2,674 research outputs found
Topological Phases of Sound and Light
Topological states of matter are particularly robust, since they exploit
global features insensitive to local perturbations. In this work, we describe
how to create a Chern insulator of phonons in the solid state. The proposed
implementation is based on a simple setting, a dielectric slab with a suitable
pattern of holes. Its topological properties can be wholly tuned in-situ by
adjusting the amplitude and frequency of a driving laser that controls the
optomechanical interaction between light and sound. The resulting chiral,
topologically protected phonon transport along the edges can be probed
completely optically. Moreover, we identify a regime of strong mixing between
photon and phonon excitations, which gives rise to a large set of different
topological phases. This would be an example of a Chern insulator produced from
the interaction between two physically very different particle species, photons
and phonons
Fermionic Mach-Zehnder interferometer subject to a quantum bath
We study fermions in a Mach-Zehnder interferometer, subject to a
quantum-mechanical environment leading to inelastic scattering, decoherence,
renormalization effects, and time-dependent conductance fluctuations. Both the
loss of interference contrast as well as the shot noise are calculated, using
equations of motion and leading order perturbation theory. The full dependence
of the shot-noise correction on setup parameters, voltage, temperature and the
bath spectrum is presented. We find an interesting contribution due to
correlations between the fluctuating renormalized phase shift and the output
current, discuss the limiting behaviours at low and high voltages, and compare
with simpler models of dephasing.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
Optomechanical creation of magnetic fields for photons on a lattice
We propose using the optomechanical interaction to create artificial magnetic
fields for photons on a lattice. The ingredients required are an optomechanical
crystal, i.e. a piece of dielectric with the right pattern of holes, and two
laser beams with the right pattern of phases. One of the two proposed schemes
is based on optomechanical modulation of the links between optical modes, while
the other is an lattice extension of optomechanical wavelength-conversion
setups. We illustrate the resulting optical spectrum, photon transport in the
presence of an artificial Lorentz force, edge states, and the photonic
Aharonov-Bohm effect. Moreover, wWe also briefly describe the gauge fields
acting on the synthetic dimension related to the phonon/photon degree of
freedom. These can be generated using a single laser beam impinging on an
optomechanical array
Decoherence induced by an interacting spin environment in the transition from integrability to chaos
We investigate the decoherence properties of a central system composed of two
spins 1/2 in contact with a spin bath. The dynamical regime of the bath ranges
from a fully integrable integrable limit to complete chaoticity. We show that
the dynamical regime of the bath determines the efficiency of the decoherence
process. For perturbative regimes, the integrable limit provides stronger
decoherence, while in the strong coupling regime the chaotic limit becomes more
efficient. We also show that the decoherence time behaves in a similar way. On
the contrary, the rate of decay of magnitudes like linear entropy or fidelity
does not depend on the dynamical regime of the bath. We interpret the latter
results as due to a comparable complexity of the Hamiltonian for both the
integrable and the fully chaotic limits.Comment: Submitted to Phys. Rev.
Dimensional Crossover of the Dephasing Time in Disordered Mesoscopic Rings: From Diffusive through Ergodic to 0D Behavior
We analyze dephasing by electron interactions in a small disordered quasi-one
dimensional (1D) ring weakly coupled to leads, where we recently predicted a
crossover for the dephasing time \tPh(T) from diffusive or ergodic 1D
(\tPh^{-1} \propto T^{2/3}, T^{1}) to behavior (\tPh^{-1} \propto
T^{2}) as drops below the Thouless energy \ETh. We provide a detailed
derivation of our results, based on an influence functional for quantum Nyquist
noise, and calculate all leading and subleading terms of the dephasing time in
the three regimes. Explicitly taking into account the Pauli blocking of the
Fermi sea in the metal allows us to describe the regime on equal footing
as the others. The crossover to , predicted by Sivan, Imry and Aronov for
3D systems, has so far eluded experimental observation. We will show that for
T \ll \ETh, dephasing governs not only the -dependence for the smooth
part of the magnetoconductivity but also for the amplitude of the
Altshuler-Aronov-Spivak oscillations, which result only from electron paths
winding around the ring. This observation can be exploited to filter out and
eliminate contributions to dephasing from trajectories which do not wind around
the ring, which may tend to mask the behavior. Thus, the ring geometry
holds promise of finally observing the crossover to experimentally.Comment: in "Perspectives of Mesoscopic Physics - Dedicated to Yoseph Imry's
70th Birthday", edited by Amnon Aharony and Ora Entin-Wohlman (World
Scientific, 2010), chap. 20, p. 371-396, ISBN-13 978-981-4299-43-
Introduction to Quantum Noise, Measurement and Amplification
The topic of quantum noise has become extremely timely due to the rise of
quantum information physics and the resulting interchange of ideas between the
condensed matter and AMO/quantum optics communities. This review gives a
pedagogical introduction to the physics of quantum noise and its connections to
quantum measurement and quantum amplification. After introducing quantum noise
spectra and methods for their detection, we describe the basics of weak
continuous measurements. Particular attention is given to treating the standard
quantum limit on linear amplifiers and position detectors using a general
linear-response framework. We show how this approach relates to the standard
Haus-Caves quantum limit for a bosonic amplifier known in quantum optics, and
illustrate its application for the case of electrical circuits, including
mesoscopic detectors and resonant cavity detectors.Comment: Substantial improvements over initial version; include supplemental
appendices
Controlled Dephasing of Electrons by Non-Gaussian Shot Noise
In a 'controlled dephasing' experiment [1-3], an interferometer loses its
coherence due to entanglement with a controlled quantum system ('which path'
detector). In experiments that were conducted thus far in mesoscopic systems
only partial dephasing was achieved. This was due to weak interactions between
many detector electrons and the interfering electron, resulting in a Gaussian
phase randomizing process [4-10]. Here, we report the opposite extreme: a
complete destruction of the interference via strong phase randomization only by
a few electrons in the detector. The realization was based on interfering edge
channels (in the integer quantum Hall effect regime, filling factor 2) in a
Mach-Zehnder electronic interferometer, with an inner edge channel serving as a
detector. Unexpectedly, the visibility quenched in a periodic lobe-type form as
the detector current increased; namely, it periodically decreased as the
detector current, and thus the detector's efficiency, increased. Moreover, the
visibility had a V-shape dependence on the partitioning of the detector
current, and not the expected dependence on the second moment of the shot
noise, T(1-T), with T the partitioning. We ascribe these unexpected features to
the strong detector-interferometer coupling, allowing only 1-3 electrons in the
detector to fully dephase the interfering electron. Consequently, in this work
we explored the non-Gaussian nature of noise [11], namely, the direct effect of
the shot noise full counting statistics [12-15].Comment: 14 pages, 4 figure
Optomechanical circuits for nanomechanical continuous variable quantum state processing
We propose and analyze a nanomechanical architecture where light is used to
perform linear quantum operations on a set of many vibrational modes. Suitable
amplitude modulation of a single laser beam is shown to generate squeezing,
entanglement, and state-transfer between modes that are selected according to
their mechanical oscillation frequency. Current optomechanical devices based on
photonic crystals may provide a platform for realizing this scheme.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figure
Strong coupling of a mechanical oscillator and a single atom
We propose and analyze a setup to achieve strong coupling between a single
trapped atom and a mechanical oscillator. The interaction between the motion of
the atom and the mechanical oscillator is mediated by a quantized light field
in a laser driven high-finesse cavity. In particular, we show that high
fidelity transfer of quantum states between the atom and the mechanical
oscillator is in reach for existing or near future experimental parameters. Our
setup provides the basic toolbox for coherent manipulation, preparation and
measurement of micro- and nanomechanical oscillators via the tools of atomic
physics.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, minro changes, accepted by PR
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning for Quantum Technologies
In recent years, the dramatic progress in machine learning has begun to impact many areas of science and technology significantly. In the present perspective article, we explore how quantum technologies are benefiting from this revolution. We showcase in illustrative examples how scientists in the past few years have started to use machine learning and more broadly methods of artificial intelligence to analyze quantum measurements, estimate the parameters of quantum devices, discover new quantum experimental setups, protocols, and feedback strategies, and generally improve aspects of quantum computing, quantum communication, and quantum simulation. We highlight open challenges and future possibilities and conclude with some speculative visions for the next decade
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