Coherent bimolecular reactions with quantum-degenerate matter waves

We demonstrate theoretically that the abstraction reaction A+ B2 →AB+B can be driven coherently and efficiently with quantum-degenerate bosonic or fermionic matter waves. We show that the initial stages of the reaction are dominated by quantum fluctuations, resulting in the appearance of macroscopic nonclassical correlations in the final atomic and molecular fields. The dynamics associated with the creation of bosonic and of fermionic dimer-atom pairs is also compared. This study opens up a promising regime of quantum-degenerate matter-wave chemistry.