The scattering amplitude of ultracold atoms near the p-wave magnetic Feshbach Resonance

TL;DR

This paper calculates the p-wave scattering amplitude of ultracold atoms near a magnetic Feshbach resonance, revealing that the effective-range theory's accuracy depends on specific conditions related to the scattering parameters.

Contribution

The paper derives an explicit form of the p-wave scattering amplitude near the Feshbach resonance, including k-dependent parameters, and establishes conditions for the validity of the effective-range approximation.

Findings

The scattering amplitude includes additional k-dependent terms beyond the effective-range theory.

Effective-range theory is valid for $^{6}$Li and $^{40}$K when the scattering volume is enhanced.

Explicit conditions are provided for when the effective-range approximation holds.

Abstract

Most of the current theories on the p-wave superfluid in cold atomic gases are based on the effective-range theory for the two-body scattering, where the low energy p-wave scattering amplitude $f_1(k)$ is given by $% f_1(k)=-1/[ik+1/(\mathcal{V}k^2)+1/\mathcal{R}]$, where $k$ is the incident momentum, and $\mathcal{V}$ and $\mathcal{R}$ are the $k$-independent scattering volume and effective-range, respectively. However, due to the long-range nature of the van der Waals interaction between two colliding ultracold atoms, the p-wave scattering amplitude of the two atoms is not described by the effective-range theory. In this paper we provide an explicit calculation for the p-wave scattering of two ultracold atoms near the p-wave magnetic Feshbach resonance (PMFR). We show that the low energy p-wave scattering amplitude in the presence of PMFR takes the form $f_1(k)=-1/[ik+1/(\mathcal{V}^{\mathrm{eff}}k^2)+1/(\mathcal{S}^{\mathrm{eff}%}k)+1/\mathcal{R}^{\mathrm{eff}}]$ where $\mathcal{V}^{\mathrm{eff}},$ $% \mathcal{S}^{\mathrm{eff}}$ and $\mathcal{R}^{\mathrm{eff}}$ are $k$% -dependent parameters. Based on this result, we show sufficient conditions for the effective range theory to be a good approximation of the exact scattering amplitude. Using these conditions we show that the effective-range theory is a good approximation for the p-wave scattering in the ultracold gases of $^{6}$Li and $^{40}$K when the scattering volume is enhanced by the resonance.