Acoustic attenuation probe for Fermion superfluidity in ultracold-atom gases

Dilute gas Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC's), currently used to cool fermionic atoms in atom traps, can also probe the superfluidity of these fermions. The damping rate of BEC-acoustic excitations (phonon modes), measured in the middle of the trap as a function of the phonon momentum, yields an unambiguous signature of BCS-like superfluidity, provides a measurement of the superfluid gap parameter, and gives an estimate of the size of the Cooper pairs in the BEC-BCS crossover regime. We also predict kinks in the momentum dependence of the damping rate which can reveal detailed information about the fermion quasiparticle dispersion relation.