We have converted an ultracold Fermi gas of ${}^6\mathrm{L}\mathrm{i}$ atoms into an ultracold gas of ${}^6\mathrm{L}\mathrm{i}_2$ molecules by adiabatic passage through a Feshbach resonance. Approximately $1.5\times {10}^5$ molecules in the least-bound, $v=38$, vibrational level of the $X^1{\Sigma }_g^{+}$ singlet state are produced with an efficiency of 50%. The molecules remain confined in an optical trap for times of up to 1 s before we dissociate them by a reverse adiabatic sweep.

We apply the conformational space annealing method to the Lennard-Jones clusters and find all known lowest energy configurations up to 201 atoms, without using extra information of the problem such as the structures of the known global energy minima. In addition, the robustness of the algorithm with respect to the randomness of initial conditions of the problem is demonstrated by ten successful independent runs up to 183 atoms. Our results indicate that this method is a general and yet efficient global optimization algorithm applicable to many systems.

A continuous-variable tripartite entangled state is experimentally generated by combining three independent squeezed vacuum states, and the variances of its relative positions and total momentum are measured. We show that the measured values violate the separability criteria based on the sum of these quantities and prove the full inseparability of the generated state.

We show that Wegner’s flow equations, as recently discussed in the Lipkin model, can be solved self-consistently. This leads to a nonlinear differential equation which fully determines the order parameter as a function of the dimensionless coupling constant, even across the phase transition. Since we consider an expansion in the fluctuations, rather than the conventional expansion in the coupling constant, convergence to the exact results is found in both phases when taking the thermodynamic limit.

Particles moving along curved trajectories will diffuse if the curvature fluctuates sufficiently in either magnitude or orientation. We consider particles moving at a constant speed with either a fixed or a Gaussian distributed magnitude of curvature. At small speeds the diffusivity is independent of the speed. At larger particle speeds, the diffusivity depends on the speed through a novel exponent. We apply our results to intracellular transport of vesicles. In sharp contrast to thermal diffusion, the effective diffusivity increases with vesicle size and so may provide an effective means of intracellular transport.

We have measured the intensity dependent rate and frequency shift of a photoassociation transition in a quantum degenerate gas of ${}^7\mathrm{L}\mathrm{i}$. The rate increases linearly with photoassociation laser intensity for low intensities, whereas saturation is observed at higher intensities. The measured rates and shifts agree reasonably well with theory within the estimated systematic uncertainties. Several theoretically predicted saturation mechanisms are discussed, but a theory in which saturation arises because of quantum mechanical unitarity agrees well with the data.

An ultracold atomic Bose gas in an optical lattice is shown to provide an ideal system for the controlled analysis of disordered Bose lattice gases. This goal may be easily achieved under the current experimental conditions by introducing a pseudorandom potential created by a second additional lattice or, alternatively, by placing a speckle pattern on the main lattice. We show that, for a noncommensurable filling factor, in the strong-interaction limit, a controlled growing of the disorder drives a dynamical transition from superfluid to Bose-glass phase. Similarly, in the weak interaction limit, a dynamical transition from superfluid to Anderson-glass phase may be observed. In both regimes, we show that even very low-intensity disorder-inducing lasers cause large modifications of the superfluid fraction of the system.

We describe an experiment in which Bose-Einstein condensates and cold atom clouds are held by a microscopic magnetic trap near a room-temperature metal wire $500\mu \mathrm{m}$ in diameter. The lifetime for atoms to remain in the microtrap is measured over a range of distances down to $27\mu \mathrm{m}$ from the surface of the metal. We observe the loss of atoms from the microtrap due to spin flips. These are induced by radio-frequency thermal fluctuations of the magnetic field near the surface, as predicted but not previously observed.

A relation between the number of bound elementary excitations of an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate and the phase shift of elastically scattered atoms is derived. Within the Bogoliubov model of a weakly interacting Bose gas this relation is exact and generalizes Levinson’s theorem. Specific features of the Bogoliubov model such as complex energy and continuum bound states are discussed and a numerical example is given.

Using three-body recombination as the underlying process, we propose a method of coherently driving an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) into a molecular BEC. Superradiantlike stimulation favors atom-to-molecule transitions when two atomic BECs collide at a resonant kinetic energy, the result being two molecular BEC clouds moving with well-defined velocities. Potential applications include the construction of a molecule laser.

The phenomenological linear response theory of non-Markovian stochastic resonance (SR) is put forward for stationary two-state renewal processes. In terms of a derivation of a non-Markov regression theorem we evaluate the characteristic SR-quantifiers; i.e., the spectral power amplification (SPA) and the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), respectively. In clear contrast to Markovian-SR, a characteristic benchmark of genuine non-Markovian SR is its distinctive dependence of the SPA and SNR on small (adiabatic) driving frequencies; particularly, the adiabatic SNR becomes strongly suppressed over its Markovian counterpart. This non-Markovian SR-theory is elucidated for a fractal gating dynamics of a potassium ion channel possessing an infinite variance of closed sojourn times.

The dynamic behavior of a Fermi gas confined in a deformed trap rotating at low angular velocity is investigated in the framework of hydrodynamic theory. The differences exhibited by a normal gas in the collisional regime and a superfluid are discussed. Special emphasis is given to the collective oscillations excited when the deformation of the rotating trap is suddenly removed or when the rotation is suddenly stopped. The presence of vorticity in the normal phase is shown to give rise to precession and beating phenomena which are absent in the superfluid phase.

We show that two, noninteracting two-level systems, immersed in a common bath, can become mutually entangled when evolving according to a Markovian, completely positive reduced dynamics.

We demonstrate the control of the dispersion of matter wave packets utilizing periodic potentials. This is analogous to the technique of dispersion management known in photon optics. Matter wave packets are realized by Bose-Einstein condensates of ${}^{87}\mathrm{R}\mathrm{b}$ in an optical dipole potential acting as a one-dimensional waveguide. A weak optical lattice is used to control the dispersion relation of the matter waves during the propagation of the wave packets. The dynamics are observed in position space and interpreted using the concept of effective mass. By switching from positive to negative effective mass, the dynamics can be reversed. The breakdown of the approximation of constant, as well as experimental signatures of an infinite effective mass are studied.

Colloidal suspensions of ferromagnetic nanoparticles, so-called ferrofluids, are shown to be suitable systems to demonstrate and investigate thermal ratchet behavior: By rectifying thermal fluctuations, angular momentum is transferred to a resting ferrofluid from an oscillating magnetic field without net rotating component. Via viscous coupling the noise driven rotation of the microscopic ferromagnetic grains is transmitted to the carrier liquid to yield a macroscopic torque. For a simple setup we analyze the rotation of the ferrofluid theoretically and show that the results are compatible with the outcome of a simple demonstration experiment.

A method for generating a mesoscopic superposition state of the collective spin variable of a gas of atoms is proposed. The state consists of a superposition of the atomic spins pointing in two slightly different directions. It is obtained by using off resonant light to carry out quantum nondemolition measurements of the spins. The relevant experimental conditions, which require very dense atomic samples, can be realized with presently available techniques. Long-lived atomic superposition states may become useful as an off-line resource for quantum computing with otherwise linear operations.

Using Landau-Ginzburg-Wilson field-theoretic methods we determine for what kind of space discretization the transition between charge-disordered and charge-ordered phases in the restricted primitive model is fluctuation-induced first order. We identify this transition with ionic-crystal formation. We predict four types of generic phase diagrams in ionic systems for various kinds of space discretization for low and intermediate densities of ions. Our results also shed light on the simulation results obtained for an off-lattice ionic system over a wide range of densities, including the fcc crystal.

The complete solution of the master equation for a system of interacting particles of finite density is presented. By using a new form of the Bethe ansatz, the totally asymmetric exclusion process on a ring is solved for arbitrary initial conditions and time intervals.

We report quantum Monte Carlo calculations of superfluid Fermi gases with short-range two-body attractive interactions with infinite scattering length. The energy of such gases is estimated to be $(0.44\pm 0.01)$ times that of the noninteracting gas, and their pairing gap is approximately twice the energy per particle.

The first precise measurement of the Casimir force between dissimilar metals is reported. The attractive force, between a Cu layer evaporated on a microelectromechanical torsional oscillator and an Au layer deposited on an ${\mathrm{A}\mathrm{l}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_3$ sphere, was measured dynamically with a noise level of $6\mathrm{f}\mathrm{N}/\sqrt{\mathrm{H}\mathrm{z}}$. Measurements were performed for separations in the $0.2–2\mu \mathrm{m}$ range. The results agree to better than $1\%$ in the $0.2–0.5\mu \mathrm{m}$ range with a theoretical model that takes into account the finite conductivity and roughness of the two metals. The observed discrepancies, which are much larger than the experimental precision, can be attributed to a lack of a complete characterization of the optical properties of the specific samples used in the experiment.