377 research outputs found
Optical detection of a BCS phase transition in a trapped gas of fermionic atoms
Light scattering from a spin-polarized degenerate Fermi gas of trapped
ultracold Li-6 atoms is studied. We find that the scattered light contains
information which directly reflects the quantum pair correlation due to the
formation of atomic Cooper pairs resulting from a BCS phase transition to a
superfluid state. Evidence for pairing can be observed in both the space and
time domains.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, revte
Growth and Collapse of a Bose Condensate with Attractive Interactions
We consider the dynamics of a quantum degenerate trapped gas of Li-7 atoms.
Because the atoms have a negative s-wave scattering length, a Bose condensate
of Li-7 becomes mechanically unstable when the number of condensate atoms
approaches a maximum value. We calculate the dynamics of the collapse that
occurs when the unstable point is reached. In addition, we use the quantum
Boltzmann equation to investigate the nonequilibrium kinetics of the atomic
distribution during and after evaporative cooling. The condensate is found to
undergo many cycles of growth and collapse before a stationary state is
reached.Comment: Four pages of ReVTeX with four postscript figure
1D to 3D Crossover of a Spin-Imbalanced Fermi Gas
We have characterized the one-dimensional (1D) to three-dimensional (3D)
crossover of a two-component spin-imbalanced Fermi gas of 6-lithium atoms in a
2D optical lattice by varying the lattice tunneling and the interactions. The
gas phase separates, and we detect the phase boundaries using in situ imaging
of the inhomogeneous density profiles. The locations of the phases are inverted
in 1D as compared to 3D, thus providing a clear signature of the crossover. By
scaling the tunneling rate with respect to the pair binding energy, we observe
a collapse of the data to a universal crossover point at a scaled tunneling
value of 0.025(7).Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
The Superfluid State of Atomic Li6 in a Magnetic Trap
We report on a study of the superfluid state of spin-polarized atomic Li6
confined in a magnetic trap. Density profiles of this degenerate Fermi gas, and
the spatial distribution of the BCS order parameter are calculated in the local
density approximation. The critical temperature is determined as a function of
the number of particles in the trap. Furthermore we consider the mechanical
stability of an interacting two-component Fermi gas, both in the case of
attractive and repulsive interatomic interactions. For spin-polarized Li6 we
also calculate the decay rate of the gas, and show that within the mechanically
stable regime of phase space, the lifetime is long enough to perform
experiments on the gas below and above the critical temperature if a bias
magnetic field of about 5 T is applied. Moreover, we propose that a measurement
of the decay rate of the system might signal the presence of the superfluid
state.Comment: 16 pages Revtex including 10 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Deformation of a Trapped Fermi Gas with Unequal Spin Populations
The real-space densities of a polarized strongly-interacting two-component
Fermi gas of Li atoms reveal two low temperature regimes, both with a
fully-paired core. At the lowest temperatures, the unpolarized core deforms
with increasing polarization. Sharp boundaries between the core and the excess
unpaired atoms are consistent with a phase separation driven by a first-order
phase transition. In contrast, at higher temperatures the core does not deform
but remains unpolarized up to a critical polarization. The boundaries are not
sharp in this case, indicating a partially-polarized shell between the core and
the unpaired atoms. The temperature dependence is consistent with a tricritical
point in the phase diagram.Comment: Accepted for publication in Physical Review Letter
Bright soliton trains of trapped Bose-Einstein condensates
We variationally determine the dynamics of bright soliton trains composed of
harmonically trapped Bose-Einstein condensates with attractive interatomic
interactions. In particular, we obtain the interaction potential between two
solitons. We also discuss the formation of soliton trains due to the quantum
mechanical phase fluctuations of a one-dimensional condensate.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, submitted to PR
Feasibility of Experimental Realization of Entangled Bose-Einstein Condensation
We examine the practical feasibility of the experimental realization of the
so-called entangled Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC), occurring in an entangled
state of two atoms of different species. We demonstrate that if the energy gap
remains vanishing, the entangled BEC persists as the ground state of the
concerned model in a wide parameter regime. We establish the experimental
accessibility of the isotropic point of the effective parameters, in which the
entangled BEC is the exact ground state, as well as the consistency with the
generalized Gross-Pitaevskii equations. The transition temperature is
estimated. Possible experimental implementations are discussed in detail.Comment: 6 pages, published versio
Measurement of the Dynamical Structure Factor of a 1D Interacting Fermi Gas
We present measurements of the dynamical structure factor of an
interacting one-dimensional (1D) Fermi gas for small excitation energies. We
use the two lowest hyperfine levels of the Li atom to form a
pseudo-spin-1/2 system whose s-wave interactions are tunable via a Feshbach
resonance. The atoms are confined to 1D by a two-dimensional optical lattice.
Bragg spectroscopy is used to measure a response of the gas to density
("charge") mode excitations at a momentum and frequency . The
spectrum is obtained by varying , while the angle between two laser
beams determines , which is fixed to be less than the Fermi momentum
. The measurements agree well with Tomonaga-Luttinger theory
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