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Physical Review X

Microscopic Characterization of Scalable Coherent Rydberg Superatoms

Johannes Zeiher, Peter Schauß, Sebastian J. Hild, Tommaso Macrì, Immanuel Bloch, Christian Groß

Published Aug 12, 2015• 141 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Light-matter coupling is an ongoing investigation in modern physics and is expected to play a role in quantum information applications. Using single-atom-controlled samples of ultracold rubidium-87 coupled to Rydberg states, scientists show that many-body systems of various sizes can be coherently manipulated as a single ``superatom.''

DOI
10.1103/physrevx.5.031015

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Light-matter coupling is an ongoing investigation in modern physics and is expected to play a role in quantum information applications. Using single-atom-controlled samples of ultracold rubidium-87 coupled to Rydberg states, scientists show that many-body systems of various sizes can be coherently manipulated as a single ``superatom.''
Strong interactions can amplify quantum effects such that they become important on macroscopic scales. Controlling these coherently on a single particle level is essential for the tailored preparation of strongly correlated quantum systems and opens up new prospects for quantum technologies. Rydberg atoms offer such strong interactions which lead to extreme nonlinearities in laser coupled atomic ensembles. As a result, multiple excitation of a Micrometer sized cloud can be blocked while the light-matter coupling becomes collectively enhanced. The resulting two-level system, often called "superatom", is a valuable resource for quantum information, providing a collective Qubit. Here we report on the preparation of two orders of magnitude scalable superatoms utilizing the large interaction strength provided by Rydberg atoms combined with precise control of an ensemble of ultracold atoms in an optical lattice. The latter is achieved with sub shot noise precision by local manipulation of a two-dimensional Mott insulator. We microscopically confirm the superatom picture by in-situ detection of the Rydberg excitations and observe the characteristic square root scaling of the optical coupling with the number of atoms. Furthermore, we verify the presence of entanglement in the prepared states and demonstrate the coherent manipulation of the superatom. Finally, we investigate the breakdown of the superatom picture when two Rydberg excitations are present in the system, which leads to dephasing and a loss of coherence.
Owing to the long lifetime of Rydberg atom, easy to operate and easy to control the interaction between Rydberg atoms, Rydberg atom has attracted considerable attention in quantum information and quantum optics fields. Specially, the anti-blockade effect, as a physical resource, can be used to implement various tasks in quantum information processing. Based on the rigid dipole blockade, an ensemble of two-level Rydberg atoms trapped in three magneto-optical traps can be regarded as a superatom. Based on the superatom model, the in-phase and anti-phase dynamics of the three-body Rydberg superatoms are studied by adjusting the numbers of atoms, and the W state and two kinds of maximal entangled states are generated simultaneously. Our work has great potential applications in coherent manipulation and quantum information processing.The numerical simulations are performed based on the superatom model and thereby the formidable obstacle that the Hilbert space dimension grows exponentially with the particle number increasing can be completely removed. As a result, the quantum control and quantum entanglement can be achieved from the single-quanta level to the mesoscopic level.
We investigate the coherent manipulation of interacting Rydberg atoms placed inside a high-finesse optical cavity for the deterministic preparation of strongly coupled light-matter systems. We consider a four-level diamond scheme with one common Rydberg level for N interacting atoms. One side of the diamond is used to excite the atoms into a collective `superatom' Rydberg state using either π-pulses or stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (STIRAP) pulses. The upper transition on the other side of the diamond is used to transfer the collective state to one that is coupled to a field mode of an optical cavity. Due to the strong interaction between the atoms in the Rydberg level, the Rydberg blockade mechanism plays a key role in the deterministic quantum state synthesis of the atoms in the cavity. We use numerical simulation to show that non-classical states of light can be generated and that the state that is coupled to the cavity field is a collective one. We also investigate how different decay mechanisms affect this interacting many-body system. We also analyze our system in the case of two Rydberg excitations within the blockade volume. The simulations are carried out with parameters corresponding to realizable high-finesse optical cavities and alkali atoms like rubidium.