driven Bose-Einstein condensates. Two-dimensional star-shaped patterns with l-fold symmetry, ranging from quadrupole (l=2) to heptagon modes (l=7), are parametrically excited by modulating the scattering length near the Feshbach resonance. An effective Mathieu equation and Floquet analysis are utilized, relating the instability conditions to the dispersion of the surface modes in a trapped superfluid. Identifying the resonant frequencies of the patterns, we precisely measure the dispersion relation of the collective excitations. The oscillation amplitude of the surface excitations increases exponentially during the modulation. We find that only the l=6 mode is unstable due to its emergent coupling with the dipole motion of the cloud. Our experimental results are in excellent agreement with the mean-field framework. Our work opens a new pathway for generating higher-lying collective excitations with applications, such as the probing of exotic properties of quantum fluids and providing a generation mechanism of quantum turbulence.

2 October 2013 in Physical Review A
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RSRüdiger Schmitz
Rüdiger Schmitz
SKSven Krönke
Sven Krönke
LCLushuai Cao
Lushuai Cao
PSPeter Schmelcher
Peter Schmelcher
Following a ``bottom-up approach'' in understanding many-particle effects and dynamics we provide a systematic ab initio study of the dependence of the breathing dynamics of ultracold bosons in a one-dimensional (1D) harmonic trap on the number of bosons ranging from few to many. To this end, we employ the multilayer multiconfiguration time-dependent Hartree method for bosons (ML-MCTDHB) which has been developed very recently [Kr\"onke, Cao, Vendrell, and Schmelcher, New J. Phys. 15, 063018 (2013)]. The beating behavior for two bosons is found numerically and consequently explained by an analytical approach. Drawing on this, we show how to compute the complete breathing mode spectrum in this case. We examine how the two-mode breathing behavior of two bosons evolves to the single-frequency behavior of the many-particle limit when adding more particles. In the limit of many particles, we numerically study the dependence of the breathing mode frequency on both the interaction strength as well as on the particle number. We provide an estimate for the parameter region where the mean-field description provides a valid approximation.

8 August 2017 in Physical Review Letters
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JSJ. M. Schurer
J. M. Schurer
ANA. Negretti
A. Negretti
PSPeter Schmelcher
Peter Schmelcher
We present an in-depth many-body investigation of the so-called mesoscopic molecular ions that can buildup when an ion is immersed into an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate in one dimension. To this end, we employ the multilayer multiconfiguration time-dependent Hartree method for mixtures of ultracold bosonic species for solving the underlying many-body Schrödinger equation. This enables us to unravel the actual structure of such massive charged molecules from a microscopic perspective. Laying out their phase diagram with respect to atom number and interatomic interaction strength, we determine the maximal number of atoms bound to the ion and reveal spatial densities and molecular properties. Interestingly, we observe a strong interaction-induced localization, especially for the ion, that we explain by the generation of a large effective mass, similarly to ions in liquid Helium. Finally, we predict the dynamical response of the ion to small perturbations. Our results provide clear evidence for the importance of quantum correlations, as we demonstrate by benchmarking them with wave function ansatz classes employed in the literature.