title: Spin diffusion in trapped clouds of cold atoms with resonant interactions.
abstract: We show that puzzling recent experimental results on spin diffusion in a strongly interacting atomic gas may be understood in terms of the predicted spin diffusion coefficient for a generic strongly interacting system. Three important features play a central role: (a) Fick's law for diffusion must be modified to allow for the trapping potential; (b) the diffusion coefficient is inhomogeneous, due to the density variations in the cloud; and (c) the diffusion approximation fails in the outer parts of the cloud, where the mean free path is long.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Aarhus, Ny Munkegade, DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.
authors.forename: G M
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Bruun
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Pethick
mesh_terms: D003080:Cold Temperature; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004058:Diffusion; D008956:Models, Chemical; D008958:Models, Molecular; D013113:Spin Labels
chemical_list: D013113:Spin Labels