We treat small trapped unequal-mass two-component Fermi gases at unitarity within a nonperturbative microscopic framework and investigate the system properties as functions of the mass ratio κ, and the numbers N1 and N2 of heavy and light fermions. While equal-mass Fermi gases with infinitely large interspecies s-wave scattering length a(s) are universal, we find that unequal-mass Fermi gases are, for sufficiently large κ and in the regime where Efimov physics is absent, not universal. In particular, the (N₁,N₂) = (2, 1) and (3, 1) systems exhibit three-body and four-body resonances at κ=12.314(2) and 10.4(2), respectively, as well as surprisingly large finite-range effects. These findings have profound implications for ongoing experimental efforts and quantum simulation proposals that utilize unequal-mass atomic Fermi gases.
Two-component Fermi and Bose gases with infinitely large interspecies
s-wave scattering length
as exhibit a variety of intriguing properties. Among these are the scale invariance of two-component Fermi gases with equal masses, and the favorable scaling of Efimov features for two-component Bose gases and Bose-Fermi mixtures with unequal masses. This paper builds on our earlier work [Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 170403 (2010)] and presents a detailed discussion of our studies of small unequal-mass two-component systems with infinite
as in the regime where three-body Efimov physics is absent. We report on nonuniversal few-body resonances. Just like with two-body systems on resonance, few-body systems have a zero-energy bound state in free space and a diverging generalized scattering length. Our calculations are performed within a nonperturbative microscopic framework and investigate the energetics and structural properties of small unequal-mass two-component systems as functions of the mass ratio $\ensuremath{\kappa}$, and the numbers
N1 and
N2 of heavy and light atoms. For purely attractive Gaussian two-body interactions, we find that the
(N1,N2)=(2,1) and
(3,1) systems exhibit three-body and four-body resonances at mass ratios $\ensuremath{\kappa}=12.314(2)$ and
10.4(2), respectively. The three- and four-particle systems on resonance are found to be large. It seems feasible that the features discussed in this paper can be probed experimentally with present-day technology.