Quantum Quench in a Harmonically Trapped One-Dimensional Bose Gas

Understand

We study the non-equilibrium dynamics of a one-dimensional Bose gas trapped by a harmonic potential for a quench from zero to infinite interaction.

• The different thermodynamic limits required for the equilibrium pre- and post-quench Hamiltonians are the origin of a few unexpected phenomena that have no counterparts in the translational invariant setting.
• We find that the dynamics is perfectly periodic with breathing time related to the strength of the trapping potential.
• For very short times, we observe a sudden expansion leading to an extreme dilution of the gas and to the emergence of slowly decaying tails in the density profile.