arXiv subjects

Simone De Liberato

Publications and source records attributed to Simone De Liberato.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

Resolution of superluminal signalling in non-perturbative cavity quantum electrodynamics

Recent technological developments have made it increasingly easy to access the non-perturbative regimes of cavity quantum electrodynamics known as ultra or deep strong coupling, where the light-matter coupling becomes comparable to the bare modal frequencies. In this work, we address the adequacy of the broadly used single-mode cavity approximation to describe such regimes. We demonstrate that, in the non-perturbative light-matter coupling regimes, the single-mode models become unphysical, allowing for superluminal signalling. Moreover, considering the specific example of the quantum Rabi model, we show that the multi-mode description of the electromagnetic field, necessary to account for light propagation at finite speed, yields physical observables that differ radically from their single-mode counterparts already for moderate values of the coupling. Our multi-mode analysis also reveals phenomena of fundamental interest on the dynamics of the intracavity electric field, where a free photonic wavefront and a bound state of virtual photons are shown to coexist.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Theory of four-wave-mixing in phonon polaritons

Third order anharmonic scattering in light-matter systems can drive a wide variety of practical and physically interesting processes from lasing to polariton condensation. Motivated by recent experimental results in the nonlinear optics of localised phonon polaritons, in this Letter we develop a quantum theory capable of describing four-wave mixing in arbitrarily inhomogeneous photonic environments. Using it we investigate Kerr self-interaction and parametric scattering of surface and localised phonon polaritons, showing both processes to be within experimental reach.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Virtual photons in the ground state of a dissipative system

Much of the novel physics predicted to be observable in the ultrastrong light-matter coupling regime rests on the hybridisation between states with different numbers of excitations, leading to a population of virtual photons in the system's ground state. In this article, exploiting an exact diagonalization approach, we derive both analytical and numerical results for the population of virtual photons in presence of arbitrary losses. Specialising our results to the case of Lorentzian resonances we then show that the virtual photon population is only quantitatively affected by losses, even when those become the dominant energy scale. Our results demonstrate most of the ultrastrong-coupling phenomenology can be observed in loss-dominated systems which are not even in the standard strong coupling regime. We thus open the possibility to investigate ultrastrong-coupling physics to platforms that were previously considered unsuitable due to their large losses.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Superradiance with local phase-breaking effects

We study the superradiant evolution of a set of $N$ two-level systems spontaneously radiating under the effect of phase-breaking mechanisms. We investigate the dynamics generated by non-radiative losses and pure dephasing, and their interplay with spontaneous emission. Our results show that in the parameter region relevant to many solid-state cavity quantum electrodynamics experiments, even with a dephasing rate much faster than the radiative lifetime of a single two-level system, a sub-optimal collective superfluorescent burst is still observable. We also apply our theory to the dilute excitation regime, often used to describe optical excitations in solid-state systems. In this regime, excitations can be described in terms of bright and dark bosonic quasiparticles. We show how the effect of dephasing and losses in this regime translates into inter-mode scattering rates and quasiparticle lifetimes.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Polariton spectrum of the Dicke-Ising model

The Dicke-Ising model describes cavity quantum electrodynamics setups in which dipoles couple not only with the photonic cavity field but also to each other through dipole-dipole interaction. In this work we diagonalise such a model in terms of bosonic polaritonic operators for arbitrarily large values of the light-matter coupling and for values of the dipole-dipole interaction until the onset of the ferromagnetic Ising phase transition. In order to accomplish this task we exploit higher order terms of the Holstein-Primakoff transformation, developing a general method which allows to solve the normal phase of the Ising model in term of bosonic excitations for large values of the dipole-dipole interaction. Our results shed light on the interplay between the dipole-dipole and the light-matter coupling strengths, and their effect on the virtual excitations which populate the ground-state when the interactions become comparable with the bare transition frequency.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Collective optomechanical effects in cavity quantum electrodynamics

We investigate a cavity quantum electrodynamic effect, where the alignment of two-dimensional freely rotating optical dipoles is driven by their collective coupling to the cavity field. By exploiting the formal equivalence of a set of rotating dipoles with a polymer we calculate the partition function of the coupled light-matter system and demonstrate it exhibits a second order phase transition between a bunched state of isotropic orientations and a stretched one with all the dipoles aligned. Such a transition manifests itself as an intensity-dependent shift of the polariton mode resonance. Our work, lying at the crossroad between cavity quantum electrodynamics and quantum optomechanics, is a step forward in the on-going quest to understand how strong coupling can be exploited to influence matter internal degrees of freedom.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Experimental verification of the very strong coupling regime in a GaAs quantum well microcavity

When the coupling between light and matter becomes comparable to the energy gap between different excited states they hybridize, leading to the appearance of a rich and complex phenomenology which attracted remarkable interest in recent years. While the mixing between states with different number of excitations, so-called ultrastrong coupling regime, has been observed in various implementations, the effect of the hybridization between different single excitation states, referred to as very strong coupling regime, has remained elusive. In semiconductor quantum wells such a regime is predicted to manifest as a photon-mediated electron-hole coupling leading to different excitonic wavefunctions for the two polaritonic branches when the ratio of the coupling strength to exciton binding energy approaches unity. Here, we verify experimentally the existence of this regime in magneto-optical measurements on a microcavity with 28 GaAs quantum wells, showing that the average electron-hole separation of the upper polariton is significantly increased compared to the bare quantum well exciton Bohr radius. This manifests in a diamagnetic shift around zero detuning that exceeds the shift of the lower polariton by one order of magnitude and the bare quantum well exciton diamagnetic shift by a factor of two. The lower polariton exhibits a diamagnetic shift smaller than expected from the coupling of a rigid exciton to the cavity mode which suggests more tightly bound electron-hole pairs than in the bare quantum well.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2017

Cavity QED Beyond Rotating Wave Approximation: Photon Bunching from the Emission of Individual Qubits

Photon antibunching in the light scattered by single quantum emitters is one of the hallmarks of quantum optics, providing an unequivocal demonstration of the quantized nature of the electromagnetic field. Antibunching can be intuitively understood by the need for a two-level system lying in its lower state after emitting a photon to be re-excited into the upper one before a second emission can take place. Here we show that such a picture breaks down in the ultrastrong light-matter coupling regime, when the coupling strength becomes comparable to the bare emitter frequency. Specialising to the cases of both a natural and a superconducting artificial atom, we thus show that a single emitter coupled to a photonic resonator can emit bunched light. The result presented herein is a clear evidence of how the ultrastrong coupling regime is able to change the nature of individual atoms.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2017

Theory of nonlinear polaritonics: $χ^{(2)}$ scattering on a $β$-SiC surface

In this article we provide a practical prescription to harness the rigorous microscopic, quantum level descriptions of light-matter systems provided by Hopfield diagonalisation for quantum description of nonlinear scattering. A general frame to describe the practically important second-order optical nonlinearities which underpin sum and difference frequency generation is developed for arbitrarily inhomogeneous dielectric environments. Specific attention is then focussed on planar systems with optical nonlinearity mediated by a polar dielectric $β$-SiC halfspace. In this system we calculate the rate of second harmonic generation and the result compared to recent experimental measurements. Furthermore the rate of difference frequency generation of subdiffraction surface phonon polaritons on the $β$-SiC halfspace by two plane waves is calculated. The developed theory is easily integrated with commercial finite element solvers, opening the way for calculation of second-order nonlinear scattering coefficients in complex geometries which lack analytical linear solutions.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2016

Light-matter decoupling in the deep strong coupling regime: The breakdown of the Purcell effect

Improvements both in the photonic confinement and in the emitter design have led to a steady increase in the strength of the light-matter coupling in cavity quantum electrodynamics experiments. This has allowed to access interaction-dominated regimes in which the state of the system can only be described in terms of mixed light-matter excitations. Here we show that, when the coupling between light and matter becomes strong enough, this picture breaks down, and light and matter degrees of freedom totally decouple. A striking consequence of such a counter-intuitive phenomenon is that the Purcell effect is reversed and the spontaneous emission rate, usually thought to increase with the light-matter coupling strength, plummets instead for large enough couplings.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2016

Theoretical Investigation of Phonon Polaritons in SiC Micropillar Resonators

Of late there has been a surge of interest in localised phonon polariton resonators which allow for sub-diffraction confinement of light in the mid-infrared spectral region by coupling to optical phonons at the surface of polar dielectrics. Resonators are generally etched on deep substrates which support propagative surface phonon polariton resonances. Recent experimental work has shown that understanding the coupling between localised and propagative surface phonon polaritons in these systems is vital to correctly describe the system resonances. In this paper we comprehensively investigate resonators composed of arrays of cylindrical SiC resonators on SiC substrates. Our bottom-up approach, starting from the resonances of single, free standing cylinders and isolated substrates, and exploiting both numerical and analytical techniques, allows us to develop a consistent understanding of the parameter space of those resonators, putting on firmer ground this blossoming technology.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2016

Real-space Hopfield diagonalization of inhomogeneous dispersive media

We introduce a real-space technique able to extend the standard Hopfield approach commonly used in quantum polaritonics to the case of inhomogeneous lossless materials interacting with the electromagnetic field. We derive the creation and annihilation polaritonic operators for the system normal modes as linear, space-dependent superpositions of the microscopic light and matter fields, and we invert the Hopfield transformation expressing the microscopic fields as functions of the polaritonic operators. As an example, we apply our approach to the case of a planar interface between vacuum and a polar dielectric, showing how we can consistently treat both propagative and surface modes, and express their nonlinear interactions, arising from phonon anharmonicity, as polaritonic scattering terms. We also show that our theory can be naturally extended to the case of dissipative materials.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2015

Excitonic spectral features in strongly-coupled organic polaritons

Starting from a microscopic model, we investigate the optical spectra of molecules in strongly-coupled organic microcavities examining how they might self-consistently adapt their coupling to light. We consider both rotational and vibrational degrees of freedom, focusing on features which can be seen in the peak in the center of the spectrum at the bare excitonic frequency. In both cases we find that the matter-light coupling can lead to a self-consistent change of the molecular states, with consequent temperature-dependent signatures in the absorption spectrum. However, for typical parameters, these effects are much too weak to explain recent measurements. We show that another mechanism which naturally arises from our model of vibrationally dressed polaritons has the right magnitude and temperature dependence to be at the origin of the observed data.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Theory of intersubband resonance fluorescence

The fluorescence spectrum of a strongly pumped two level system is characterised by the Mollow triplet that has been observed in a variety of systems, ranging from atoms to quantum dots and superconducting qubits. We theoretically studied the fluorescence of a strongly pumped intersubband transition in a quantum well. Our results show that the many-electron nature of such a system leads to a modification of the usual Mollow theory. In particular, the intensity of the central peak in the fluorescence spectrum becomes a function of the electron coherence, allowing access to the coherence time of a two dimensional electron gas through a fluorescence intensity measurement.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Coherent coupling between localised and propagating phonon polaritons

Following the recent observation of localised phonon polaritons in user-defined silicon carbide nano-resonators, here we demonstrate coherent coupling between those localised modes and propagating phonon polaritons bound to the surface of the nano-resonator's substrate. In order to obtain phase-matching, the nano-resonators have been fabricated to serve the double function of hosting the localised modes, while also acting as grating for the propagating ones. The coherent coupling between long lived, optically accessible localised modes, and low-loss propagative ones, opens the way to the design and realisation of phonon-polariton based quantum circuits.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Perspectives for gapped bilayer graphene polaritonics

Bilayer graphene is normally a semimetal with parabolic dispersion, but a tunable bandgap up to few hundreds meV can be opened by breaking the symmetry between the layers through an external potential. Ab-initio calculations show that the optical response around the bandgap is strongly dominated by bound excitons, whose characteristics and selection rules differ from the usual excitons found in semiconductor quantum wells. In this work we study the physics of those excitons resonantly coupled to a photonic microcavity, assessing the possibility to reach the strong and the ultrastrong coupling regimes of light-matter interaction. We discover that both regimes are experimentally accessible, thus opening the way for a most promising technological platform, combining mid-infrared quantum polaritonics with the tunability and electronic features of graphene bilayers.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Ground State Electroluminescence

Electroluminescence, the emission of light in the presence of an electric current, provides information on the allowed electronic transitions of a given system. It is commonly used to investigate the physics of strongly-coupled light-matter systems, whose eigenfrequencies are split by the strong coupling with the photonic field of a cavity. Here we show that, together with the usual electroluminescence, systems in the ultrastrong light-matter coupling regime emit a uniquely quantum radiation when a flow of current is driven through them. While standard electroluminescence relies on the population of excited states followed by spontaneous emission, the process we describe herein extracts bound photons by the dressed ground state and it has peculiar features that unequivocally distinguish it from usual electroluminescence.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2015

Generation of Rabi frequency radiation using exciton-polaritons

We study the use of exciton-polaritons in semiconductor microcavities to generate radiation spanning the infrared to terahertz regions of the spectrum by exploiting transitions between upper and lower polariton branches. The process, which is analogous to difference-frequency generation (DFG), relies on the use of semiconductors with a nonvanishing second-order susceptibility. For an organic microcavity composed of a nonlinear optical polymer, we predict a DFG irradiance enhancement of $2.8\cdot10^2$, as compared to a bare nonlinear polymer film, when triple resonance with the fundamental cavity mode is satisfied. In the case of an inorganic microcavity composed of (111) GaAs, an enhancement of $8.8\cdot10^3$ is found, as compared to a bare GaAs slab. Both structures show high wavelength tunability and relaxed design constraints due to the high modal overlap of polariton modes.

physics.optics↗