We determine the zero-temperature density profile of a cloud of fermionic atoms in a trap subject to a mutual attractive interaction, as the strength of the interaction is progressively increased. We find a significant decrease of the size of the atomic cloud as it evolves from the weak-coupling regime of overlapping Cooper pairs to the strong-coupling (Bose-Einstein) regime of nonoverlapping bound-fermion pairs. Most significantly, we find a pronounced increase of the value of the density at the center of the trap (even by an order of magnitude) when evolving between the two regimes. Our results are based on a generalized Thomas-Fermi approximation for the superfluid state, which covers continuously all coupling regimes.

• Received 28 November 2002

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.68.031601