No Arabic abstract
We show that four heavy fermions interacting resonantly with a lighter atom (4+1 system) become Efimovian at mass ratio 13.279(2), which is smaller than the corresponding 2+1 and 3+1 thresholds. We thus predict the five-body Efimov effect for this system in the regime where any of its subsystem is non- Efimovian. For smaller mass ratios we show the existence and calculate the energy of a universal 4+1 pentamer state, which continues the series of the 2+1 trimer predicted by Kartavtsev and Malykh and 3+1 tetramer discovered by Blume. We also show that the effective-range correction for the light-heavy interaction has a strong effect on all these states and larger effective ranges increase their tendency to bind.
In this paper we discuss the recent discovery of the universality of the three-body parameter (3BP) from Efimov physics. This new result was identified by recent experimental observations in ultracold quantum gases where the value of the s-wave scattering length, $a=a_-$, at which the first Efimov resonance is created was found to be nearly the same for a range of atomic species --- if scaled as $a_-/r_{rm vdW}$, where $r_{rm vdW}$ is the van der Waals length. Here, we discuss some of the physical principles related to these observations that emerge from solving the three-body problem with van der Waals interactions in the hyperspherical formalism. We also demonstrate the strong three-body multichannel nature of the problem and the importance of properly accounting for nonadiabatic effects.
We report on the observation of triatomic Efimov resonances in an ultracold gas of cesium atoms. Exploiting the wide tunability of interactions resulting from three broad Feshbach resonances in the same spin channel, we measure magnetic-field dependent three-body recombination loss. The positions of the loss resonances yield corresponding values for the three-body parameter, which in universal few-body physics is required to describe three-body phenomena and in particular to fix the spectrum of Efimov states. Our observations show a robust universal behavior with a three-body parameter that stays essentially constant.
Few-body correlations emerging in two-dimensional harmonically trapped mixtures, are comprehensively investigated. The presence of the trap leads to the formation of atom-dimer and trap states, in addition to trimers. The Tans contacts of these eigenstates are studied for varying interspecies scattering lengths and mass ratio, while corresponding analytical insights are provided within the adiabatic hyperspherical formalism. The two- and three-body correlations of trimer states are substantially enhanced compared to the other eigenstates. The two-body contact of the atom-dimer and trap states features an upper bound regardless of the statistics, treated semi-classically and having an analytical prediction in the limit of large scattering lengths. Such an upper bound is absent in the three-body contact. Interestingly, by tuning the interspecies scattering length the contacts oscillate as the atom-dimer and trap states change character through the existent avoided-crossings in the energy spectra. For thermal gases, a gradual suppression of the involved two- and three-body correlations is evinced manifesting the impact of thermal effects. Moreover, spatial configurations of the distinct eigenstates ranging from localized structures to angular anisotropic patterns are captured. Our results provide valuable insights into the inherent correlation mechanisms of few-body mixtures which can be implemented in recent ultracold atom experiments and will be especially useful for probing the crossover from few- to many-atom systems.
We have analyzed our recently-measured three-body loss rate coefficient for a Bose-Einstein condensate of spin-polarized metastable triplet 4He atoms in terms of Efimov physics. The large value of the scattering length for these atoms, which provides access to the Efimov regime, arises from a nearby potential resonance. We find the loss coefficient to be consistent with the three-body parameter (3BP) found in alkali-metal experiments, where Feshbach resonances are used to tune the interaction. This provides new evidence for a universal 3BP, the first outside the group of alkali-metal elements. In addition, we give examples of other atomic systems without Feshbach resonances but with a large scattering length that would be interesting to analyze once precise measurements of three-body loss are available.
We study the two-body and three-body bound states in ultracold atomic mixtures with one of the atoms subjected to an isotropic spin-orbit (SO) coupling. We consider a system of two identical fermions interacting with one SO coupled atom. It is found that there can exist two types of three-body bound states, Efimov trimers and universal trimers. The Efimov trimers are energetically less favored by the SO coupling, which will finally merge into the atom-dimer threshold as increasing the SO coupling strength. Nevertheless, these trimers exhibit a new kind of discrete scaling law incorporating the SO coupling effect. On the other hand, the universal trimers are more favored by the SO coupling. They can be induced at negative s-wave scattering lengths and with smaller mass ratios than those without SO coupling. These results are obtained by both the Born-Oppenheimer approximation and exact solutions from three-body equations.