Reference frame-independent model of a collective excitation atom interferometer

Abstract

We theoretically analyze the operating principles of a proposed matter-wave Sagnac interferometer utilizing Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) phonon modes as an interference medium. Previous work found that the orbital angular momentum phonon modes of a ring-trapped BEC are split in frequency by rotations, leading to a measurable rotation signal. We develop an alternate description in which an imbalance in the counter-propagating modes' amplitudes (populations) is induced by the rotation of the system during condensation. This description gives analytic forms for the interferometric phase shift in 1D and is readily generalized to include mean-field interactions. To validate our findings, we simulate a ring-trapped BEC Sagnac interferometer in one dimension and demonstrate that measurement of an unknown rotation rate can be performed using a modified analysis. Our simulation data show strong agreement with our analytic results, and we further employ simulations to explore and clarify the role of superfluidity in this matter-wave Sagnac interferometer.