Optical Feshbach resonances (OFRs) have generated significant experimental interest in recent years. These resonances are promising for many-body physics experiments, yet the practical application of OFRs has been limited. The theory of OFRs has been based on an approximate model that fails in important detuning regimes, and the incomplete theoretical understanding of this effect has hindered OFR experiments. We present the most complete theoretical treatment of OFRs to date, demonstrating important characteristics that must be considered in OFR experiments and comparing OFRs to the well-studied case of magnetic Feshbach resonances. We also present a comprehensive treatment of the approximate OFR model, including a study of the range of validity for this model. Finally, we derive experimentally useful expressions that can be applied to real experimental data to extract important information about the resonance structure of colliding atoms.
We perform Feshbach spectroscopy in an ultracold mixture of
23Na and
40K with different spin-state combinations. We observed 24 new interspecies Feshbach resonances at magnetic fields up to 350 G. A full coupled-channel calculation is performed to assign these resonances. Among them, 12 resonances are identified as
d-wave Feshbach resonances. These
d-wave Feshbach resonances are about 5 G systematically smaller than the predictions based on the previous model potential. Taking into account these experimental results, we improve the Born-Oppenheimer potentials between Na and K and achieve good agreement between the theory and experiment for all the observed Feshbach resonances.
Feshbach resonances are a powerful tool to tune the interaction in an ultracold atomic gas. The commonly used magnetic Feshbach resonances are specific for each species and are restricted with respect to their temporal and spatial modulation. Optical Feshbach resonances are an alternative which can overcome this limitation. Here, we show that ultra-long-range Rydberg molecules can be used to implement an optical Feshbach resonance. Tuning the on-site interaction of a degenerate Bose gas in a 3D optical lattice, we demonstrate a similar performance compared to recent realizations of optical Feshbach resonances using intercombination transitions. Our results open up a class of optical Feshbach resonances with a plenitude of available lines for many atomic species and the possibility to further increase the performance by carefully selecting the underlying Rydberg state.