3 research outputs found
Proposed realization of the Dicke-model quantum phase transition in an optical cavity QED system
The Dicke model describing an ensemble of two-state atoms interacting with a single quantized mode of the electromagnetic field (with omission of the Â^2 term) exhibits a zero-temperature phase transition at a critical value of the dipole coupling strength. We propose a scheme based on multilevel atoms and cavity-mediated Raman transitions to realize an effective Dicke model operating in the phase transition regime. Optical light from the cavity carries signatures of the critical behavior, which is analyzed for the thermodynamic limit where the number of atoms is very large
Optical signatures of quantum phase transitions in a light-matter system
Information about quantum phase transitions in conventional condensed matter
systems, must be sought by probing the matter system itself. By contrast, we
show that mixed matter-light systems offer a distinct advantage in that the
photon field carries clear signatures of the associated quantum critical
phenomena. Having derived an accurate, size-consistent Hamiltonian for the
photonic field in the well-known Dicke model, we predict striking behavior of
the optical squeezing and photon statistics near the phase transition. The
corresponding dynamics resemble those of a degenerate parametric amplifier. Our
findings boost the motivation for exploring exotic quantum phase transition
phenomena in atom-cavity, nanostructure-cavity, and
nanostructure-photonic-band-gap systems.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure