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arXiv · 2609.11858

Sub-cycle doublon-holon dynamics in one-dimensional Mott insulators revealed by two-color high-harmonic spectroscopy

Lance Hatch·Aditya Verma·Eric Schultz·Hanjun Yang·Priscila Rosa·Genda Gu·Igor Zaliznyak·Giulio Vampa·Laimei Nie·Hanzhe Liu
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Abstract

Solid-state high-harmonic spectroscopy is becoming an emerging tool for probing nonequilibrium many-body dynamics. Yet, direct measurements of strongly driven, sub-optical-cycle dynamics in correlated materials during high-harmonic emission remain largely unexplored. Here, we measure high-harmonic emission chirp in a prototypical one-dimensional Mott insulator, which encodes strongly driven doublon-holon dynamics at sub-optical-cycle timescales. We observe a positive chirp for above band gap harmonics, indicating that high harmonics are dominated by doublon-holon recombinations. We further show a harmonic order-dependent dephasing, which can be understood through different doublon-holon excursion distances associated with each harmonic. These results reveal coherent doublon-holon dynamics and their ultrafast dephasing in Mott insulators, which is relevant to other nonequilibrium light-induced phenomena, such as Floquet engineering.

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Lance Hatch, Aditya Verma, Eric Schultz, Hanjun Yang, Priscila Rosa, Genda Gu, Igor Zaliznyak, Giulio Vampa, Laimei Nie, Hanzhe Liu. 2026-09-10. Sub-cycle doublon-holon dynamics in one-dimensional Mott insulators revealed by two-color high-harmonic spectroscopy. https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.11858

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