arXiv subjects

Henning Moritz

Publications and source records attributed to Henning Moritz.

34 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2010

A Mott insulator of fermionic atoms in an optical lattice

In a solid material strong interactions between the electrons can lead to surprising properties. A prime example is the Mott insulator, where the suppression of conductivity is a result of interactions and not the consequence of a filled Bloch band. The proximity to the Mott insulating phase in fermionic systems is the origin for many intriguing phenomena in condensed matter physics, most notably high-temperature superconductivity. Therefore it is highly desirable to use the novel experimental tools developed in atomic physics to access this regime. Indeed, the Hubbard model, which encompasses the essential physics of the Mott insulator, also applies to quantum gases trapped in an optical lattice. However, the Mott insulating regime has so far been reached only with a gas of bosons, lacking the rich and peculiar nature of fermions. Here we report on the formation of a Mott insulator of a repulsively interacting two-component Fermi gas in an optical lattice. It is signalled by three features: a drastic suppression of doubly occupied lattice sites, a strong reduction of the compressibility inferred from the response of double occupancy to atom number increase, and the appearance of a gapped mode in the excitation spectrum. Direct control of the interaction strength allows us to compare the Mott insulating and the non-interacting regime without changing tunnel-coupling or confinement. Our results pave the way for further studies of the Mott insulator, including spin ordering and ultimately the question of d-wave superfluidity.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2010

Lifetime of double occupancies in the Fermi-Hubbard model

We investigate the decay of artificially created double occupancies in a repulsive Fermi-Hubbard system in the strongly interacting limit using diagrammatic many-body theory and experiments with ultracold fermions on optical lattices. The lifetime of the doublons is found to scale exponentially with the ratio of the on-site repulsion to the bandwidth. We show that the dominant decay process in presence of background holes is the excitation of a large number of particle hole pairs to absorb the energy of the doublon. We also show that the strongly interacting nature of the background state is crucial in obtaining the correct estimate of the doublon lifetime in these systems. The theoretical estimates and the experimental data are in fair quantitative agreement.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2009

Analog control of open quantum systems under arbitrary decoherence

We derive and investigate a general non-Markovian equation for the time-dependence of a Hamiltonian that maximizes the fidelity of a desired quantum gate on any finite-dimensional quantum system in the presence of arbitrary bath and noise sources. The method is illustrated for a single-qubit gate implemented on a three-level system.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2007

Interaction-controlled transport of an ultracold Fermi gas

We explore the transport properties of an interacting Fermi gas in a three-dimensional optical lattice. The center of mass dynamics of the atoms after a sudden displacement of the trap minimum is monitored for different interaction strengths and lattice fillings. With increasingly strong attractive interactions the weakly damped oscillation, observed for the non-interacting case, turns into a slow relaxational drift. Tuning the interaction strength during the evolution allows us to dynamically control the transport behavior. Strong attraction between the atoms leads to the formation of local pairs with a reduced tunneling rate. The interpretation in terms of pair formation is supported by a measurement of the number of doubly occupied lattice sites. This quantity also allows us to determine the temperature of the non-interacting gas in the lattice to be as low as (27\pm2)% of the Fermi temperature.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2006

Detecting multi-atomic composite states in optical lattices

We propose and discuss methods for detecting quasi-molecular complexes which are expected to form in strongly interacting optical lattice systems. Particular emphasis is placed on the detection of composite fermions forming in Bose-Fermi mixtures. We argue that, as an indirect indication of the composite fermions and a generic consequence of strong interactions, periodic correlations must appear in the atom shot noise of bosonic absorption images, similar to the bosonic Mott insulator [S. Fölling, et al., Nature {\bf 434}, 481 (2005)]. The composites can also be detected directly and their quasi-momentum distribution measured. This method -- an extension of the technique of noise correlation interferometry [E. Altman et al., Phys. Rev. A {\bf 79}, 013603 (2004)] -- relies on measuring higher order correlations between the bosonic and fermionic shot noise in the absorption images. However, it fails for complexes consisting of more than three atoms.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2006

Bose-Fermi Mixtures in a Three-dimensional Optical Lattice

We have studied mixtures of fermionic $^{40}$K and bosonic $^{87}$Rb quantum gases in a three-dimensional optical lattice. We observe that an increasing admixture of the fermionic species diminishes the phase coherence of the bosonic atoms as measured by studying both the visibility of the matter wave interference pattern and the coherence length of the bosons. Moreover, we find that the attractive interactions between bosons and fermions lead to an increase of the boson density in the lattice which we measure by studying three-body recombination in the lattice. In our data we do not observe three-body loss of the fermionic atoms. An analysis of the thermodynamics of a noninteracting Bose-Fermi mixture in the lattice suggests a mechanism for sympathetic cooling of the fermions in the lattice.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2006

Strongly Interacting Atoms and Molecules in a 3D Optical Lattice

We report on the realization of a strongly interacting quantum degenerate gas of fermionic atoms in a three-dimensional optical lattice. We prepare a band-insulating state for a two-component Fermi gas with one atom per spin state per lattice site. Using a Feshbach resonance, we induce strong interactions between the atoms. When sweeping the magnetic field from the repulsive side towards the attractive side of the Feshbach resonance we induce a coupling between Bloch bands leading to a transfer of atoms from the lowest band into higher bands. Sweeping the magnetic field across the Feshbach resonance from the attractive towards the repulsive side leads to two-particle bound states and ultimately to the formation of molecules. From the fraction of formed molecules we determine the temperature of the atoms in the lattice.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2006

Molecules of Fermionic Atoms in an Optical Lattice

We create molecules from fermionic atoms in a three-dimensional optical lattice using a Feshbach resonance. In the limit of low tunnelling, the individual wells can be regarded as independent three-dimensional harmonic oscillators. The measured binding energies for varying scattering length agree excellently with the theoretical prediction for two interacting atoms in a harmonic oscillator. We demonstrate that the formation of molecules can be used to measure the occupancy of the lattice and perform thermometry.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2006

Fermionic atoms with tunable interactions in a 3D optical lattice

We report on the realization of a quantum degenerate atomic Fermi gas in an optical lattice. Fermi surfaces of noninteracting fermions are studied in a three-dimensional lattice. Using a Feshbach resonance, we observe a coupling of the Bloch bands in the strongly interacting regime.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2005

p-Wave Interactions in Low-Dimensional Fermionic gases

We study a spin-polarized degenerate Fermi gas interacting via a p-wave Feshbach resonance in an optical lattice. The strong confinement available in this system allows us to realize one- and two-dimensional gases and therefore to restrict the asymptotic scattering states of atomic collisions. When aligning the atomic spins along (or perpendicular to) the axis of motion in a one-dimensional gas, scattering into channels with the projection of the angular momentum of |m|=1 (or m=0) can be inhibited. In two and three dimensions we observe the doublet structure of the p-wave Feshbach resonance. Both for the one-dimensional and the two-dimensional gas we find a shift of the position of the resonance with increasing confinement due to the change in collisional energy. In a three-dimensional optical lattice the losses on the Feshbach resonance are completely suppressed.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2005

Confinement induced molecules in a 1D Fermi gas

We have observed two-particle bound states of atoms confined in a one-dimensional matter wave guide. These bound states exist irrespective of the sign of the scattering length, contrary to the situation in free space. Using radio-frequency spectroscopy we have measured the binding energy of these dimers as a function of the scattering length and confinement and find good agreement with theory. The strongly interacting one-dimensional Fermi gas which we create in an optical lattice represents a realization of a tunable Luttinger liquid.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

arXiv2005

Fermionic atoms in a 3D optical lattice: Observing Fermi-surfaces, dynamics and interactions

We have studied interacting and non-interacting quantum degenerate Fermi gases in a three-dimensional optical lattice. We directly image the Fermi surface of the atoms in the lattice by turning off the optical lattice adiabatically. Due to the confining potential gradual filling of the lattice transforms the system from a normal state into a band insulator which constitutes a high fidelity quantum register. The dynamics of the transition from a band insulator to a normal state is studied and the time scale is measured to be an order of magnitude larger than the tunneling time in the lattice. Using a Feshbach resonance we increase the interaction between atoms in two different spin states and dynamically induce a coupling between the lowest energy bands. We observe a shift of this coupling with respect to the Feshbach resonance in free space which is anticipated for strongly confined atoms.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

arXiv2004

Excitations of a Superfluid in a 3D Optical Lattice

We prepare a Bose-Einstein condensed gas in a three-dimensional optical lattice and study the excitation spectrum of the superfluid phase for different interaction strengths. We probe the response of the system by modulating the depth of the optical lattice along one axis. The interactions can be controlled independently by varying the tunnel coupling along the other two lattice axes. In the weakly interacting regime we observe a small susceptibility of the superfluid to excitations, while for stronger interactions an unexpected resonance appears in the excitation spectrum. In addition we measure the coherent fraction of the atomic gas, which determines the depletion of the condensate.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

arXiv2004

1D Bose Gases in an Optical Lattice

We report on the study of the momentum distribution of a one-dimensional Bose gas in an optical lattice. From the momentum distribution we extract the condensed fraction of the gas and thereby measure the depletion of the condensate and compare it with a theorical estimate. We have measured the coherence length of the gas for systems with average occupation $\bar{n}>1$ and $\bar{n}<1$ per lattice site.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

arXiv2004

Exciting Collective Oscillations in a Trapped 1D Gas

We report on the realization of a trapped one dimensional Bose gas and its characterization by means of measuring its lowest lying collective excitations. The quantum degenerate Bose gas is prepared in a 2D optical lattice and we find the ratio of the frequencies of the lowest compressional (breathing) mode and the dipole mode to be $(ω_B/ω_D)^2\simeq3.1$, in accordance with the Lieb-Liniger and mean-field theory. For a thermal gas we measure $(ω_B/ω_D)^2\simeq4$. By heating the quantum degenerate gas we have studied the transition between the two regimes. For the lowest number of particles attainable in the experiment the kinetic energy of the system is similar to the interaction energy and we enter the strongly interacting regime.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2004

Transition from a strongly interacting 1D superfluid to a Mott insulator

We study one-dimensional trapped Bose gases in the strongly interacting regime. The systems are created in an optical lattice and are subject to a longitudinal periodic potential. Bragg spectroscopy enables us to investigate the excitation spectrum of the one-dimensional gas in different regimes. In the superfluid phase a broad continuum of excitations is observed which calls for an interpretation beyond the Bogoliubov spectrum taking into account the effect of quantum depletion. In the Mott insulating phase a discrete spectrum is measured. The excitation spectra of both phases are compared to the three-dimensional situation and to the crossover regime from one to three dimensions. The coherence length and coherent fraction of the gas in all configurations are measured quantitatively. We observe signatures for increased fluctuations which are characteristic for 1D systems. Furthermore, ceasing collective oscillations near the transition to the Mott insulator phase are found.

cond-mat.soft↗