Drag Force and Superfluidity in the Supersolid Stripe Phase of a Spin–Orbit-Coupled Bose–Einstein Condensate

Abstract: The phase diagram of a spin–orbit-coupled two-component Bose gas includes a supersolid stripe phase, which is featuring density modulations along the direction of the spin–orbit coupling. This phase has been recently found experimentally [31]. In the present work, we characterize the superfluid behavior of the stripe phase by calculating the drag force acting on a moving impurity. Because of the gapless band structure of the excitation spectrum, the Landau critical velocity vanishes if the motion is not strictly parallel to the stripes, and energy dissipation takes place at any speed. Moreover, due to the spin–orbit coupling, the drag force can develop a component perpendicular to the velocity of the impurity. Finally, by estimating the time over which the energy dissipation occurs, we find that for slow impurities, the effects of friction are negligible on a time scale up to several seconds, which is comparable with the duration of a typical experiment.