arXiv:1512.00696 · Physical Review A
Quantum signature for laser-driven correlated excitation of Rydberg atoms
Huai‐Zhi Wu, Yong Li, Zhen‐Biao Yang, Shi‐Biao Zheng
Abstract
The excitation dynamics of a laser-driven Rydberg-atom system exhibits a cooperative effect due to the interatomic Rydberg-Rydberg interaction, but the large many-body system with inhomogeneous Rydberg coupling is hard to exactly solve or numerically study by density-matrix equations. In this paper, we find that the laser-driven Rydberg-atom system with most of the atoms being in the ground state can be described by a simplified interaction model resembling the optical Kerr effect if the distance-dependent Rydberg-Rydberg interaction is replaced by an infinite-range coupling. We can then quantitatively study the effect of the quantum fluctuations on the Rydberg excitation with the interatomic correlation involved and analytically calculate the statistical characteristics of the excitation dynamics in the steady state, revealing the quantum signature of the driven-dissipative Rydberg-atom system. The results obtained here will be of great interest for other spin-1/2 systems with spin-spin coupling.