arXiv subjects

Pascal Naidon

Publications and source records attributed to Pascal Naidon.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

Two impurities in a Bose-Einstein condensate: from Yukawa to Efimov attracted polarons

The well-known Yukawa and Efimov potentials are two different mediated interaction potentials. The first one arises in quantum field theory from the exchange of virtual particles. The second one is mediated by a real particle resonantly interacting with two other particles. This Letter shows how two impurities immersed in a Bose-Einstein condensate can exhibit both phenomena. For a weak impurity-boson attractive interactionattraction with the condensate, the two impurities form two polarons that interact through a weak Yukawa attraction mediated by virtual excitations. For a resonant attraction with the condensate, the exchanged excitation becomes a real boson and the mediated interaction changes to a strong Efimov attraction that can bind the two polarons. The resulting bipolarons turn into in-medium Efimov trimers made of the two impurities and one boson. Evidence of this physics could be seen in ultracold mixtures of atoms.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2018

Tetramers of two heavy and two light bosons

This article considers the bound states of two heavy and two light bosons, when a short-range force attracts the bosons of different mass, and a short-range force repel the light bosons. The existence of such four-body bound states results from the competition between these two forces. For a given strength of the attraction, the critical strength of the repulsion necessary to unbind the four particles is calculated. This study is motivated by the experimental realisation of impurity atoms immersed in an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate, and aims at determining in which regime only one boson contributes to binding two impurities.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2016

Universal clusters as building blocks of stable quantum matter

We present an exploratory study that suggests that Efimov physics, a leading research theme in few-body quantum physics, can also induce stable many-body ground states whose building blocks are universal clusters. We identify a range of parameters in a mass-and-density imbalanced two-species fermionic mixture for which the ground state is a gas of Efimov-related universal trimers. An explicit calculation of the trimer-trimer interaction reveals that the trimer phase is an SU$(3)$ Fermi liquid stable against recombination losses. We propose to experimentally observe this phase in a fermionic $^6$Li-$^{53}$Cr mixture.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2015

Scattering of universal fermionic clusters in the resonating group method

Mixtures of polarised fermions of two different masses can form weakly-bound clusters, such as dimers and trimers, that are universally described by the scattering length between the heavy and light fermions. We use the resonating group method to investigate the low-energy scattering processes involving dimers or trimers. The method reproduces approximately the known particle-dimer and dimer-dimer scattering lengths. We use it to estimate the trimer-trimer scattering length, which is presently unknown, and find it to be positive.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2014

Microscopic Origin and Universality Classes of the Efimov Three-Body Parameter

The low-energy spectrum of three particles interacting via nearly resonant two-body interactions in the Efimov regime is set by the so-called three-body parameter. We show that the three-body parameter is essentially determined by the zero-energy two-body correlation. As a result, we identify two classes of two-body interactions for which the three-body parameter has a universal value in units of their effective range. One class involves the universality of the three-body parameter recently found in ultracold atom systems. The other is relevant to short-range interactions that can be found in nuclear physics and solid-state physics.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Scattering and bound states of two polaritons in an array of coupled cavities

We develop an analytical approach for calculating the scattering and bound states of two polaritons in a one-dimensional (1D) infinite array of coupled cavities, with each cavity coupled to a two-level system (TLS). In particular, we find that in such a system a contact interaction between two polaritons is induced by the nonlinearity of the Jaynes-Cummigs Hamiltonian. Using our approach we solve the two-polariton problem with zero center-of-mass momentum, and find 1D resonances. Our results are relevant to the transport of two polaritons, and are helpful for the investigation of many-body physics in a dilute gas of polaritons in a 1D cavity array.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2012

Crossover trimers connecting continuous and discrete scaling regimes

For a system of two identical fermions and one distinguishable particle interacting via a short-range potential with a large s-wave scattering length, the Efimov trimers and Kartavtsev-Malykh trimers exist in different regimes of the mass ratio. The Efimov trimers are known to exhibit a discrete scaling invariance, while the Kartavtsev-Malykh trimers feature a continuous scaling invariance. We point out that a third type of trimers, "crossover trimers", exist universally regardless of short-range details of the potential. These crossover trimers have neither the discrete nor continuous scaling invariance. We show that the crossover trimers continuously connect the discrete and continuous scaling regimes as the mass ratio and the scattering length are varied. We identify the regions for the Kartavtsev-Malykh trimers, Efimov trimers, crossover trimers, and non-universal trimers as a function of the mass ratio and the s-wave scattering length by investigating the scaling property and model-independence of the trimers.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Universality and the three-body parameter of helium-4 trimers

We consider a system of three helium-4 atoms, which is so far the simplest realistic three-body system exhibiting the Efimov effect, in order to analyse deviations from the universal Efimov three-body spectrum. We first calculate the bound states using a realistic two-body potential, and then analyse how they can be reproduced by simple effective models beyond Efimov's universal theory. We find that the non-universal variations of the first two states can be well reproduced by models parametrized with only three quantities: the scattering length and effective range of the original potential, and the strength of a small three-body force. Furthermore, the three-body parameter which fixes the origin of the infinite set of three-body levels is found to be consistent with recent experimental observations in other atomic species.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2011

The Efimov effect in lithium 6

We analyse the recent experiments investigating the low-energy physics of three lithium 6 atoms in different internal states with resonant two-body scattering lengths. All observed features are qualitatively consistent with the expected Efimov effect, i.e. the effective universal three-body attraction that arises for large values of the scattering lengths. However, we find that a quantitative description at negative energy requires non-universal two- and three-body corrections due to presently unknown behaviour at short distance. An attempt to implement these corrections is made through energy-dependent parameters fitted to the experimental data.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Universal physics of 2+1 particles with non-zero angular momentum

The zero-energy universal properties of scattering between a particle and a dimer that involves an identical particle are investigated for arbitrary scattering angular momenta. For this purpose, we derive an integral equation that generalises the Skorniakov - Ter-Martirosian equation to the case of non-zero angular momentum. As the mass ratio between the particles is varied, we find various scattering resonances that can be attributed to the appearance of universal trimers and Efimov trimers at the collisional threshold.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2010

Measurement of an Efimov trimer binding energy in a three-component mixture of 6Li

The binding energy of an Efimov trimer state was precisely determined via radio-frequency association. It is found that the measurement results significantly shift with temperature, but that the shift can be made negligible at the lowest temperature in our experiment. The obtained trimer binding energy reveals a significant deviation from the nonuniversal theory prediction based on a three-body parameter with a monotonic energy dependence.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2010

The scattering amplitude of ultracold atoms near the p-wave magnetic Feshbach Resonance

Most of the current theories on the p-wave superfluid in cold atomic gases are based on the effective-range theory for the two-body scattering, where the low energy p-wave scattering amplitude $f_1(k)$ is given by $% f_1(k)=-1/[ik+1/(\mathcal{V}k^2)+1/\mathcal{R}]$, where $k$ is the incident momentum, and $\mathcal{V}$ and $\mathcal{R}$ are the $k$-independent scattering volume and effective-range, respectively. However, due to the long-range nature of the van der Waals interaction between two colliding ultracold atoms, the p-wave scattering amplitude of the two atoms is not described by the effective-range theory. In this paper we provide an explicit calculation for the p-wave scattering of two ultracold atoms near the p-wave magnetic Feshbach resonance (PMFR). We show that the low energy p-wave scattering amplitude in the presence of PMFR takes the form $f_1(k)=-1/[ik+1/(\mathcal{V}^{\mathrm{eff}}k^2)+1/(\mathcal{S}^{\mathrm{eff}%}k)+1/\mathcal{R}^{\mathrm{eff}}]$ where $\mathcal{V}^{\mathrm{eff}},$ $% \mathcal{S}^{\mathrm{eff}}$ and $\mathcal{R}^{\mathrm{eff}}$ are $k$% -dependent parameters. Based on this result, we show sufficient conditions for the effective range theory to be a good approximation of the exact scattering amplitude. Using these conditions we show that the effective-range theory is a good approximation for the p-wave scattering in the ultracold gases of $^{6}$Li and $^{40}$K when the scattering volume is enhanced by the resonance.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2009

A possible Efimov trimer state in a 3-component lithium-6 mixture

We consider the Efimov trimer theory as a possible framework to explain recently observed losses by inelastic three-body collisions in a three-hyperfine-component ultracold mixture of lithium 6. Within this framework, these losses would arise chiefly from the existence of an Efimov trimer bound state below the continuum of free triplets of atoms, and the loss maxima (at certain values of an applied magnetic field) would correspond to zero-energy resonances where the trimer dissociates into three free atoms. Our results show that such a trimer state is indeed possible given the two-body scattering lengths in the three-component lithium mixture, and gives rise to two zero-energy resonances. The locations of these resonances appear to be consistent with observed losses.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2009

Independent Control of Scattering Lengths in Multicomponent Quantum Gases

We develop a method of simultaneous and independent control of different scattering lengths in ultracold multicomponent atomic gases, such as $ \mathrm{40}}$K or $^{\mathrm{40}} $K-$^{\mathrm{6}}$Li mixture. Our method can be used to engineer multi-component quantum phases and Efimov trimer states.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2008

The Bose-Hubbard ground state: extended Bogoliubov and variational methods compared with time-evolving block decimation

We determine the ground-state properties of a gas of interacting bosonic atoms in a one-dimensional optical lattice. The system is modelled by the Bose-Hubbard Hamiltonian. We show how to apply the time-evolving block decimation method to systems with periodic boundary conditions, and employ it as a reference to find the ground state of the Bose-Hubbard model. Results are compared with recently proposed approximate methods, such as Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov (HFB) theories generalised for strong interactions and the variational Bijl-Dingle-Jastrow method. We find that all HFB methods do not bring any improvement to the Bogoliubov theory and therefore provide correct results only in the weakly-interacting limit, where the system is deeply in the superfluid regime. On the other hand, the variational Bijl-Dingle-Jastrow method is applicable for much stronger interactions, but is essentially limited to the superfluid regime as it reproduces the superfluid-Mott insulator transition only qualitatively.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2008

Coherent, adiabatic and dissociation regimes in coupled atomic-molecular Bose-Einstein condensates

We discuss the dynamics of a Bose-Einstein condensate of atoms which is suddenly coupled to a condensate of molecules by an optical or magnetic Feshbach resonance. Three limiting regimes are found and can be understood from the transient dynamics occuring for each pair of atoms. This transient dynamics can be summarised into a time-dependent shift and broadening of the molecular state. A simple Gross-Pitaevskii picture including this shift and broadening is proposed to describe the system in the three regimes. Finally, we suggest how to explore these regimes experimentally.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2008

Two-body transients in coupled atomic-molecular BECs

We discuss the dynamics of an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate when pairs of atoms are converted into molecules by single-color photoassociation. Three main regimes are found and it is shown that they can be understood on the basis of time-dependent two-body theory. In particular, the so-called rogue dissociation regime [Phys. Rev. Lett., 88, 090403 (2002)], which has a density-dependent limit on the photoassociation rate, is identified with a transient regime of the two-atom dynamics exhibiting universal properties. Finally, we illustrate how these regimes could be explored by photoassociating condensates of alkaline-earth atoms.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2007

Effective-range description of a Bose gas under strong one- or two-dimensional confinement

We point out that theories describing s-wave collisions of bosonic atoms confined in one- or two-dimensional geometries can be extended to much tighter confinements than previously thought. This is achieved by replacing the scattering length by an energy-dependent scattering length which was already introduced for the calculation of energy levels under 3D confinement. This replacement accurately predicts the position of confinement-induced resonances in strongly confined geometries.

physics.atom-ph↗