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Physics Condensed Matter Quantum Gases

cond-mat.quant-gas Watch Quantum Gases

Monday 7 September

Quantum Gases

Nonequilibrium full counting statistics of multicomponent strongly-interacting quantum gases with defects

Ovidiu I. Patu, Oleksandr Gamayun and Catalin Pascu Moca

We investigate the full counting statistics of a one-dimensional multicomponent impenetrable gas released from a bipartite state in the presence of a local defect. Spin–charge separation reduces the multivariate generating function to an exact Fredholm determinant whose kernel is built from time-evolved single-particle orbitals. Expressing these orbitals in terms of scattering data gives access to both transient dynamics and the nonequilibrium steady state. We derive the leading long-time asymptotics and identify persistent oscillations in densities and currents caused by multiple bound states at the junction. We argue that interactions between components lead to a linear low-temperature correction to the current, in contrast to the quadratic correction in the single-component case. At equilibrium, we obtain the M-Wright distribution of spin transfer with $t^{1/4}$ scaling.
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Sunday 6 September

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from astro-ph.GA

Fractional Bose-Einstein Condensate Dark Matter Cores: Numerical GPP Solutions and SPARC Rotation Curves

Akila Labadi, Mohamed Benarous and Ahmed Hocine

We investigate a fractional Bose Einstein condensate dark matter scenario in which an ultralight bosonic component forms a self gravitating core embedded in a predominantly cold dark matter halo. The stationary GPP system solved numerically beyond the TF approximation leads to energetically bound equilibrium configurations and good phenomenological fits to the selected rotation curves from 30 SPARC galaxies.
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Quantum Gases

Superfluidity in active quantum flocks

Byjesh N. Radhakrishnan, Reyhaneh Khasseh, Thomas Schmidt et al. (+1 more)

Active quantum matter has very recently emerged at the intersection between bio- and quantum many-body physics, combining the self-organization of living systems with the coherence of the quantum world. Active quantum systems have been shown to exhibit flocking - a collective phenomenon with no precedent in equilibrium quantum physics. In this work we uncover an unexpected layer of quantum order in active quantum flocks: they can become superfluid. We show that, in addition to the symmetry breaking associated with their directed motion, these flocks can also break an additional U(1) symmetry, giving rise to off-diagonal long-range order. For a microscopic model of active hard-core bosons governed by Lindblad dynamics, we derive an effective long-wavelength description of the single-particle density matrix and demonstrate that the flocking phase develops an instability toward off-diagonal long-range order characteristic of superfluid behavior. Our findings reveal active quantum matter as a promising research direction for discovering exotic nonequilibrium phases of quantum matter.
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All authors Byjesh N. Radhakrishnan, Reyhaneh Khasseh, Thomas Schmidt, Markus Heyl

Quantum Gases

Dynamical signatures of Hardcore-Boson Supersolid on the Triangular Lattice

Xingchuan Zhu, Qingyang Guo, Junsong Sun et al. (+6 more)

We investigate the dynamical signatures of the supersolid phase in the triangular-lattice hardcore Bose-Hubbard model via large-scale quantum Monte Carlo simulations and linear spin-wave theory. We reveal a distinct momentum-space separation in the spectral weights. The transverse spectrum shows gapless Goldstone modes at the $\Gamma$ and $K$ points, while the longitudinal spectrum features a gapless mode at $K$ and a roton-like minimum at $M$. Directly in the imaginary-time domain, the supersolid is unambiguously characterized by the coexistence of transverse spectral lines at $\Gamma$ and $K$. Furthermore, we show that strong quantum fluctuations induce a breakdown of the sharp quasiparticle picture, leading to asymmetric line shapes and broad continua. Our work establishes the definitive dynamical signatures of the hardcore-boson supersolid, providing key insights into analogous spin supersolids in triangular quantum magnets.
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All authors Xingchuan Zhu, Qingyang Guo, Junsong Sun, Yujun Fu, Xingmin Huo, Yixuan Huang, Shiping Feng, Richard T. Scalettar, Huaiming Guo

Saturday 5 September

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from physics.comp-ph

A Boson-informed neural network for Ground States of Many-Body Schrödinger equations

Zhizhong Kong, Jerry Zhijian Yang, Cheng Yuan et al. (+1 more)

We propose a symmetry-preserving Boson-informed neural network (BINN) for the variational Monte Carlo computation of interacting-boson ground states in continuous space. The framework explicitly separates the two dominant physical scales of the system. At the microscopic interaction scale, a cell Jastrow factor absorbs the leading near-contact stiffness, while at the macroscopic scale, a potential-aware envelope encodes the external confinement, leaving the neural network to capture a smoother many-body residual. Across both two- and three-dimensional tests, the BINN approaches the Hartree and Gross-Pitaevskii limits with an empirical $\mathcal{O}(N^{-1})$ finite-size trend in both energy and density. The energies agree with diffusion Monte Carlo to within $0.06\%$ for the particle number tested up to $350$ in the three-dimensional shrinking-range case. Applications are made under various trapping scenarios, justifying robust performance of BINN.
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All authors Zhizhong Kong, Jerry Zhijian Yang, Cheng Yuan, Xiaofei Zhao

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from quant-ph

Wigner Time: a data-oriented approach to experimental timeline creation for quantum science and technology

T. W. Clark, B. Sárközi, A. Dombi et al. (+6 more)

Precisely timed, multi-device control in atomic, molecular and optical physics is provided by specialized real-time systems, which impose their own terms on the description of the experiment: a program over a global clock, in which every stage boundary is an absolute time computed from everything preceding it. Such descriptions are tightly coupled – changing one stage affects all later ones – and are correspondingly hard to reuse, inspect, or move elsewhere. We introduce Wigner Time, a Python package in which the experimental procedure is instead represented as data: a table of timed updates, assembled by composing functions and referred to named points in the experiment rather than to absolute instants. Hardware enters only at a final conversion step, leaving the description readable and back-end agnostic. Wigner Time has run two cold-atom setups for more than two years, where replacing a hand-written real-time program improved the achievable temporal resolution five-fold; the design applies to any domain requiring precise multi-device timing.
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All authors T. W. Clark, B. Sárközi, A. Dombi, Á. Kurkó, D. Nagy, A. Simon, D. Varga, P. Domokos, A. Vukics

Friday 4 September

Quantum Gases

Generating quantum error correcting codes from topological pre-thermal scars

William N. Faugno, Frank Barrows, Terry A. Loring et al. (+2 more)

Quantum many-body scars are rare nonthermal states embedded within otherwise thermalizing spectra, making them promising candidates for storing and manipulating quantum information. However, a general framework that can both identify such states without prior knowledge of their microscopic scarring mechanism and determine when they enable a quantum error correcting code has remained elusive. Here, we develop an end-to-end framework connecting nonthermal-state discovery to certifiable quantum error correction using a many-body spectral localizer. By searching for states jointly localized in energy and a diagnostic observable in systems with a many-body grading symmetry, the spectral localizer identifies candidate scars within dense many-body spectra in tandem with a topological index whose shifts determine their graded subspace. For suitable pairs of same-graded scars, the grading renders grading-odd errors exactly detectable, while their localization can suppress the logical action of sufficiently local grading-even error products, yielding an approximate Knill–Laflamme condition and an operator-algebra quantum error-correction structure. We demonstrate the scar-identification framework in one- and two-dimensional density-difference-dependent bosonic models and in the PXP model, and explicitly construct the resulting approximate quantum code in the one-dimensional bosonic system. Our results establish a systematic route from identifying nonthermal many-body states to exploiting them for protecting quantum information, and position pseudospectral methods as a broadly applicable tool for discovering useful behaviors in interacting quantum systems.
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All authors William N. Faugno, Frank Barrows, Terry A. Loring, Nathan Goldman, Alexander Cerjan

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from hep-th

Matrix Holography on an Optical Lattice

Robin Löwenberg and Julian Sonner

We propose an analog quantum-simulation protocol based on a lattice of atomic ensembles and time-averaged Floquet dynamics to construct the four-body potentials that typically appear in bosonic BFSS-like matrix quantum mechanics. In contrast to gate-based digital implementations requiring deep circuits, our approach generates the target model through a fixed set of control stages per Floquet cycle, keeping the number of consecutive unitaries constant with respect to the matrix size $N$. The principal scaling cost in our construction is given by the frequency range required to control the growing lattice. We show that this cost grows at most as $\mathcal{O}(N^3)$, giving a polynomial scaling route to large$-N$, attractive to experimental implementation. Additionally, we demonstrate that the coupling parameter can be tuned beyond $\mathcal{O}(1)$, enabling the simulation of strong-coupling physics necessary for holographic phases.
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Quantum Gases

Quantum Quenches across the Bose-glass Transition

Bo Song, Shaurya Bhave, Emmanuel Gottlob et al. (+2 more)

Due to their intrinsic interplay between long-range order and quasi-disorder, quasicrystalline systems provide a rich platform for investigating novel quantum phenomena. Here we study the non-equilibrium dynamics following quantum quenches across the superfluid to Bose-glass transition using ultracold bosons in an optical quasicrystal. Fast quenches into the Bose glass regime induce a quantum walk in momentum space that spreads over increasingly higher momentum orders. Conversely, quenches into the superfluid regime initiate a real-space quantum walk of initially localized atoms, forming a light-cone-like structure bounded by Lieb-Robinson limits. Characteristic timescales reveal strong links to the underlying Hamiltonian and are governed primarily by quasi-disorder strength in the Bose glass phase, and by tunneling strength in the superfluid phase. Finally, we analyze slower quenches into deeper lattices and observe the decay of coherence across the phase transition.
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All authors Bo Song, Shaurya Bhave, Emmanuel Gottlob, Leanne Reeve, Ulrich Schneider

Quantum Gases

How dipolar interactions structure molecular droplets

Wiiliam Freitas, Panagiotis Giannakeas and Jan M. Rost

We investigate how dipolar interactions between microwave-shielded polar molecules structure the self-bound droplets formed under variation of the interaction strength. We identify the transition from droplets to crystals as a finite-size first order transition. With droplet-ring states and transitional supersolid states we predict additional structure in the crystal and droplet phases, respectively. To describe this strongly correlated regime, and in particular the reconfiguration of quantum ground states, we design a variational Monte Carlo framework based on neural quantum states. It is especially suitable to describe ground states and almost degenerate states with very different configurations. Moreover, one can easily determine the superfluid fraction. Our results reveal the sequence of finite-size structures through which dipolar interactions reorganize molecular droplets into crystals.
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Quantum Gases

Fluctuations of a Photon Bose-Einstein Condensate Coupled to a Reservoir: Describing Coherence Properties in a Free-Energy Model

Martin Weitz, Andreas Redmann, Riccardo Panico et al. (+4 more)

Photons are mutually nearly noninteracting particles, so thermalized photon ensembles are commonly obtained not from direct particle-particle-interactions but rather from contact with matter, which can constitute a reservoir for the photon gas. We develop a theory model for photons in a material-filled (e.g. liquid dye) optical microcavity, with the aim to study the fluctuation properties using a free-energy description for noninteracting photons coupled to a reservoir of material electronic excitations. To begin with, we use a single mode description for the condensate. For a small relative size of the material reservoir, corresponding to the canonical regime, condensate number fluctuations are small, and the derived free energy landscape takes the usual Mexican-hat shaped form such that spontaneous symmetry breaking occurs. In contrast, for a large relative size of the reservoir, corresponding to the grand canonical regime, fluctuations become as large as the average particle number. We show that the resulting free energy landscape acquires a bowl-shaped form, with a single minimum at the origin. Thus, a macroscopic occupation of the ground state (i.e., Bose-Einstein condensation) in the absence of spontaneous symmetry breaking is expected. We also provide a model for the treatment of a photon gas trapped in a box-shaped potential with spatially distributed coupling to a reservoir. The model predicts, for example, a statistically fluctuating pattern of islands with long-range coherence, resembling transient microcondensates.
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All authors Martin Weitz, Andreas Redmann, Riccardo Panico, Leon Kleeblank, Kevin J.H. Peters, Frank Vewinger, Julian Schmitt

Quantum Gases

Spin-Charge Subordination in the Infinite-$U$ $SU(N)$ Hubbard Chain

Cătălin Paşcu Moca, Ovidiu I. Pâţu, Gergely Zaránd et al. (+1 more)

We obtain the exact full counting statistics of charge and flavor transport in the one-dimensional infinite-$U$ $SU(N)$ Hubbard model. The no-passing constraint freezes the ordered flavor sequence while the particle coordinates evolve as free spinless fermions. Consequently, charge transfer is governed by a free-fermion determinant, whereas flavor transfer is exactly subordinated to the number of particles crossing the observation cut. For an arbitrary traceless Cartan generator this yields an exact relation between the charge and flavor cumulants. The complete asymptotic flavor distribution is a universal non-Gaussian M-Wright law. Together, these results establish spin–charge subordination as a kinematic mechanism for anomalously slow internal-state transport in one-dimensional impenetrable quantum gases.
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All authors Cătălin Paşcu Moca, Ovidiu I. Pâţu, Gergely Zaránd, Balázs Dóra

Thursday 3 September

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from hep-lat

Non-Abelian string melting and thermalization in an open lattice gauge theory

Erick Parra Verde, Giovanni Cataldi, Stefan Kühn et al. (+2 more)

Open-system lattice gauge theory (LGT) has so far been developed predominantly in Abelian settings, leaving open how genuinely non-Abelian gauge structure reshapes dissipative real-time dynamics. Here, we study a $1+1$D SU(2) Yang–Mills LGT with dynamical matter coupled to a thermal scalar environment through a gauge-preserving Lindblad evolution, which we solve using tensor networks. Starting from a quark–antiquark pair connected by a chromoelectric flux string, we find that the thermal medium melts the string by delocalizing the color charges and screening the flux; on resonance, this dissipative melting competes with and delays coherent string breaking. The thermalization time is non-monotonic in the environment coupling, decreasing through environment-assisted transport at weak dissipation before increasing in a quantum-Zeno regime. In the strong-dephasing limit, a Schrieffer–Wolff expansion maps the dynamics to a classical exclusion process and yields the Liouvillian thermalization time analytically. Beyond these generic open-system effects, the non-Abelian matter structure produces a systematic mesonic bias in the steady state, while the thermalization time decreases with temperature, in contrast to the Abelian Schwinger model trend and in qualitative agreement with pNRQCD studies of the quark–gluon plasma. These results establish a gauge-preserving framework for thermalization and string dynamics in open non-Abelian lattice gauge theories.
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All authors Erick Parra Verde, Giovanni Cataldi, Stefan Kühn, Giuseppe Magnifico, Jad C. Halimeh

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from hep-lat

Real-Time String Dynamics in $3+1$D Lattice Quantum Electrodynamics

Helen Zwölfer, Giovanni Cataldi, Umberto Borla et al. (+1 more)

Understanding real-time string dynamics in three spatial dimensions is essential for connecting quantum simulations of lattice gauge theories (LGTs) to the physical dimensionality of QED and QCD, where transverse fluctuations and competing local processes proliferate. We present the first real-time simulations of string breaking in $3+1$D lattice quantum electrodynamics. Using tree tensor networks, we simulate the quench dynamics of electric flux strings in a $3\!+\!1$D U(1) LGT with dynamical matter. At strong coupling, the string breaks resonantly at a sharp resonance condition of mass and gauge couplings, converting electric energy into matter–antimatter pairs that screen the static charges. Off resonance, we classify all competing channels—pair production, string deformations and extensions, and flux loops—whose multiplicity, extensive for pair production and flux loops, depletes the string sector even far from resonance. A channel-resolved perturbation theory quantitatively reproduces these dynamics and their Fourier spectrum. Our results establish diagnostics and benchmarks for upcoming quantum simulators of higher-dimensional LGTs.
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All authors Helen Zwölfer, Giovanni Cataldi, Umberto Borla, Jad C. Halimeh

Quantum Gases

Three-observable measurement of the critical velocity in a paraxial superfluid of light flowing past a mobile impurity

T. Aladjidi, M. Baker-Rasooli, T. D. Ferreira et al. (+4 more)

We report the measurement of the critical velocity of a paraxial superfluid of light flowing past a mobile impurity, realized using a dual-wavelength optical scheme in a warm vapor of $^{87}\text{Rb}$. The superflow is two-dimensional by nature, while the impurity features a highly repulsive potential, a large tunable radius, and a finite mass. The critical velocity is evaluated by simultaneously monitoring three complementary observables: the number of vortices nucleated in the wake of the impurity, the hydrodynamic force exerted on it, and its displacement velocity relative to the flow. These independent methods yield consistent values for the critical velocity, which remain systematically below the Landau criterion and decrease with the impurity radius, in qualitative agreement with theoretical expectations. Our results demonstrate the reliability of these combined diagnostics, establishing paraxial superfluids of light as a versatile platform for exploring the impurity problem in quantum hydrodynamics.
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All authors T. Aladjidi, M. Baker-Rasooli, T. D. Ferreira, A. Bramati, M. Albert, Q. Glorieux, P.-É. Larré

Quantum Gases

Finite-temperature mass gap and quench dynamics of mobile impurities in a Fermi gas

Baihua Gong

Recently, a mass-gap description of mobile impurities in a Fermi gas was introduced, which connects Anderson's orthogonality catastrophe for static impurities to the quasiparticle picture of Fermi polarons through a recoil-induced energy gap in the fermionic dispersion. That description, however, was restricted to zero temperature and did not address dynamics. Here we generalize the mass-gap model to finite temperature by combining the Lee–Low–Pines transformation with a self-consistent Hartree–Fock decoupling of the recoil-induced interaction, and we study the quench dynamics within this framework using the functional-determinant approach. At finite temperature the effective mass gap obeys the self-consistency equation $\Delta(T)=2U_F\tanh[\Delta(T)/4k_B T]$, with $U_F=k_F^2/2M$ and $M$ the impurity mass. This equation admits a nonzero solution below the characteristic temperature $T^*=U_F/(2k_B)$ and closes as $(T^*-T)^{1/2}$. We identify this closing as the mean-field signature of the thermal melting of the polaron and molecule quasiparticles. Computing the Ramsey response $S(t)$ after a sudden quench of the impurity–fermion interaction, we find that its long-time oscillations—quantum beats between the bound and in-gap states—disappear precisely above $T^*$. Our work ties the thermodynamic and dynamical fingerprints of polaron formation to a single temperature-dependent mean-field parameter.
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Quantum Gases

Universal scaling of fluctuations and correlations across the superfluid transition

Paul Paquiez, Géraud Dupuy, Maxime Allemand et al. (+6 more)

The critical behavior of a system near a continuous phase transition is commonly characterized by power laws and a set of universal critical exponents. Yet universality at phase transitions has even more fundamental manifestations. It dictates that all observables follow universal scaling functions, which may extend beyond simple power laws. Furthermore, microscopic details are captured entirely by only two system-specific scale factors, that rescale any measured quantity onto its universal form. In this work, we report the experimental validation of this prediction in ultracold lattice Bose gases undergoing the superfluid transition. We extract the scale factors by collapsing the order-parameter cumulants measured at varying entropies. We show that these factors specify scaling functions governing both the order-parameter distribution and two-point correlations. By measuring these scaling functions, we also determine three critical exponents $\beta$, $\gamma$ and $\nu$. Our results provide an experimental demonstration that universal scaling is simultaneously obeyed by multiple observables in a quantum many-body system.
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All authors Paul Paquiez, Géraud Dupuy, Maxime Allemand, Henri Coquinot, Tommaso Roscilde, Nicolas Dupuis, Adam Rançon, Thomas Chalopin, David Clément

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from quant-ph

Revealing Many-Body Phases at finite temperatures through Quantum Coherence Distribution

Antonio Palamara, Nicola Lo Gullo, Antonello Sindona et al. (+1 more)

We introduce a diagnostic framework based on the full probability distribution of quantum coherence to probe single-particle and many-body phases at finite temperature. We first apply this approach to the localization transition in the non-interacting Aubry-André model and then extend the analysis to its interacting counterpart, whose phase diagram is substantially richer. We show that the moments of the coherence distribution provide clear signatures of quantum phase transitions and capture the emergence of many-body phases. More importantly, we find that the entropy of the coherence distribution emerges as an even more powerful indicator, retaining clear signatures of the underlying quantum phases while remaining remarkably robust against increasing thermal fluctuations.
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All authors Antonio Palamara, Nicola Lo Gullo, Antonello Sindona, Francesco Plastina

Wednesday 2 September

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from quant-ph

Robust Hamiltonian engineering with subensemble control

Wenjie Gong, Matteo Votto and Soonwon Choi

We present a robust protocol to reshape interactions in a spin ensemble based on global control pulse sequences applied to multiple subensembles in parallel. This setting arises naturally from ensembles of solid-state defects or multi-species atomic arrays. We show that it is provably computationally hard to find pulse sequences that simultaneously engineer interactions both within and between subensembles. Despite its formal hardness, we identify a set of necessary or sufficient conditions under which one can synthesize a target Hamiltonian from the native one. Moreover, we introduce efficient numerical strategies for designing pulse sequences that engineer target Hamiltonians robust against common control imperfections. As a specific application, we discuss the robust generation of two-mode spin squeezing in dual-species atomic ensembles, which is a challenging task without subensemble control. Our results provide a practical toolbox to design novel quantum simulation and sensing experiments with minimal control overhead.
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Quantum Gases

Dynamical stabilisation of a quantum fluid using a single topological defect

Deborah Capecchi, Paolo Comaron, Antonio Gianfrate et al. (+5 more)

The size and shape of a quantum fluid in equilibrium is strongly influenced by the inter-particle interactions. In the attractive interaction regime, atomic quantum fluids ultimately collapse in a violent process that expels most of the particles from the macroscopically occupied state. Here, we use a quantum fluid of light in propagating geometry as an analogue to a two-dimensional Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) with large attractive interactions to show that non-trivial topology significantly alters the dynamical behaviour of the collapse, enhancing the BEC stability and delaying the collapse time by an order of magnitude. We measure direct experimental signatures of topology affecting quantum hydrodynamics, unveiling the inherent competition between attractive nonlinearities, that lead to the collapse, and the preservation of topological charge from a multi-charged vortex. We fully characterise the collapse process in coordinate space and the eventual `solitonification' of the system and connect it to the mode structure of the excitation spectrum.
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All authors Deborah Capecchi, Paolo Comaron, Antonio Gianfrate, Milena De Giorgi, Dario Ballarini, Daniele Sanvitto, Franco Dalfovo, Dimitrios Trypogeorgos

Quantum Gases

Magnetic-Field-Calibration-Free Determination of the Hyperfine Constant $A$ in Ultracold Fermi gases of $^{40}$K

Yajing Yang, Biao Shan, Yuhang Zhao et al. (+8 more)

Hyperfine constant $A$ is a key parameter of the hyperfine structure and underpins precision spectroscopy and metrology. In this Letter, we develop a magnetic-field-calibration-free method for determining the ground-state hyperfine constant $A$ in an ultracold $^{40}$K Fermi gas by utilizing a pair of magnetically insensitive ("clock") transitions. This overcomes the stringent magnetic-field calibration requirements of conventional methods. We measure the transition frequency between these two magnetically insensitive transitions with Hz-level resolution over a range of magnetic fields, and obtain the ground-state hyperfine constant $A = -h\times 285.730536(2)\,\mathrm{MHz}$, corresponding to an absolute uncertainty of about $2\,\mathrm{Hz}$. Our value reduces the uncertainty by nearly three orders of magnitude compared with previous determinations, providing a substantially improved reference for high-precision spectroscopy and metrology with $^{40}$K.
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All authors Yajing Yang, Biao Shan, Yuhang Zhao, Jiahui Shen, Zhuxiong Ye, Liangchao Chen, Zengming Meng, Pengjun Wang, Wei Han, Jing Zhang, Lianghui Huang

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from math-ph

Precise spectral asymptotics, exponential localization, and spectral gap estimates for the three-boson lattice Schrödinger operator

Janikul Abdullaev, Abdumalik Eshniyozov, Abdikhurayra Toshturdiev et al. (+1 more)

We study three identical bosons with contact attraction of strength mu on the square lattice at total quasimomentum K = 0 and K = pi. First, at K = 0, for all sufficiently large mu there are exactly two eigenvalues below the essential spectrum. The trimer branch follows from Kato perturbation theory at the simple isolated eigenvalue 3 of the pair-contact operator, uniformly in K; the atom-dimer branch follows from a Feshbach-Schur reduction whose limiting equation coincides with the second Birman-Schwinger (Faddeev) eigenvalue of the finite-rank principal part. The spectral gap between the two branches grows linearly in mu. Second, at K = pi the trimer branch is unchanged up to O(mu^-2), the two-particle threshold equals -mu + 4 exactly, and the gap to it is 2mu - 2 plus lower order corrections. The second bound state disappears because the exchange operator changes sign, S_pi = -S_0: the s-channel eigenvalue that exceeds 1 at K = 0 becomes negative, while the only positive atom-dimer channel at K = pi is the odd p-channel, bounded by 2 - 4/pi < 1. Consequently the operator has exactly one eigenvalue below the threshold minus 36/(mu - 10). Third, the ground state is exponentially localized in the relative coordinates. The decay exponent is positive unconditionally; under a non-cancellation hypothesis it is bounded above by log(3mu) plus lower order terms, while finite-volume computations indicate the slowest tail is the atom-dimer dissociation channel with decay rate one half log(2mu). A dictionary between the principal-part method, Kato theory, and the atom-dimer threshold matrix is given, together with the three-dimensional constants for comparison.
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All authors Janikul Abdullaev, Abdumalik Eshniyozov, Abdikhurayra Toshturdiev, Mikhail Dolgopolov

Quantum Gases

Bell inequality violation with momentum-entangled massive particles

Y. S. Athreya, S. Kannan, X. T. Yan et al. (+3 more)

Bell's theorem revealed the fundamental incompatibility between the predictions of quantum mechanics and local realism. Bell inequality violations have since demonstrated quantum nonlocality using photons and internal states of massive particles, but never using their motional states. Here we report the first Bell inequality violation in the motional states of massive particles. Using momentum-entangled pairs of metastable helium atoms manipulated by matter-wave interferometry, we measure a Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) Bell parameter of $S = 2.52 \pm 0.17$, violating the CHSH-Bell inequality ($S \le 2$). Our work completes a long-standing objective in quantum atom optics by extending Bell tests from internal quantum variables to the external degrees of freedom of massive particles, opening a new regime for exploring quantum nonlocality in matter waves and for investigating the interplay between quantum mechanics and gravity.
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All authors Y. S. Athreya, S. Kannan, X. T. Yan, K. V. Kheruntsyan, A. G. Truscott, S. S. Hodgman

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from quant-ph

Maximal-velocity deficit under a finite-support constraint in a hard-wall half-line continuous-time quantum walk

Kangqiao Liu and Deyou Chen

Continuous-time quantum walks on a lattice spread ballistically and converge to a limiting distribution for the rescaled position. On the hard-wall half line the boundary reflects the walker but does not change the bulk dispersion, so the ballistic front remains set by the maximal group velocity. We ask how close one can get to this front when the initial state is constrained to occupy only the first $M$ sites. We show that optimizing the moment-generating function of the limiting-velocity distribution over this finite-support class reduces to the principal eigenvalue of an explicit $M\times M$ Hermitian matrix, which yields the optimal state by direct diagonalization. For large $M$, a near-front scaling limit produces a continuum description that controls the entire peak region. In particular, the maximal mean drift approaches the front with an inverse-square deficit in $M$ and a constant prefactor $\pi^2/4$. Numerical results verify both the finite-$M$ spectral formulation and the predicted scaling.
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Tuesday 1 September

Quantum Gases

Non-Additivity of Microwave-Shielded Interactions between Dipolar Molecules

Fabian Prieschl, Andreas Schindewolf and Robert E. Zillich

Theoretical models of the effective interactions between microwave-shielded polar molecules typically rely on the assumption of pairwise additivity. In this work, we test the validity of this pairwise approximation by evaluating the exact many-body potential energy for configurations of three and four molecules. We demonstrate that this approximation fails for molecule configurations in the plane of the circularly polarized microwave field. In these planar geometries, many-body effects significantly increase the depth of the attractive potential well and shift the position of the repulsive barrier. Although out-of-plane interactions in three-dimensional arrangements weaken this non-additivity, the effective interactions between microwave-shielded dipoles are not a simple sum of pair interactions. In particular, their attractive well, crucial for self-bound clusters, can only be described by the full many-body potential energy.
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Quantum Gases

Kelvin-Helmholtz instability in annular superfluids across the UFG-BCS crossover

Michał Śliwiński, Klejdja Xhani and Gabriel Wlazłowski

We investigate the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability of counter-rotating annular Fermi superfluids using time-dependent superfluid density functional theory. When the two initially separated superflows merge, a necklace of quantized vortices forms at their interface and subsequently becomes unstable. We extract mode-resolved instability growth rates and study their dependence on relative flow velocity, interaction strength, and temperature across the strongly interacting unitary regime and the weakly attractive BCS regime. In the unitary gas and moderate BCS regimes, the growth rates remain qualitatively consistent with the point-vortex model, though systematically at or above its predictions, with no significant dependence on interaction strength or temperature up to approximately $0.3 T_c$. Deeper in the BCS regime, the dynamics change qualitatively: boundary-generated antivortices proliferate faster than the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability itself, destroying the initial vortex necklace before the instability can fully develop. These results provide a microscopic benchmark for Kelvin-Helmholtz dynamics in fermionic superfluids and help constrain possible explanations of the existing experiment-theory discrepancy.
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Quantum Gases

Quantum antidipolar systems in two-dimensional geometries

Juan Sánchez-Baena and Jordi Boronat

Particles with magnetic moment can be polarized, and rapidly rotated, employing a magnetic field such that the dipolar interaction among them changes sign, becoming antidipolar and thus isotropically attractive in a plane. Polar molecules can also be manipulated using microwave dressing fields to invert the sign of the dipole-dipole interaction. In this work, we study a two-dimensional system of antidipolar particles by calculating its equation of state and structural properties. The system behaves as a liquid even for scattering lengths significantly greater than the dipolar length. For large enough densities, the system transitions to a solid with one particle per lattice site via a first-order phase transition at a significantly smaller density than its dipolar counterpart. Moreover, motivated by the recent realization of a strongly axially trapped, bilayer geometry [Science 384, 546-551 (2024)], we study the properties of the bilayer liquid phase as the inter-layer distance is tuned, and provide the range of parameters where one layer can influence the properties of the other.
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Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from physics.optics

Topological charge switching in trapped polariton condensates

Jaewon Kim, Hyun Gyu Song, Daegwang Choi et al. (+1 more)

Topological charges in photonic systems provide a robust degree of freedom with direct applications in optical information processing. Bound states in the continuum (BICs) in photonic crystal slabs inherently carry such quantized topological charges, yet they are topologically protected, making active reconfiguration fundamentally challenging. Here, we demonstrate topological charge switching in trapped BIC polariton condensates in a photonic crystal, where spatial modulation of the photonic crystals supports multiple confined states, each carrying a distinct charge. Trapped condensates within the Dirac bandgap are expelled into the leaky band via polariton blueshift, enabling single-mode selection by solely tuning the excitation power. This work offers a platform for optically controlling topological charges by harnessing polariton nonlinearity.
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All authors Jaewon Kim, Hyun Gyu Song, Daegwang Choi, Yong-Hoon Cho

Monday 31 August

Quantum Gases · Cross-listed from gr-qc

Guiding center quantization of a quantum Hall analog of Hawking radiation

Rodrigo Andrade e Silva and Ted Jacobson

We revisit the quantum Hall analog of Hawking radiation in which a Fermi sea of electrons occupying half of a plane, subjected to a quadrupolar electric potential, gives rise to analog Hawking radiation of chiral edge modes. We show that the phenomenon is accurately captured by quantization of the classical guiding center theory, where the gyroscopic motion of the electrons is coarse grained and only the drift motion is resolved. The quantum dynamics takes place on a non-commutative plane, which requires an electron localized in the half-plane to be supported everywhere along the edge direction. This kinematical constraint on the quantum state leads directly to the radiation, which propagates in both directions away from the origin along the edge. The radiation is thermal with respect to laboratory time, which is equal (up to a constant factor) to the boost angle in the analog Minkowski spacetime in which the chiral edge modes propagate, so in fact it corresponds to analog Unruh radiation.
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Quantum Gases

Temporal Signature of Bosonic Stimulation Induced by Dark Exciton in a Two-photon Pumped Polariton Condensate

Nadav Landau, Dmitry Panna, Sarit Feldman et al. (+4 more)

Strongly-coupled light-matter exciton-polaritons constitute an on-chip solid-state platform where the macroscopic quantum phenomenon of condensation is not only achievable at elevated temperatures, but can also be optically controlled, including through their interaction with inaccessible "dark" states. A recent study has shown that polariton condensation can be established under nonlinear two-photon pumping, paving the way towards dark state-condensate coherent control and highly-efficient terahertz (THz) lasing. In this letter, we show for the first time a temporal signature of dark exciton induced bosonic stimulation by investigating one- and two-photon pumped condensation with time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy. Our results show a clear difference in the detuning dependence of the buildup and relaxation rates of the condensate-induced blueshifts under one- and two-photon pumping. This difference is associated with the stronger exciton-fraction dependence expected for one-photon pumped condensation, where polariton-polariton stimulation dominates, compared with two-photon pumped condensation, where a 2p-exciton-to-lower-polariton THz transition can provide another stimulation channel, together with various spin-flip, electron-hole exchange and phonon-based mechanisms. These observations indicate the presence of a new dark state originated stimulation channel that could facilitate highly-efficient THz lasing in semiconductor microcavities.
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All authors Nadav Landau, Dmitry Panna, Sarit Feldman, Sebastian Brodbeck, Christian Schneider, Sven Höfling, Alex Hayat