Hydrodynamic Decay of Decorated Quantum Vortex Rings

Abstract

The decay of quantum vortex rings in counterflow regimes, visualized in Helium II with the help of solid hydrogen particles trapped to their cores, has been a puzzling issue within the usual description of superfluid vortex dynamics, grounded on the hypothesis that a vortex filament is, effectively, an extended massless object subject to a canceling superposition of Magnus and mutual friction forces. We discuss, from a general energy-budget point of view, a phenomenological solution of this problem, which relies on viscous and quantum dissipation mechanisms, the later associated to the backreaction of vortex singular structures on the surrounding two-component fluid mixture.