CAREER: Quantum Emulation of Strongly Driven Interacting Systems

University Of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara CA

Investigators

Abstract

Non-technical Abstract: Using lasers that can be turned on and off extremely quickly, scientists can now probe the behavior of electrons inside atoms at timescales smaller than a millionth of a billionth of a second. This capability has the potential to unlock new technologies, including cameras for imaging electron motion inside biomolecules, ultrafast information processors, and devices based on exotic non-equilibrium states of matter. However, these exciting developments will require major advances in our ability to understand and control non-equilibrium quantum systems. To this end, the research team is building an artificial solid in which trapped strontium atoms are used to emulate the behavior of electronic solids on ultrafast-equivalent timescales. Using this approach, the team aims to reveal hitherto invisible ultrafast processes in matter, in regimes beyond the limits of existing theories and experiments. Research activities are integrated into local science education at the high school, community college, undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral levels, with a focus on scientific professional development. As part of the project, the PI guides a multi-layered mentoring system in which graduate students and postdocs are trained to become advocates for science literacy and leaders who encourage broad participation in research. Technical Abstract: This project studies interactions between intense pulsed fields and solids using optically trapped ultracold strontium as a quantum emulator of ultrafast dynamics, thus probing some of the fastest processes in atomic physics using some of the slowest. As a result of this rescaling of time, the dynamics underlying ultrafast phenomena like tunnel ionization occur over milliseconds rather than attoseconds, and can be observed in extreme slow-motion. The research consists of three related efforts: (1) studies of the impulse response of interacting quantum systems; (2) exploration of exotic strong-driving Hamiltonians beyond those which are currently possible in the solid state; and (3) realization of controllable emergent non-equilibrium phases in driven lattice systems. The quantum-emulator-based approach enables clean realization and study of strong-field phenomena, provides a tool for validation and extension of existing approximate theories of ultrafast interactions, and opens the path to studying new forms of matter and new phenomena that emerge in non-equilibrium regimes beyond the reach of existing ultrafast experiments.