Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:0801.2406 · Physical Review A

Many-body Rabi oscillations of Rydberg excitation in small mesoscopic samples

Jovica Stanojevic, Robin Côté

Published Sep 28, 2009• 44 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We investigate collective aspects of Rydberg excitations in ultracold mesoscopic samples. Strong interactions between Rydberg atoms influence the excitation process and impose correlations between excited atoms. The manifestations of the collective behavior of Rydberg excitations are many-body Rabi oscillations, spatial correlations between atoms, as well as fluctuations in the number of excited atoms. We study these phenomena in detail by numerically solving the many-body Schr\"odinger equation, using a ``superatom'' approach. We find that, under certain conditions, these many-body behaviors could be observed experimentally.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.80.033418

Related papers

Effects of strong interactions in ultracold Rydberg gases

Jovica Stanojevic

In this thesis I present several theoretical methods to explore the excitation dynamics of Ultracold Rydberg systems in various regimes. For some applications the details of interactions between Rydberg atoms have to be carefully examined, while for others, the many-body aspect of Rydberg excitation may be crucial. In both cases, the basic prerequisite is to know the interactions sufficiently well. I will review the basic concepts how to evaluate molecular potentials in various Hund's cases and approximations. Long-range Rydberg-Rydberg interactions between Rydberg atoms induce ℓ-mixing which in certain situations gives rise to molecular resonances. For these resonances, we calculate long-range potentials in Hund's case (c) by diagonalization of an interaction matrix. The excitation dynamics of the resonances is always modeled as pair excitation. At high principal quantum number n, the interactions between Rydberg atoms can blockade the excitation of many surrounding atoms in the range of few μm. The atoms within this range are strongly correlated so that many-body treatments are, in general, needed. To describe this blockading effect and other manifestations of the collective behavior of Rydberg excitation, such as the many-body Rabi oscillations, spatial correlations between atoms and the fluctuations of the number of excited atoms, I have used three different approaches. In the mean-field approach the interactions between different atoms is modeled by a distribution of mean-field shifts for which a distribution of probabilities is calculated, A good agreement between the theoretical model and experimental measurements is found. To study the correlations between atoms the many-body wavefunction is numerically computed. The possibility of observing the many-body Rabi oscillations of Rydberg excitation and other aspects of many-body dynamics is analyzed. Although strong interactions cannot be treated perturbatively other expansions may be feasible. I will show that the expansion in powers of the single atom Rabi frequency can be evaluated in the interaction and Heisenberg picture. The expansion is expected to behave well for arbitrary strong interactions. ^

•Jan 1, 2007•1 citation

Rabi oscillations between ground and Rydberg states and van der Waals blockade in a mesoscopic frozen Rydberg gas

M. Reetz‐Lamour, Johannes Deiglmayr, Thomas Amthor +1 more

We present a detailed analysis of our recent observation of synchronous Rabi oscillations between the electronic ground state and Rydberg states in a mesoscopic ensemble containing roughly 100 ultracold atoms (Reetz-Lamour et al submitted, Preprint 0711.4321). The mesoscopic cloud is selected out of a sample of laser-cooled Rb atoms by optical pumping. The atoms are coupled to a Rydberg state with principal quantum number around 30 by a two-photon scheme employing flat-top laser beams. The influence of residual spatial intensity fluctuations as well as sources of decoherence such as redistribution to other states, radiative lifetime and laser bandwidth are analysed. The results open up new possibilities for the investigation of coherent many-body phenomena in dipolar Rydberg gases. As an example we demonstrate the van der Waals blockade, a variant of the dipole blockade, for a mesoscopic atom sample.

•Apr 1, 2008•15 citations

Rabi oscillations between ground and Rydberg states and van der Waals blockade in a mesoscopic frozen Rydberg gas

M Reetz-Lamour, Johannes Deiglmayr, T Amthor +1 more

We present a detailed analysis of our recent observation of synchronous Rabi oscillations between the electronic ground state and Rydberg states in a mesoscopic ensemble containing roughly 100 ultracold atoms (Reetz-Lamour et al submitted, Preprint 0711.4321). The mesoscopic cloud is selected out of a sample of laser-cooled Rb atoms by optical pumping. The atoms are coupled to a Rydberg state with principal quantum number around 30 by a two-photon scheme employing flat-top laser beams. The influence of residual spatial intensity fluctuations as well as sources of decoherence such as redistribution to other states, radiative lifetime and laser bandwidth are analysed. The results open up new possibilities for the investigation of coherent many-body phenomena in dipolar Rydberg gases. As an example we demonstrate the van der Waals blockade, a variant of the dipole blockade, for a mesoscopic atom sample.

arXiv:0801.3999•New Journal of Physics•Apr 30, 2008•38 citations

Many-body dynamics of Rydberg excitation using the Ω expansion

Jovica Stanojevic, Robin Côté

We investigate the excitation dynamics of Rydberg atoms in ultracold atomic samples by expanding the excitation probability and the correlation function between excited atoms in powers of the isolated atom Rabi frequency $\ensuremath{\Omega}$. In the Heisenberg picture, we give recurrence relations to calculate any order of these expansions, which are expected to be well behaved for arbitrarily strong interactions. For large homogeneous samples, the explicit terms of the expansions, up to ${\ensuremath{\Omega}}^{4}$, are given and then averaged over all possible random spatial distributions of atoms for the most important cases of excitation pulses and interactions.

Physical Review A•May 12, 2010•9 citations

Many-body dynamics of Rydberg excitation using the ΩΩΩ-expansion

Jovica Stanojevic, Robin Côté

We investigate the excitation dynamics of Rydberg atoms in ultracold atomic samples by expanding the excitation probability and the correlation function between excited atoms in powers of the isolated atom Rabi frequency $Ω$. In the Heisenberg picture, we give recurrence relations to calculate any order of the expansions, which ere expected to be well-behaved for arbitrarily strong interactions. For homogeneous large samples, we give the explicit form of the expansions, up to $Ω^4$, averaged over all possible random spatial distributions of atoms, for the most important cases of excitation pulses and interactions.

arXiv:0801.2396•Jan 15, 2008•0 citations

Properties of collective Rabi oscillations with two Rydberg atoms

Dan-Dan Ma, Ke-Ye Zhang, Jing Qian

Motivated by experimental advances that the collective excitation of two Rydberg atoms was observed, we provide an elaborate theoretical study for the dynamical behavior of two-atom Rabi oscillations. In the large-intermediate-detuning case, the two-photon Rabi oscillation is found to be significantly affected by the strength of the interatomic van der Waals interaction. With a careful comparison of the exact numbers and values of the oscillation frequency, we propose a new way to determine the strength of excitation blockade, agreeing well with the previous universal criterion for full, partial, and no blockade regions. In the small-intermediate-detuning case, we find a blockade-like effect, but the collective enhancement factor is smaller than 2 due to the quantum interference of double optical transitions involving the intermediate state. Moreover, a fast two-photon Rabi oscillation in ns timescale is manifested by employing intense lasers with an intensity of ∼ MW/cm 2 , offering a possibility of ultrafast control of quantum dynamics with Rydberg atoms.

arXiv:1811.08037•Chinese Physics B•Jan 1, 2019•4 citations
We investigate collective aspects of Rydberg excitations in ultracold mesoscopic samples. Strong interactions between Rydberg atoms influence the excitation process and impose correlations between excited atoms. The manifestations of the collective behavior of Rydberg excitations are many-body Rabi oscillations, spatial correlations between atoms, as well as fluctuations in the number of excited atoms. We study these phenomena in detail by numerically solving the many-body Schr"odinger equation, using a ``superatom'' approach. We find that, under certain conditions, these many-body behaviors could be observed experimentally.
In this thesis I present several theoretical methods to explore the excitation dynamics of Ultracold Rydberg systems in various regimes. For some applications the details of interactions between Rydberg atoms have to be carefully examined, while for others, the many-body aspect of Rydberg excitation may be crucial. In both cases, the basic prerequisite is to know the interactions sufficiently well. I will review the basic concepts how to evaluate molecular potentials in various Hund's cases and approximations. Long-range Rydberg-Rydberg interactions between Rydberg atoms induce ℓ-mixing which in certain situations gives rise to molecular resonances. For these resonances, we calculate long-range potentials in Hund's case (c) by diagonalization of an interaction matrix. The excitation dynamics of the resonances is always modeled as pair excitation. At high principal quantum number n, the interactions between Rydberg atoms can blockade the excitation of many surrounding atoms in the range of few μm. The atoms within this range are strongly correlated so that many-body treatments are, in general, needed. To describe this blockading effect and other manifestations of the collective behavior of Rydberg excitation, such as the many-body Rabi oscillations, spatial correlations between atoms and the fluctuations of the number of excited atoms, I have used three different approaches. In the mean-field approach the interactions between different atoms is modeled by a distribution of mean-field shifts for which a distribution of probabilities is calculated, A good agreement between the theoretical model and experimental measurements is found. To study the correlations between atoms the many-body wavefunction is numerically computed. The possibility of observing the many-body Rabi oscillations of Rydberg excitation and other aspects of many-body dynamics is analyzed. Although strong interactions cannot be treated perturbatively other expansions may be feasible. I will show that the expansion in powers of the single atom Rabi frequency can be evaluated in the interaction and Heisenberg picture. The expansion is expected to behave well for arbitrary strong interactions. ^
We present a detailed analysis of our recent observation of synchronous Rabi oscillations between the electronic ground state and Rydberg states in a mesoscopic ensemble containing roughly 100 ultracold atoms (Reetz-Lamour et al submitted, Preprint 0711.4321). The mesoscopic cloud is selected out of a sample of laser-cooled Rb atoms by optical pumping. The atoms are coupled to a Rydberg state with principal quantum number around 30 by a two-photon scheme employing flat-top laser beams. The influence of residual spatial intensity fluctuations as well as sources of decoherence such as redistribution to other states, radiative lifetime and laser bandwidth are analysed. The results open up new possibilities for the investigation of coherent many-body phenomena in dipolar Rydberg gases. As an example we demonstrate the van der Waals blockade, a variant of the dipole blockade, for a mesoscopic atom sample.
We present a detailed analysis of our recent observation of synchronous Rabi oscillations between the electronic ground state and Rydberg states in a mesoscopic ensemble containing roughly 100 ultracold atoms (Reetz-Lamour et al submitted, Preprint 0711.4321). The mesoscopic cloud is selected out of a sample of laser-cooled Rb atoms by optical pumping. The atoms are coupled to a Rydberg state with principal quantum number around 30 by a two-photon scheme employing flat-top laser beams. The influence of residual spatial intensity fluctuations as well as sources of decoherence such as redistribution to other states, radiative lifetime and laser bandwidth are analysed. The results open up new possibilities for the investigation of coherent many-body phenomena in dipolar Rydberg gases. As an example we demonstrate the van der Waals blockade, a variant of the dipole blockade, for a mesoscopic atom sample.
We investigate the excitation dynamics of Rydberg atoms in ultracold atomic samples by expanding the excitation probability and the correlation function between excited atoms in powers of the isolated atom Rabi frequency $\ensuremath{\Omega}$. In the Heisenberg picture, we give recurrence relations to calculate any order of these expansions, which are expected to be well behaved for arbitrarily strong interactions. For large homogeneous samples, the explicit terms of the expansions, up to ${\ensuremath{\Omega}}^{4}$, are given and then averaged over all possible random spatial distributions of atoms for the most important cases of excitation pulses and interactions.
We investigate the excitation dynamics of Rydberg atoms in ultracold atomic samples by expanding the excitation probability and the correlation function between excited atoms in powers of the isolated atom Rabi frequency ΩΩΩ. In the Heisenberg picture, we give recurrence relations to calculate any order of the expansions, which ere expected to be well-behaved for arbitrarily strong interactions. For homogeneous large samples, we give the explicit form of the expansions, up to Ω4Ω^4Ω4, averaged over all possible random spatial distributions of atoms, for the most important cases of excitation pulses and interactions.
Motivated by experimental advances that the collective excitation of two Rydberg atoms was observed, we provide an elaborate theoretical study for the dynamical behavior of two-atom Rabi oscillations. In the large-intermediate-detuning case, the two-photon Rabi oscillation is found to be significantly affected by the strength of the interatomic van der Waals interaction. With a careful comparison of the exact numbers and values of the oscillation frequency, we propose a new way to determine the strength of excitation blockade, agreeing well with the previous universal criterion for full, partial, and no blockade regions. In the small-intermediate-detuning case, we find a blockade-like effect, but the collective enhancement factor is smaller than 2 due to the quantum interference of double optical transitions involving the intermediate state. Moreover, a fast two-photon Rabi oscillation in ns timescale is manifested by employing intense lasers with an intensity of ∼ MW/cm 2 , offering a possibility of ultrafast control of quantum dynamics with Rydberg atoms.