Collision Integrals in the Kinetic Equations of dilute Bose-Einstein Condensates

Abstract

We derive the mean field kinetic equation for the momentum distribution of Bogoliubov excitations (bogolons) in a spatially uniform Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), with a focus on the collision integrals. We use the method of Peletminksii and Yatsenko rather than the standard non-equilibrium Green's function formalism. This method produces three collision integrals ${\cal G}^{12}$, ${\cal G}^{22}$ and ${\cal G}^{31}$. Only ${\cal G}^{12}$ and ${\cal G}^{22}$ have been considered by previous authors. The third collision integral ${\cal G}^{31}$ contains the effects of processes where one bogolon becomes three and vice versa. These processes are allowed because the total number of bogolons is not conserved. Since ${\cal G}^{31}$ is of the same order in the interaction strength as ${\cal G}^{22}$, we predict that it will significantly influence the dynamics of the bogolon gas, especially the relaxation of the total number of bogolons to its equilibrium value.