arXiv subjects

Alessio Celi

Publications and source records attributed to Alessio Celi.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

Unruh effect for interacting particles with ultracold atoms

The Unruh effect is a quantum relativistic effect where the accelerated observer perceives the vacuum as a thermal state. Here we propose the experimental realization of the Unruh effect for interacting ultracold fermions in optical lattices by a sudden quench resulting in vacuum acceleration with varying interactions strengths in the real temperature background. We observe the inversion of statistics for the low lying excitations in the Wightman function as a result of competition between the spacetime and BCS Bogoliubov transformations. This paper opens up new perspectives for simulators of quantum gravity.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2018

Diffusion through a network of compartments separated by partially-transmitting boundaries

We study the random walk of a particle in a compartmentalized environment, as realized in biological samples or solid state compounds. Each compartment is characterized by its length $L$ and the boundaries transmittance $T$. We identify two relevant spatio-temporal scales that provide alternative descriptions of the dynamics: i) the microscale, in which the particle position is monitored at constant time intervals; and ii) the mesoscale, in which it is monitored only when the particle crosses a boundary between compartments. Both descriptions provide --by construction-- the same long time behavior. The analytical description obtained at the proposed mesoscale allows for a complete characterization of the complex movement at the microscale, thus representing a fruitful approach for this kind of systems. We show that the presence of disorder in the transmittances is a necessary condition to induce anomalous diffusion, whereas the spatial heterogeneity reduces the degree of subdiffusion and, in some cases, can even compensate for the disorder induced by the stochastic transmittance.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2018

Effective control of chemical potentials by Rabi coupling with rf-fields in ultracold mixtures

We show that a linear term coupling the atoms of an ultracold binary mixture provides a simple method to induce an effective and tunable population imbalance between them. This term is easily realized by a Rabi coupling between different hyperfine levels of the same atomic species. The resulting effective imbalance holds for one-particle states dressed by the Rabi coupling and obtained diagonalizing the mixing matrix of the Rabi term. This way of controlling the chemical potentials applies for both bosonic and fermionic atoms and it allows also for spatially and temporally dependent imbalances. As a first application, we show that, in the case of two attractive fermionic hyperfine levels with equal chemical potentials and coupled by the Rabi pulse, the same superfluid properties of an imbalanced binary mixture are recovered. We finally discuss the properties of m-species mixtures in the presence of SU(m)-invariant interactions.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2017

Measuring Chern numbers in Hofstadter strips

Topologically non-trivial Hamiltonians with periodic boundary conditions are characterized by strictly quantized invariants. Open questions and fundamental challenges concern their existence, and the possibility of measuring them in systems with open boundary conditions and limited spatial extension. Here, we consider transport in Hofstadter strips, that is, two-dimensional lattices pierced by a uniform magnetic flux which extend over few sites in one of the spatial dimensions. As we show, an atomic wavepacket exhibits a transverse displacement under the action of a weak constant force. After one Bloch oscillation, this displacement approaches the quantized Chern number of the periodic system in the limit of vanishing tunneling along the transverse direction. We further demonstrate that this scheme is able to map out the Chern number of ground and excited bands, and we investigate the robustness of the method in presence of both disorder and harmonic trapping. Our results prove that topological invariants can be measured in Hofstadter strips with open boundary conditions and as few as three sites along one direction.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2017

Chiral spin currents in a trapped-ion quantum simulator using Floquet engineering

The most typical ingredient of topologically protected quantum states are magnetic fluxes. In a system of spins, complex-valued interaction parameters give rise to a flux, if their phases do not add up to zero along a closed loop. Here we apply periodic driving, a powerful tool for quantum engineering, to a trapped-ion quantum simulator in order to generate such spin-spin interactions. We consider a simple driving scheme, consisting of a repeated series of locally quenched fields, and demonstrate the feasibility of this approach by studying the dynamics of a small system. An emblematic hallmark of the flux, accessible in experiments, is the appearance of chiral spin currents. Strikingly, we find that in parameter regimes where, in the absence of fluxes, phonon excitations dramatically reduce the fidelity of the spin model simulation, the spin dynamics remains widely unaffected by the phonons when fluxes are present.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Different models of gravitating Dirac fermions in optical lattices

In this paper I construct the naive lattice Dirac Hamiltonian describing the propagation of fermions in a generic 2D optical metric for different lattice and flux-lattice geometries. First, I apply a top-down constructive approach that we first proposed in [Boada {\it et al.,New J. Phys.} {\bf 13} 035002 (2011)] to the honeycomb and to the brickwall lattices. I carefully discuss how gauge transformations that generalize momentum (and Dirac cone) shifts in the Brillouin zone in the Minkowski homogeneous case can be used in order to change the phases of the hopping. In particular, I show that lattice Dirac Hamiltonian for Rindler spacetime in the honeycomb and brickwall lattices can be realized by considering real and isotropic (but properly position dependent) tunneling terms. For completeness, I also discuss a suitable formulation of Rindler Dirac Hamiltonian in semi-synthetic brickwall and $π$-flux square lattices (where one of the dimension is implemented by using internal spin states of atoms as we originally proposed in [Boada {\it et al.,Phys. Rev. Lett. } {\bf 108} 133001 (2012)] and [Celi {\it et al.,Phys. Rev. Lett. } {\bf 112} 043001 (2012)]).

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2017

Synthetic Unruh effect in cold atoms

We propose to simulate a Dirac field near an event horizon using ultracold atoms in an optical lattice. Such a quantum simulator allows for the observation of the celebrated Unruh effect. Our proposal involves three stages: (1) preparation of the ground state of a massless 2D Dirac field in Minkowski spacetime; (2) quench of the optical lattice setup to simulate how an accelerated observer would view that state; (3) measurement of the local quantum fluctuation spectra by one-particle excitation spectroscopy in order to simulate a De Witt detector. According to Unruh's prediction, fluctuations measured in such a way must be thermal. Moreover, following Takagi's inversion theorem, they will obey the Bose-Einstein distribution, which will smoothly transform into the Fermi-Dirac as one of the dimensions of the lattice is reduced.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2016

Quantum optics and frontiers of physics: The third quantum revolution

The year 2015 was the International Year of Light. It marked, however, also the 20th anniversary of the first observation of Bose-Einstein condensation in atomic vapors by Eric Cornell, Carl Wieman and Wolfgang Ketterle. This discovery can be considered as one of the greatest achievements of quantum optics that has triggered an avalanche of further seminal discoveries and achievements. For this reason we devote this essay for focus issue on "Quantum Optics in the International Year of Light" to the recent revolutionary developments in quantum optics at the frontiers of all physics: atomic physics, molecular physics, condensed matter physics, high energy physics and quantum information science. We follow here the lines of the introduction to our book "Ultracold atoms in optical lattices: Simulating quantum many-body systems" [1]. The book, however, was published in 2012, and many things has happened since then -- the present essay is therefore upgraded to include the latest developments.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2016

Topology and the Kardar-Parisi-Zhang universality class

We study the role of the topology of the background space on the one-dimensional Kardar-Parisi-Zhang (KPZ) universality class. To do so, we study the growth of balls on disordered 2D manifolds with random Riemannian metrics, generated by introducing random perturbations to a base manifold. As base manifolds we consider cones of different aperture angles $θ$, including the limiting cases of a cylinder ($θ=0$, which corresponds to an interface with periodic boundary conditions) and a plane ($θ=π/2$, which corresponds to an interface with circular geometry). We obtain that in the former case the radial fluctuations of the ball boundaries follow the Tracy-Widom (TW) distribution of the largest eigenvalue of random matrices in the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble (TW-GOE), while on cones with any aperture angle $θ\neq 0$ fluctuations correspond to the TW-GUE distribution related with the Gaussian unitary ensemble. We provide a topological argument to justify the relevance of TW-GUE statistics for cones, and state a conjecture which relates the KPZ universality subclass with the background topology.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2016

Topological bound states of a quantum walk with cold atoms

We suggest a method for engineering a quantum walk, with cold atoms as walkers, which presents topologically non-trivial properties. We derive the phase diagram, and show that we are able to produce a boundary between topologically distinct phases using the finite beam width of the applied lasers. A topologically protected bound state can then be observed, which is pinned to the interface and is robust to perturbations. We show that it is possible to identify this bound state by averaging over spin sensitive measures of the atom's position, based on the spin distribution that these states display. Interestingly, there exists a parameter regime in which our system maps on to the Creutz ladder.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2016

Modified spin-wave theory and spin liquid behavior of cold bosons on an inhomogeneous triangular lattice

Ultracold bosons in a triangular lattice are a promising candidate for observing quantum spin liquid behavior. Here we investigate, for such system, the role of a harmonic trap giving rise to an inhomogeneous density. We construct a modified spin-wave theory for arbitrary filling, and predict the breakdown of order for certain values of the lattice anisotropy. These regimes, identified with the spin liquid phases, are found to be quite robust upon changes in the filling factor. This result is backed by an exact diagonalization study on a small lattice.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2015

Chains with loops - synthetic magnetic fluxes and topological order in one-dimensional spin systems

Engineering topological quantum order has become a major field of physics. Many advances have been made by synthesizing gauge fields in cold atomic systems. Here, we carry over these developments to other platforms which are extremely well suited for quantum engineering, namely trapped ions and nano-trapped atoms. Since these systems are typically one-dimensional, the action of artificial magnetic fields has so far received little attention. However, exploiting the long-range nature of interactions, loops with non-vanishing magnetic fluxes become possible even in one-dimensional settings. This gives rise to intriguing phenomena, such as fractal energy spectra, flat bands with localized edge states, and topological many-body states. We elaborate on a simple scheme for generating the required artificial fluxes by periodically driving an XY spin chain. Concrete estimates demonstrating the experimental feasibility for trapped ions and atoms in waveguides are given.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2014

Tensor Networks for Lattice Gauge Theories with continuous groups

We discuss how to formulate lattice gauge theories in the Tensor Network language. In this way we obtain both a consistent truncation scheme of the Kogut-Susskind lattice gauge theories and a Tensor Network variational ansatz for gauge invariant states that can be used in actual numerical computation. Our construction is also applied to the simplest realization of the quantum link models/gauge magnets and provides a clear way to understand their microscopic relation with Kogut-Susskind lattice gauge theories. We also introduce a new set of gauge invariant operators that modify continuously Rokshar-Kivelson wave functions and can be used to extend the phase diagram of known models. As an example we characterize the transition between the deconfined phase of the $Z_2$ lattice gauge theory and the Rokshar-Kivelson point of the U(1) gauge magnet in 2D in terms of entanglement entropy. The topological entropy serves as an order parameter for the transition but not the Schmidt gap.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2014

Quantum simulation of non-trivial topology

We propose several designs to simulate quantum many-body systems in manifolds with a non-trivial topology. The key idea is to create a synthetic lattice combining real-space and internal degrees of freedom via a suitable use of induced hoppings. The simplest example is the conversion of an open spin-ladder into a closed spin-chain with arbitrary boundary conditions. Further exploitation of the idea leads to the conversion of open chains with internal degrees of freedom into artificial tori and Möbius strips of different kinds. We show that in synthetic lattices the Hubbard model on sharp and scalable manifolds with non-Euclidean topologies may be realized. We provide a few examples of the effect that a change of topology can have on quantum systems amenable to simulation, both at the single-particle and at the many-body level.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2014

Quantum magnetism of ultracold atoms with a dynamical pseudospin degree of freedom

We consider bosons in a Hubbard lattice with an SU($\cal N$) pseudospin degree of freedom which is made dynamical via a coherent transfer term. It is shown that, in the basis which diagonalizes the pseudospin coupling, a generic hopping process affects the spin state, similar to a spin-orbit coupling. This results, for the system in the Mott phase, in a ferromagnetic phase with variable quantization axis. In extreme cases, it can even give rise to antiferromagnetic order.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Non-Abelian gauge fields and topological insulators in shaken optical lattices

Time-periodic driving like lattice shaking offers a low-demanding method to generate artificial gauge fields in optical lattices. We identify the relevant symmetries that have to be broken by the driving function for that purpose and demonstrate the power of this method by making concrete proposals for its application to two-dimensional lattice systems: We show how to tune frustration and how to create and control band touching points like Dirac cones in the shaken kagomé lattice. We propose the realization of a topological and a quantum spin Hall insulator in a shaken spin-dependent hexagonal lattice. We describe how strong artificial magnetic fields can be achieved for example in a square lattice by employing superlattice modulation. Finally, exemplified on a shaken spin-dependent square lattice, we develop a method to create strong non-Abelian gauge fields.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2007

Neither black-holes nor regular solitons: a no-go theorem

By studying the BPS equations for electrostatic and spherically symmetric configurations in N=2, d=5 gauged supergravity with vector multiplets and hypermultiplets coupled, we demonstrate that no regular supersymmetric black-hole solutions of this kind exist. Furthermore, we demonstrate that it is not possible to construct supersymmetric regular solitons that have the above symmetries. As a consequence the scalar flow associated to the BPS solutions is always unbounded.

hep-th↗

arXiv2007

Null Deformed Domain Wall

We study null 1/4 BPS deformations of flat domain wall solutions (NDDW) in N=2, d=5 gauged supergravity with hypermultiplets and vector multiplets coupled. These are uncharged time-dependent configurations and contain as special case, 1/2 supersymmetric flat domain walls (DW), as well as 1/2 BPS null solutions of the ungauged supergravity. Combining our analysis with the classification method initiated by Gauntlett et al., we prove that all the possible deformations of the DW have origin in the hypermultiplet sector or/and are null. Here, we classify all the null deformations: we show that they naturally organize themselves into "gauging" (v-deformation) and "non gauging" (u-deformation). They have different properties: only in presence of v-deformation is the solution supported by a time-dependent scalar potential. Furthermore we show that the number of possible deformations equals the number of matter multiplets coupled. We discuss the general procedure for constructing explicit solutions, stressing the crucial role taken by the integrability conditions of the scalars as spacetime functions. Two analytical solutions are presented. Finally, we comment on the holographic applications of the NDDW, in relation to the recently proposed time-dependent AdS/CFT.

hep-th↗