Beyond universality in three-body recombination: An effective field theory treatment

¹ Department of Physics and Astronomy, Ohio University - Athens, OH 45701, USA
² Helmholtz-Institut für Strahlen- und Kernphysik, Universität Bonn - D-53115, Bonn, Germany, EU
³ Department of Physics, Ohio State University - Columbus, OH 43120, USA
⁴ Institute for Nuclear Theory, University of Washington - Seattle, WA 98102, USA

^a jichen@phy.ohiou.edu

Received: 17 May 2010
Accepted: 21 September 2010

Abstract

We discuss the impact of a finite effective range on three-body systems interacting through a large two-body scattering length. By employing a perturbative analysis in an effective field theory well suited to this scale hierarchy we find that an additional three-body parameter is required for consistent renormalization once range corrections are considered. This allows us to extend previously discussed universal relations between different observables in the recombination of cold atoms to account for the presence of a finite effective range. We show that such range corrections allow us to simultaneously describe the positive and negative scattering-length loss features observed in recombination with ⁷Li atoms by the Bar-Ilan group. They do not, however, significantly reduce the disagreement between the universal relations and the data of the Rice group on ⁷Li recombination at positive and negative scattering lengths.