Stable multi-peak vector solitons in spin–orbit coupled spin-1 polar condensates

Abstract

We demonstrate the formation of multi-peak three-component stationary stripe vector solitons in a quasi-one-dimensional spin–orbit-coupled hyper-fine spin F=1 polar Bose–Einstein condensate. The present investigation is carried out through a numerical solution by imaginary-time propagation and an analytic variational approximation of the underlying mean-field Gross–Pitaevskii equation. Simple analytic results for energy and component densities were found to be in excellent agreement with the numerical results for solitons with more than 100 pronounced maxima and minima. The vector solitons are one of the two types: dark–bright–dark or bright–dark–bright. In the former a maximum density in component Fz=0 at the center is accompanied by a zero in components Fz=±1. The opposite happens in the latter case. The vector solitons are demonstrated to be mobile and dynamically stable. The collision between two such vector solitons is found to be quasi elastic at large velocities with the conservation of total density of each vector soliton. However, at very small velocity, the collision is inelastic with a destruction of the initial vector solitons. It is possible to observe and study the predicted SO-coupled vector solitons in a laboratory.