We demonstrate photon-mediated interactions between two individually trapped atoms coupled to a nanophotonic cavity. Specifically, we observe collective enhancement when the atoms are resonant with the cavity and level repulsion when the cavity is coupled to the atoms in the dispersive regime. Our approach makes use of individual control over the internal states of the atoms and their position with respect to the cavity mode, as well as the light shifts to tune atomic transitions individually, allowing us to directly observe the anticrossing of the bright and dark two-atom states. These observations open the door for realizing quantum networks and studying quantum many-body physics based on atom arrays coupled to nanophotonic devices.
Abstract Coherent quantum control of multiqubit systems represents one of the challenging tasks in quantum science and quantum technology. Here we theoretically investigate the reflectivity spectrum in an atom-nanophotonic cavity with collective nonreciprocal couplings. In the strong-coupling regime with a high cooperativity, we theoretically predict distinct on-resonance spectral dips owing to destructive interferences of chiral couplings. Due to the well-separated multiple dips in the spectrum, a contrasted reflectivity suggests a new control knob over the desired entangled state preparation in the basis of coupled and uncoupled states from the atoms’ internal hyperfine ground states. We propose to utilize such atom-nanophotonic cavity to quantum engineer the atomic internal states via photon-mediated dipole–dipole interactions in the coupled state and the chirality of decay channels, where the atomic Bell state and W states for arbitrary number of atoms can be tailored and heralded by state carving in the single-photon reflection spectrum. Our results pave the way toward quantum engineering of multiqubit states and offer new opportunities for coherent and scalable multipartite entanglement transport in atoms coupled to nanophotonic devices.
Strong coupling of a reconfigurable 171Yb atom array to a tunable telecom-band nanofiber cavity
Nanophotonic cavities provide strong atom-photon coupling in a compact, directly fiber-coupled geometry, while a reconfigurable array of 171Yb atoms combines high-fidelity gates with a metastable qubit state coupled directly to a telecom-band transition, making the two a natural interface between neutral-atom quantum processors and telecom quantum networks. Here, we realize strong atom-cavity coupling on the 3P0↔3D1 transition of 171Yb, establishing, to our knowledge, the first neutral-atom cavity-QED system to reach the single-atom strong-coupling regime on a telecom-band atomic transition. Reflection spectroscopy of a single-sided cavity yields a single-atom internal cooperativity of Cin=5.6(1.0) and collective coupling following N scaling up to N=5 atoms, with homogeneous coupling at antinodes over $\sim$200 μm along the nanofiber. Thermal tuning of a fiber Bragg grating provides in situ control of the cavity outcoupling rate over two orders of magnitude from the undercoupled to the overcoupled regime, relevant for various atom-cavity protocols. We confirm compatibility with reconfigurable atom arrays by demonstrating 99.95(6)\% imaging fidelity and trap lifetimes comparable to free-space array, at 1 μm from the nanofiber axis. Moreover, the diameter-engineered antireflection design of the nanofiber enables tweezer-based atom transport across the nanofiber with no measurable loss or heating at 4.5 μm above the nanofiber, supporting a two-layer architecture for the nanofiber-integrated atom array. From the demonstrated atom-cavity coupling, atom capacity, and cavity mode profile, we project time-multiplexed remote atom-atom entanglement generation at 40 kHz, with prospects for further scaling through technical enhancements and channel multiplexing.