Simulating dense QCD matter with ultracold atomic boson-fermion mixtures

TL;DR

This paper models dense quark matter using ultracold atomic mixtures, exploring phase transitions and symmetry breaking patterns as a function of interaction strength, providing insights into QCD phenomena through cold atom analogs.

Contribution

It introduces a cold atom analog for dense QCD matter, analyzing phase structure and symmetry breaking with tunable interactions, a novel approach in quantum simulation.

Findings

Weak attraction leads to a mixture of Bose-Einstein condensate and degenerate fermions.

Strong attraction results in composite fermions that are superfluid.

The phase diagram relates to that of dense QCD, showing similar symmetry breaking patterns.

Abstract

We delineate, as an analog of two-flavor dense quark matter, the phase structure of a many-body mixture of atomic bosons and fermions in two internal states with a tunable boson-fermion attraction. The bosons b correspond to diquarks, and the fermions f to unpaired quarks. For weak b-f attraction, the system is a mixture of a Bose-Einstein condensate and degenerate fermions, while for strong attraction composite b-f fermions N, analogs of the nucleon, are formed, which are superfluid due to the N-N attraction in the spin-singlet channel. We determine the symmetry breaking patterns at finite temperature as a function of the b-f coupling strength, and relate the phase diagram to that of dense QCD.