Particle number fractionization of an atomic Fermi-Dirac gas in an optical lattice

摘要

We show that a dilute 2-species gas of Fermi-Dirac alkali-metal atoms in aperiodic optical lattice may exhibit fractionization of particle number whenthe two components are coupled via a coherent electromagnetic field with atopologically nontrivial phase profile. This results in fractional eigenvaluesof the spin operator with vanishing fluctuations. The fractional part can beaccurately controlled by modifying the effective detuning of theelectromagnetic field.