Collective dynamics of fermion clouds in cigar-shaped traps

Abstract

The propagation of zero sound in a spin-polarized Fermi gas under harmonic confinement is studied as a function of the mean-field interactions with a second Fermi gas. A local-density treatment is compared with the numerical solution of the Vlasov-Landau equations for the propagation of density distortions in a trapped two-component Fermi gas at temperature T = 0.2 T-F. The response of the gas to the sudden creation of a sharp hole at its centre is also studied numerically. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.