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arXiv:1107.0942 · Physical Review A

Role of fourth-order phase-space moments in collective modes of trapped Fermi gases

Silvia Chiacchiera, Thomas Lepers, D. Davesne, Mi­chael Urban

Published Oct 21, 2011• 20 citations
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Abstract

We study the transition from hydrodynamic to collisionless behavior in collective modes of ultracold trapped Fermi gases. To that end, we solve the Boltzmann equation for the trapped Fermi gas via the moments method. We showed previously that it is necessary to go beyond second-order moments if one wants to reproduce the results of a numerical solution of the Boltzmann equation. Here, we will give the detailed description of the method including fourth-order moments. We apply this method to the case of realistic parameters, and compare the results for the radial quadrupole and scissors modes at unitarity to experimental data obtained by the Innsbruck group. It turns out that the inclusion of fourth-order moments clearly improves the agreement with the experimental data. In particular, the fourth-order moments reduce the effect of collisions and therefore partially compensate the effect of the enhanced in-medium cross section at low temperatures.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.84.043634

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We study the transition from hydrodynamic to collisionless behavior in collective modes of ultracold trapped Fermi gases. To that end, we solve the Boltzmann equation for the trapped Fermi gas via the moments method. We showed previously that it is necessary to go beyond second-order moments if one wants to reproduce the results of a numerical solution of the Boltzmann equation. Here, we will give the detailed description of the method including fourth-order moments. We apply this method to the case of realistic parameters, and compare the results for the radial quadrupole and scissors modes at unitarity to experimental data obtained by the Innsbruck group. It turns out that the inclusion of fourth-order moments clearly improves the agreement with the experimental data. In particular, the fourth-order moments reduce the effect of collisions and therefore partially compensate the effect of the enhanced in-medium cross section at low temperatures.
We study the damping of the quadrupole and scissors modes of ultracold trapped Fermi gases with large negative scattering length at temperatures above the superfluid critical temperature T c within the framework of the Boltzmann equation. The in-medium scattering cross-section is strongly enhanced at temperatures slightly above T c . This has strong effects on the collisional damping of the collective modes and the transition from hydrodynamic to collisionless behaviour as a function of temperature. Within the method of phase-space moments of second order, it was found that the resulting damping rates are in strong disagreement with experimental data from the Innsbruck group, which seemed to favour the free cross section. However, the comparison with numerical solutions of the Boltzmann equation revealed that the method of second-order phase-space moments is insufficient. Here we show that the agreement between the calculation using the in-medium cross-section and the data can be clearly improved by including also fourth-order moments.
We study the transition from the hydrodynamic to the collisionless regime in collective modes of three- and two-dimensional Fermi gases by using the semiclassical Boltzmann equation. We use direct numerical simulations as well as the method of phase-space moments to solve the Boltzmann equation and show that the restriction to second-order moments is not accurate enough. By including higher-order moments, we can successfully describe the hydrodynamic to collisionless transition observed in the quadrupole mode in three-dimensional Fermi gases and the frequency shift and damping of the sloshing mode due to the anharmonic shape of the experimental trap potential. In the case of two-dimensional Fermi gases, however, the strong damping of the quadrupole mode observed in a recent experiment remains unexplained.
We numerically solve the Boltzmann equation for trapped fermions in the normal phase by using the test-particle method. After discussing a couple of tests in order to estimate the reliability of the method, we apply it to the description of collective modes in a spherical harmonic trap. The numerical results are compared with those obtained previously by taking moments of the Boltzmann equation. We find that the general shape of the response function is very similar in both methods, but the relaxation time obtained from the simulation is significantly longer than that predicted by the method of moments. It is shown that the result of the method of moments can be corrected by including fourth-order moments in addition to the usual second-order ones and that this method agrees very well with our numerical simulations.
Due to Pauli blocking of intermediate states, the scattering matrix (or TTT matrix) of two fermionic atoms in a Fermi gas becomes different from that of two atoms in free space. This effect becomes particularly important near a Feshbach resonance, where the interaction in free space is very strong but becomes effectively suppressed in the medium. We calculate the in-medium TTT matrix in ladder approximation and study its effects on the properties of collective modes of a trapped gas in the normal-fluid phase. We introduce the in-medium interaction on both sides of the Boltzmann equation, namely, in the calculation of the mean field and in the calculation of the collision rate. This allows us to explain the observed upward shift of the frequency of the quadrupole mode in the collisionless regime. By including the mean field, we also improve considerably the agreement with the measured temperature dependence of frequency and damping rate of the scissors mode, whereas the use of the in-medium cross section deteriorates the description, in agreement with previous work.
The excitation spectra of the radial quadrupole and scissors modes of ultracold Fermi gases in elongated traps are studied across the BCS superfluid-normal phase transition in the framework of a transport theory for quasiparticles. In the limit of zero temperature, this theory reproduces the results of superfluid hydrodynamics, while in the opposite limit, above the critical temperature, it reduces to the collisionless Vlasov equation. In the intermediate temperature range, the excitation spectra have two or three broad peaks, respectively, which are roughly situated at hydrodynamic and collisionless frequencies, and whose strength is shifted from the hydrodynamic to the collisionless modes with increasing temperature. By fitting the time-dependent quadrupole deformation with a damped oscillation of a single frequency, we can understand the ``jump'' of the frequency of the radial quadrupole mode as a function of interaction strength which has recently been reported by the Innsbruck group.
By means of the Boltzmann-Vlasov kinetic equation we investigate dynamical properties of a trapped, one-component Fermi gas at zero temperature, featuring the anisotropic and long-range dipole-dipole interaction. To this end, we determine an approximate solution by rescaling both space and momentum variables of the equilibrium distribution, thereby obtaining coupled ordinary differential equations for the corresponding scaling parameters. Based on previous results on how the Fermi sphere is deformed in the hydrodynamic regime of a dipolar Fermi gas, we are able to implement the relaxation-time approximation for the collision integral. Then, we proceed by linearizing the equations of motion around the equilibrium in order to study both the frequencies and the damping of the low-lying excitation modes all the way from the collisionless to the hydrodynamic regime. Our theoretical results are expected to be relevant for understanding current experiments with trapped dipolar Fermi gases.