Mass-imbalanced Fermi gases with spin-orbit coupling

TL;DR

This paper uses mean-field theory to explore the complex phase diagrams of spin-orbit coupled mass-imbalanced Fermi gases across the BCS-BEC crossover, revealing rich phases and topological transitions.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the ground-state phases of spin-orbit coupled mass-imbalanced Fermi gases, including topological phase transitions, using mean-field theory.

Findings

Rich phase diagrams with normal, superfluid, and phase-separated regions

Identification of quantum phase transitions between trivial and topological superfluids

Potential for experimental observation of exotic phases in cold atom systems

Abstract

We use the mean-field theory to analyze the ground-state phase diagrams of spin-orbit coupled mass-imbalanced Fermi gases throughout the BCS-BEC evolution, including both the population-balanced and -imbalanced systems. Our calculations show that the competition between the mass and population imbalance and the Rashba-type spin-orbit coupling (SOC) gives rise to very rich phase diagrams, involving normal, superfluid and phase separated regions. In addition, we find quantum phase transitions between the topologically trivial gapped superfluid and the nontrivial gapless superfluid phases, opening the way for the experimental observation of exotic phenomena with cold atom systems.