Ultracold Atoms as Strongly Correlated Systems

Ultracold atoms are obviously important in atomic physics and have played a major role in the improvement of high-resolution spectroscopy, as well as in the study of atomic scattering and the formation of ultracold molecules. However, it came as a surprise the range of applications and insights of relevance in condensed matter physics, with ultracold atoms playing the intermediate role between ideal, noninteracting systems fully dominated by quantum statistics and manifesting universal behavior and strongly correlated systems for which analytical treatments are lacking. From the theoretical standpoint, ultracold atoms are systems in which interactions can be controlled, offering therefore a continuum of possibilities precluded to the usual condensed matter systems.