Abstract:

We consider the possible mechanical instability of an ultracold Fermi gas due to the attractive interactions between fermions of different species. We investigate how the instability, predicted by a mean field calculation, is modified when the gas is trapped in a harmonic potential and quantum effects are included.

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1140/epjd/e2004-00169-0

Affiliations: 1: Laboratoire de Physique Statistique, École Normale Supérieure (Laboratoire associé au Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique et aux Universités Paris 6 et Paris 7., 24 rue Lhomond, 75231, Paris Cedex 05, France, Email: leyronas@lps.ens.fr 2: Laboratoire de Physique Statistique, École Normale Supérieure (Laboratoire associé au Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique et aux Universités Paris 6 et Paris 7., 24 rue Lhomond, 75231, Paris Cedex 05, France,