Simulating Chiral Magnetic and Separation Effects with Spin-Orbit Coupled Atomic Gases

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that rotating spin-orbit coupled atomic gases can simulate chiral magnetic and separation effects, typically studied in quark-gluon plasma, by inducing analogous currents and mass quadrupoles.

Contribution

It introduces a novel simulation platform using atomic gases to mimic quantum anomaly-induced effects observed in high-energy physics.

Findings

Analogous chiral effects occur in rotating atomic gases with Weyl-Zeeman spin-orbit coupling.

Rotation induces a mass quadrupole in the atomic cloud along the rotation axis.

Atomic gases can serve as potential experimental simulators for chiral magnetic phenomena.

Abstract

The chiral magnetic and chiral separation effects---quantum-anomaly-induced electric current and chiral current along an external magnetic field in parity-odd quark-gluon plasma---have received intense studies in the community of heavy-ion collision physics. We show that analogous effects occur in rotating trapped Fermi gases with Weyl-Zeeman spin-orbit coupling where the rotation plays the role of an external magnetic field. These effects can induce a mass quadrupole in the atomic cloud along the rotation axis which may be tested in future experiments. Our results suggest that the spin-orbit coupled atomic gases are potential simulators of the chiral magnetic and separation effects.