Elastic Multi-Body Interactions on a Lattice

We show that by coupling two hyperfine states of an atom in an optical lattice one can independently control two-, three-, and four-body on-site interactions in a non-perturbative manner. In particular, under typical conditions of current experiments one can have a purely three- or four-body interacting gas of $^{39}$K atoms characterized by on-site interaction shifts of several 100Hz.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure

Three-Body Interacting Bosons in Free Space

We propose a method of controlling two- and three-body interactions in an ultracold Bose gas in any dimension. The method requires us to have two coupled internal single-particle states split in energy such that the upper state is occupied virtually but amply during collisions. By varying system parameters one can switch off the two-body interaction while maintaining a strong three-body one. The mechanism can be implemented for dipolar bosons in the bilayer configuration with tunnelling or in an atomic system by using radio-frequency fields to couple two hyperfine states. One can then aim to observe a purely three-body-interacting gas, dilute self-trapped droplets, the paired superfluid phase, Pfaffian state, and other exotic phenomena.Comment: Published version with Supplemental Materia

Propagation of a Dark Soliton in a Disordered Bose-Einstein Condensate

We consider the propagation of a dark soliton in a quasi 1D Bose-Einstein condensate in presence of a random potential. This configuration involves nonlinear effects and disorder, and we argue that, contrarily to the study of stationary transmission coefficients through a nonlinear disordered slab, it is a well defined problem. It is found that a dark soliton decays algebraically, over a characteristic length which is independent of its initial velocity, and much larger than both the healing length and the 1D scattering length of the system. We also determine the characteristic decay time.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure

A ring trap for ultracold atoms

We propose a new kind of toroidal trap, designed for ultracold atoms. It relies on a combination of a magnetic trap for rf-dressed atoms, which creates a bubble-like trap, and a standing wave of light. This new trap is well suited for investigating questions of low dimensionality in a ring potential. We study the trap characteristics for a set of experimentally accessible parameters. A loading procedure from a conventional magnetic trap is also proposed. The flexible nature of this new ring trap, including an adjustable radius and adjustable transverse oscillation frequencies, will allow the study of superfluidity in variable geometries and dimensionalities.Comment: 4 figures, 10 pages ; the order of the sections has been changed ; to appear in Phys. Rev.