P. M. Preiss | Searcharxiv

arXiv2019

Density Oscillations Induced by Individual Ultracold Two-Body Collisions

Access to single-particle momenta provides new means of studying the dynamics of a few interacting particles. In a joint theoretical and experimental effort, we observe and analyze the effects of a finite number of ultracold two-body collisions on the relative and single-particle densities by quenching two ultracold atoms with an initial narrow wave packet into a wide trap with an inverted aspect ratio. The experimentally observed spatial oscillations of the relative density are reproduced by a parameter-free zero-range theory and interpreted in terms of cross-dimensional flux. We theoretically study the long-time dynamics and find that the system does not approach its thermodynamic limit. The setup can be viewed as an advanced particle collider that allows one to watch the collision process itself.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2017

Probing the conformal Calabrese-Cardy scaling with cold atoms

We demonstrate that current experiments using cold bosonic atoms trapped in one-dimensional optical lattices and designed to measure the second-order Renyi entanglement entropy S_2, can be used to verify detailed predictions of conformal field theory (CFT) and estimate the central charge c. We discuss the adiabatic preparation of the ground state at half-filling where we expect a CFT with c=1. This can be accomplished with a very small hoping parameter J, in contrast to existing studies with density one where a much larger J is needed. We provide two complementary methods to estimate and subtract the classical entropy generated by the experimental preparation and imaging processes. We compare numerical calculations for the classical O(2) model with a chemical potential on a 1+1 dimensional lattice, and the quantum Bose-Hubbard Hamiltonian implemented in the experiments. S_2 is very similar for the two models and follows closely the Calabrese-Cardy scaling, (c/8)\ln(N_s), for N_s sites with open boundary conditions, provided that the large subleading corrections are taken into account.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗