2026-07-072026-07-07http://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/165717The properties of a special class of correlated many-body wave functions, named rotating vortex clusters (RVCs), that preserve the total angular momentum of a small cloud of trapped rotating bosons are investigated. They have lower energy and provide a superior description for the formation of vortices compared to the mean-field Gross-Pitaevskii (GP) states that break the rotational symmetry. The GP vortex states are shown to be wave packets composed of such RVC states. Our results suggest that, for a small number of bosons, the physics is different from that of ideal Bose-Einstein condensates which characterize larger assembliesRevtex 4 with 4 color figures. Published version. Ref. [25] (experimental) was added. For related papers, see http://www.prism.gatech.edu/~ph274cy/Mesoscale and Nanoscale PhysicsOther Condensed MatterNuclear TheoryAtomic and Molecular Clusterstext