Phase conjugation of a quantum-degenerate atomic fermion beam.

Abstract

We discuss the possibility of phase conjugation of an atomic Fermi field via nonlinear wave mixing in an ultracold gas. It is shown that for a beam of fermions incident on an atomic phase-conjugate mirror, a time-reversed backward propagating fermionic beam is generated similar to the case in nonlinear optics. By adopting an operational definition of the phase, we show that it is possible to infer the presence of the phase-conjugate field by the loss of the interference pattern in an atomic interferometer.