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arXiv:1508.05947 · Physical Review A

Parity effect in a mesoscopic Fermi gas

Johannes Hofmann, Alejandro M. Lobos, Victor M. Galitski

Published Jun 13, 2016• 11 citations
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Abstract

We develop a quantitative analytic theory that accurately describes the odd-even effect observed experimentally in a one-dimensional, trapped Fermi gas with a small number of particles [G. Z\"urn et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 175302 (2013)]. We find that the underlying physics is similar to the parity effect known to exist in ultrasmall mesoscopic superconducting grains and atomic nuclei. However, in contrast to superconducting nanograins, the density (Hartree) correction dominates over the superconducting pairing fluctuations and leads to a much more pronounced odd-even effect in the mesoscopic, trapped Fermi gas. We calculate the corresponding parity parameter and separation energy using both perturbation theory and a path integral framework in the mesoscopic limit, generalized to account for the effects of the trap, pairing fluctuations, and Hartree corrections. Our results are in an excellent quantitative agreement with experimental data and exact diagonalization. Finally, we discuss a few-particle to many-particle crossover between the perturbative mesoscopic regime and nonperturbative many-body physics that the system approaches in the thermodynamic limit.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.93.061602

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We develop a quantitative analytic theory that accurately describes the odd-even effect observed experimentally in a one-dimensional, trapped Fermi gas with a small number of particles [G. Z"urn et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 175302 (2013)]. We find that the underlying physics is similar to the parity effect known to exist in ultrasmall mesoscopic superconducting grains and atomic nuclei. However, in contrast to superconducting nanograins, the density (Hartree) correction dominates over the superconducting pairing fluctuations and leads to a much more pronounced odd-even effect in the mesoscopic, trapped Fermi gas. We calculate the corresponding parity parameter and separation energy using both perturbation theory and a path integral framework in the mesoscopic limit, generalized to account for the effects of the trap, pairing fluctuations, and Hartree corrections. Our results are in an excellent quantitative agreement with experimental data and exact diagonalization. Finally, we discuss a few-particle to many-particle crossover between the perturbative mesoscopic regime and nonperturbative many-body physics that the system approaches in the thermodynamic limit.
We develop a quantitative analytic theory that accurately describes the odd-even effect observed experimentally in a one-dimensional, trapped Fermi gas with a small number of particles [G. Z\urn et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 175302 (2013)]. We find that the underlying physics is similar to the parity effect known to exist in ultrasmall mesoscopic superconducting grains and atomic nuclei. However, in contrast to superconducting nanograins, the density fluctuation effect (Hartree correction) dominates over the superconducting pairing fluctuations and leads to a much more pronounced odd-even effect in the mesoscopic, trapped Fermi gas. We calculate the corresponding parity parameter and separation energy using both perturbation theory and a path integral framework, generalized to account for the effects of the trap, pairing fluctuations, and Hartree corrections. Our results are in an excellent quantitative agreement with experimental data and exact diagonalization. Finally, we describe a few-to-many particle crossover between the perturbative mesoscopic regime and non-perturbative many-body physics that the system approaches in the thermodynamic limit.
Strongly interacting, dilute Fermi gases exhibit a scale-invariant, universal thermodynamic behavior. This is notoriously difficult to understand theoretically because of the absence of a small interaction parameter. Here, we present a systematic comparison of theoretical predictions from different quantum many-body theories with recent experimental data of Nascimbne et al (2010 Nature 463 1057). Our comparisons have no adjustable parameters, either theoretically or experimentally. All the model approximations seem to fluctuate rather than converge on the experimental data. It turns out that a simple Gaussian pair fluctuation theory gives the best quantitative agreement, except at the critical superfluid transition region. In the normal state, we also calculate the equation of state by using a quantum cluster expansion theory and explore in detail its applicability to low temperatures. Using the accurate experimental result for the thermodynamic function S ( T ), we determine the temperature T of a trapped Fermi gas at unitarity as a function of a non-interacting temperature T i , which can be obtained by an adiabatic sweep to the free gas limit. By analyzing the recent experimental data, we find a characteristic temperature ( T / T F ) 0 =0.19±0.02 or ( T i / T F ) 0 =0.16±0.02 in a harmonic trap, below which there are deviations from normal Fermi-liquid-like behavior that may be attributed to pairing effects. Here, T F is the Fermi temperature for a trapped ideal, non-interacting Fermi gas. Our thorough comparison may shed light on the further theoretical development of strongly interacting fermions.
The properties of a balanced two-component Fermi gas in a one-dimensional harmonic trap are studied by means of the coupled-cluster method. For few fermions we recover the results of exact diagonalization, yet with this method we are able to study much larger systems. We compute the energy, the chemical potential, the pairing gap, and the density profile of the trapped clouds, smoothly mapping the crossover between the few-body and many-body limits. The energy is found to converge surprisingly rapidly to the many-body result for every value of the interaction strength. Many more particles are instead needed to give rise to the nonanalytic behavior of the pairing gap, and to smoothen the pronounced even-odd oscillations of the chemical potential induced by the shell structure of the trap.
We examine the contribution of pairing fluctuations to the superfluid order parameter for harmonically trapped atomic Fermi gases in the BCS regime. In the limit of small systems we consider, both analytically and numerically, their space and temperature dependence. We predict a parity effect, i.e., that pairing fluctuations show a maximum or a minimum at the center of the trap, depending on the value of the last occupied shell being even or odd. We propose to detect pairing fluctuations by measuring the density-density correlation function after a ballistic expansion of the gas.
The fermionic Tonks-Girardeau gas is an exactly solvable model realizing a conventional macroscopic condensate of p-wave Cooper pairs. Here we demonstrate that, when confined by a trapping potential, it also hosts unconventional odd-frequency pairing, i.e., pair correlations with s-wave symmetry that are only present with a finite time delay t between fermions forming a pair. Quantitative results for fixed particle number are obtained using a generalization of Yang's theory of off-diagonal long-range order to define a t-dependent order parameter that is antisymmetric under combined t inversion and exchange of fermion-pair indices. Odd-frequency pairing in the fermionic Tonks-Girardeau gas is found to be a mesoscopic effect, localized at the system's boundary and therefore nonextensive thermodynamically. Our results show that this elusive hidden order is accessible in systems having fixed particle number, suggesting new avenues towards its experimental realization and further detailed study.