Anomalous quantum mass flow of atoms in p-wave resonance

TL;DR

This paper predicts a novel quantum phenomenon in p-wave superfluids where a persistent anomalous mass current arises due to chiral gapless quasiparticles bound to a topological domain wall, linking superfluidity with quantum anomalies.

Contribution

It introduces a new topological defect in p-wave superfluids, explicitly solves for it, and predicts a chiral mass current resulting from bound quasiparticles, connecting superfluidity with quantum anomalies.

Findings

Discovery of a domain wall as a topological defect.

Existence of chiral gapless quasiparticles bound to the wall.

Prediction of a persistent anomalous mass current in the superfluid ground state.

Abstract

I analyze an atomic Fermi gas with a planar p-wave interaction, motivated by the experimentally observed anisotropy in p-wave Feshbach resonances. An axial superfluid state is verified. A domain wall object is discovered to be a new topological defect of this superfluid and an explicit solution has been found. Gapless quasiparticles appear as bound states on the wall, dispersing in the space of reduced dimensions. Surprisingly, they are chiral, deeply related to fermion zero modes and anomalies in quantum chromodynamics. The chirality of the superfluid is manifested by a persistent anomalous mass current of atoms in the groundstate. This spectacular quantum phenomenon is a prediction for future experiments.