The route toward a Bose-Einstein condensate of dipolar molecules requires the ability to efficiently associate dimers of different chemical species and transfer them to the stable rovibrational ground state. Here, we report on recent spectroscopic measurements of two weakly bound molecular levels and newly observed narrow d-wave Feshbach resonances. The data are used to improve the collisional model for the Bose-Bose mixture 41K87Rb, among the most promising candidates to create a molecular dipolar BEC.
We consider the generation of longitudinal phonons in an elongated Bose-condensed gas at zero temperature due to parametric resonance as a result of the modulation of the transverse trap frequency. The nonlinear temporal evolution with account of the phonon-phonon interaction leads self-consistently to the formation of the stationary state with the macroscopic occupation of a single phonon quantum state.
Recent measurements of Efimov resonances in a number of ultracold atom species have revealed an unexpected universality, in which three-body scattering properties are determined by the van der Waals length of the two-body interaction potential. To investigate whether this universality extends to heteronuclear mixtures, we measure loss rate coefficients in an ultracold trapped gas of $^{40}$K and $^{87}$Rb atoms. We find an Efimov-like resonance in the rate of inelastic collisions between $^{40}$K$^{87}$Rb Feshbach molecules and $^{87}$Rb atoms. However, we do not observe any Efimov-related resonances in the rates of inelastic collisions between three atoms. These observations are compared to previous measurements by the LENS group of Efimov resonances in a $^{41}$K and $^{87}$Rb mixture as well as to recent predictions.
We theoretically investigate a supersymmetric collective mode called Goldstino in a Bose-Fermi mixture. The explicit supersymmetry breaking, which is unavoidable in cold atom experiments, is considered. We derive the Gell-Mann--Oakes-Renner (GOR) relation for the Goldstino, which gives the relation between the energy gap at the zero momentum and the explicit breaking term. We also numerically evaluate the gap of Goldstino above the Bose-Einstein condensation temperature within the random phase approximation (RPA). While the gap obtained from the GOR relation coincides with that in the RPA for the mass-balanced system, there is a deviation from the GOR relation in the mass-imbalanced system. We point out the deviation becomes large when the Goldstino pole is close to the branch point, although it is parametrically a higher order with respect to the mass-imbalanced parameter. To examine the existence of the goldstino pole in realistic cold atomic systems, we show how the mass-imbalance effect appears in $^6$Li-$^7$Li, $^{40}$K-$^{41}$K, and $^{173}$Yb-$^{174}$Yb mixtures. Furthermore, we analyze the Goldstino spectral weight in a $^{173}$Yb-$^{174}$Yb mixture with realistic interactions and show a clear peak due to the Goldstino pole. As a possibility to observe the Goldstino spectrum in cold atom experiments, we discuss the effects of the Goldstino pole on the fermionic single-particle excitation as well as the relationship between the GOR relation and Tans contact.
We give an overview of recent experiments on an ultracold Fermi-Bose quantum gas where the interspecies interaction can be tuned via magnetic Feshbach resonances. We first describe the various steps that have led to the observation of Feshbach resonances in the K-Rb system we investigate, and their accurate characterization. We then describe experiments in which Feshbach resonances are exploited to study interaction effects and to associate weakly bound KRb dimers.
We create atom-molecule superpositions in a Bose-Fermi mixture of Rb-87 and K-40 atoms. The superpositions are generated by ramping an applied magnetic field near an interspecies Fano-Feshbach resonance to coherently couple atom and molecule states. Rabi- and Ramsey-type experiments show oscillations in the molecule population that persist as long as 150 microseconds and have up to 50% contrast. The frequencies of these oscillations are magnetic-field dependent and consistent with the predicted molecule binding energy. This quantum superposition involves a molecule and a pair of free particles with different statistics (i.e. bosons and fermions), and furthers exploration of atom-molecule coherence in systems without a Bose-Einstein condensate.