arXiv · cond-mat/0403362
On the conversion efficiency of ultracold fermionic atoms to bosonic molecules via Feshbach resonances
Abstract
We explain why the experimental efficiency observed in the conversion of ultracold Fermi gases of $^{40}$K and $^{6}$Li atoms into diatomic Bose gases is limited to 0.5 when the Feshbach resonance sweep rate is sufficiently slow to pass adiabatically through the Landau Zener transition but faster than ``the collision rate'' in the gas, and increases beyond 0.5 when it is slower. The 0.5 efficiency limit is due to the preparation of a statistical mixture of two spin-states, required to enable s-wave scattering. By constructing the many-body state of the system we show that this preparation yields a mixture of even and odd parity pair-states, where only even parity can produce molecules. The odd parity spin-symmetric states must decorrelate before the constituent atoms can further Feshbach scatter thereby increasing the conversion efficiency; ``the collision rate'' is the pair decorrelation rate.
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E. Pazy, A. Vardi, Y. B. Band. 2004-08-12. On the conversion efficiency of ultracold fermionic atoms to bosonic molecules via Feshbach resonances. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.93.120409
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