`Baryonic' bound-state instability in trapped fermionic atoms

Abstract

We consider a homogeneous gas of spin-S fermionic atoms, as might occur near the center of an optical trap. In the case where all scattering lengths are negative and of the same magnitude we demonstrate the instability of the Fermi sea to the condensation of bound `baryonic' composites containing 2S+1 atoms. The gap in the excitation spectrum is calculated.