title: Theory of fractional Lévy kinetics for cold atoms diffusing in optical lattices.
abstract: Recently, anomalous superdiffusion of ultracold 87Rb atoms in an optical lattice has been observed along with a fat-tailed, Lévy type, spatial distribution. The anomalous exponents were found to depend on the depth of the optical potential. We find, within the framework of the semiclassical theory of Sisyphus cooling, three distinct phases of the dynamics as the optical potential depth is lowered: normal diffusion; Lévy diffusion; and x∼t(3/2) scaling, the latter related to Obukhov's model (1959) of turbulence. The process can be formulated as a Lévy walk, with strong correlations between the length and duration of the excursions. We derive a fractional diffusion equation describing the atomic cloud, and the corresponding anomalous diffusion coefficient.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Institute of Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 52900, Israel.
authors.forename: David A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Kessler
authors.forename: Eli
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Barkai