Pair wave functions in atomic Fermi condensates

Abstract

Recent experiments have observed condensation behavior in a strongly interacting system of fermionic atoms. We interpret these observations in terms of a mean-field version of resonance superfluidity theory. We find that the objects condensed are not bosonic molecules composed of bound fermion pairs, but are rather spatially correlated Cooper pairs whose coherence length is comparable to the mean spacing between atoms. We propose experiments that will help to further probe these novel pairs.