Theory of cooling by flow through narrow pores

Abstract

We consider the possibility of adding a stage to a dilution refrigerator to provide additional cooling by ``filtering out'' hot atoms. Three methods are considered: 1) Effusion, where holes having diameters larger than a mean-free path allow atoms to pass through easily; 2) Particle waveguide-like motion using very narrow channels that greatly restrict the quantum states of the atoms in a channel. 3) Wall-limited diffusion through channels, in which the wall scattering is disordered so that local density equilibrium is established in a channel. We assume that channel dimension are smaller than the mean-free path for atom-atom interactions. The particle waveguide and the wall-limited diffusion methods using channels on order of the de Broglie wavelength give cooling. Recent advances in nano-filters give this method some hope of being practical.