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arXiv:1608.03038 · Physical Review A

Probing the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of two interacting atoms

Tim Keller, Thomás Fogarty

Published Dec 19, 2016• 17 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We study the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of two interacting atoms in a one-dimensional harmonic trap after a quench by a tightly pinned impurity atom. We make use of an approximate variational calculation called the Lagrange-mesh method to solve the Schr\"odinger equation as a function of interparticle interaction and impurity quench strength. We investigate the out-of-equilibrium dynamics by calculating the Loschmidt echo which quantifies the irreversibility of the system following the quench, while its probability distribution after long times can be used to identify distinct dynamical regimes. These quantities are related to the spectral function which describes the full dynamical spectrum, and we show through a thorough examination of the parameter space the existence of distinct scattering states and collective oscillations. This work demonstrates how these dynamics are strongly dependent on the interaction strength between the atoms and may be tuned to observe the establishment of the orthogonality catastrophe in few-body systems.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.94.063620

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We study the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of two interacting atoms in a one-dimensional harmonic trap after a quench by a tightly pinned impurity atom. We make use of an approximate variational calculation called the Lagrange-mesh method to solve the Schr"odinger equation as a function of interparticle interaction and impurity quench strength. We investigate the out-of-equilibrium dynamics by calculating the Loschmidt echo which quantifies the irreversibility of the system following the quench, while its probability distribution after long times can be used to identify distinct dynamical regimes. These quantities are related to the spectral function which describes the full dynamical spectrum, and we show through a thorough examination of the parameter space the existence of distinct scattering states and collective oscillations. This work demonstrates how these dynamics are strongly dependent on the interaction strength between the atoms and may be tuned to observe the establishment of the orthogonality catastrophe in few-body systems.
We apply the framework of non-equilibrium quantum thermodynamics to the physics of quenched small-sized bosonic quantum gases in a one-dimensional harmonic trap. We show that dynamical orthogonality can occur in these few-body systems with strong interactions after a quench and we find its occurrence analytically for an infinitely repulsive pair of atoms. We further show this phenomena is related to the fundamental excitations that dictate the dynamics from the spectral function. We establish a clear qualitative link between the amount of (irreversible) work performed on the system and the establishment of entanglement. We extend our analysis to multipartite systems by examining the case of three trapped atoms. We show the initial (pre-quench) interactions play a vital role in determining the dynamical features, while the qualitative features of the two particle case appear to remain valid. Finally, we propose the use of the atomic density profile as a readily accessible indicator of the non-equilibrium properties of the systems in question.
We study the dynamics of two strongly interacting bosons with an additional impurity atom trapped in a harmonic potential. Using exact numerical diagonalization we are able to fully explore the dynamical evolution when the interaction between the two distinct species is suddenly switched on (quenched). We examine the behavior of the densities, the entanglement, the Loschmidt echo, and the spectral function for a large range of interspecies interactions and find that even in such small systems evidence of Anderson's orthogonality catastrophe can be witnessed.
We consider the quantum evolution of a pair of interacting atoms in a three-dimensional isotropic trap where the interaction strength is quenched from one value to another. Using exact solutions of the static problem we are able to evaluate time-dependent observables such as the overlap between initial and final states and the expectation value of the separation between the two atoms. In the case where the interaction is quenched from the noninteracting regime to the strongly interacting regime, or vice versa, we are able to obtain analytic results. Examining the overlap between the initial and final states we show that when the interaction is quenched from the noninteracting to strongly interacting regimes the early time dependence dynamics are consistent with theoretical work in the single impurity many-body limit. When the system is quenched from the strongly to noninteracting regime we predict large oscillations in the separation between the two atoms, which arises from a logarithmic divergence due to the zero-range nature of the interaction potential.
We investigate the behavior of a two-level atom coupled to a one-dimensional, ultracold Fermi gas. The sudden switching on of the scattering between the two entities leads to the loss of any coherence in the initial state of the impurity and we show that the exact dynamics of this process is strongly influenced by the effect of the orthogonality catastrophe within the gas. We highlight the relationship between the Loschmidt echo and the retarded Green's function---typically used to formulate the dynamical theory of the catastrophe---and demonstrate that the effect is reflected in the impurity dynamics. We show that the expected nonexponential decay of the spectral function can be observed using Ramsey interferometry on the two-level atom and comment on finite temperature effects.
We investigate the quantum dynamics of two identical bosons in a one-dimensional harmonic trap following an interaction quench from zero to infinite interaction strength and vice versa. For both quench scenarios, closed analytical expressions for the temporal evolution of the wave function as well as the Loschmidt echo are found and the dynamics of the momentum density as well as the reduced single-particle density matrix are analyzed. We observe a crossover of these quantities between bosonic, ``symmetrized'' fermionic, and fermionic properties. Furthermore, several combined quenches are analyzed as well.
We investigate the non-equilibrium quantum dynamics and thermodynamics of free fermions suddenly coupled to a localized defect in a one-dimensional harmonic trap. This setup realizes a quantum quench transformation that gives rise to the orthogonalization of the system's wave-function as an effect of the localized perturbation. Using the Loschmidt echo and the Kirkwood-Dirac quasiprobability (KDQ) distribution of the work done by the defect, we quantify the extent and rate of the orthogonalization dynamics. In particular, we show that initializing the system in a coherent superpositions of energy eigenstates leads to non-classical features, such as Wigner function's negativity and non-positivity of the work KDQ distribution. Starting from simple single-particle superpositions and then progressing with coherent and cat states of few-body fermionic systems, we uncover how quantum coherence and few-body correlations shape the out-of-equilibrium response due to the presence of the defect.