Lasing [1, 2] and superradiance [3‐5] phenomena are currently enjoying a renaissance as research topics in atomic physics. Fundamentally based on the interaction of matter with an electromagnetic (light) field, the atomic dipoles in a “lasing medium” collectively emit into selected modes of the electromagnetic field and thereby create an amplified and coherent source of light. Present-day lasers use di erent types of gain media and cover a wide range of output frequencies for application in both, fundamental research and industry. A recent string of papers has reported on superradiance [6, 7] and lasing-type instabilities using Bose gases of various type (thermal atoms [8, 9], photon gases [10] and Bose-Einstein condensed atoms [11‐14]) in optical cavities. Buoyed by experimental control over essentially single excitation quanta of atoms and photons [15‐19] in cavity quantum electrodynamics, these works o er intriguing prospects for the next wave of experiments on strongly interacting light-mattter systems including a new regime where unexpected many-body and quantum fluctuation e ects of the lasing medium may become visible. Bohnet et al. [20] recently operated a superradiant “bad-cavity” laser in the few-photon regime based on coherent oscillations of the inter-atomic, collective dipole of the ultracold atoms in the cavity [21]. In this paper, we point out that a quantum degenerate Fermi gas has remarkable features as a lasing medium in a transversally driven cavity as sketched in Fig. 1. We show that the quantum statistics of the Fermi gas puts the coupled cavity+atoms system generically close to superradiance threshold as a consequence of the Pauli exclusion principle (“Pauli pressure”). Physically, this arises from enhanced scattering of fermions between di erent points on the Fermi surface with radiusjkFj by exchanging relatively large photon momenta Q from the cavity as illustrated in Fig. 1. By changing the power of the pump laser at a given density of the Fermi gas, the lasing transition is concomitant with the spontaneous formation of a charge density wave oscillating with 1=Q in real space. Tuning the ratiojkFj=jQj allows to generate a cavity spectrum with “broadband light” in certain spectral ranges or, for energies outside the particle-hole continuum of the fermions, light with relatively narrow linewidth. The normal mode splitting of the cavity by a single atom is completely replaced by many-body Ω |kF| Q
Lasing [1, 2] and superradiance [3‐5] phenomena are currently enjoying a renaissance as research topics in atomic physics. Fundamentally based on the interaction of matter with an electromagnetic (light) field, the atomic dipoles in a “lasing medium” collectively emit into selected modes of the electromagnetic field and thereby create an amplified and coherent source of light. Present-day lasers use di erent types of gain media and cover a wide range of output frequencies for application in both, fundamental research and industry. A recent string of papers has reported on superradiance [6, 7] and lasing-type instabilities using Bose gases of various type (thermal atoms [8, 9], photon gases [10] and Bose-Einstein condensed atoms [11‐14]) in optical cavities. Buoyed by experimental control over essentially single excitation quanta of atoms and photons [15‐19] in cavity quantum electrodynamics, these works o er intriguing prospects for the next wave of experiments on strongly interacting light-mattter systems including a new regime where unexpected many-body and quantum fluctuation e ects of the lasing medium may become visible. Bohnet et al. [20] recently operated a superradiant “bad-cavity” laser in the few-photon regime based on coherent oscillations of the inter-atomic, collective dipole of the ultracold atoms in the cavity [21]. In this paper, we point out that a quantum degenerate Fermi gas has remarkable features as a lasing medium in a transversally driven cavity as sketched in Fig. 1. We show that the quantum statistics of the Fermi gas puts the coupled cavity+atoms system generically close to superradiance threshold as a consequence of the Pauli exclusion principle (“Pauli pressure”). Physically, this arises from enhanced scattering of fermions between di erent points on the Fermi surface with radiusjkFj by exchanging relatively large photon momenta Q from the cavity as illustrated in Fig. 1. By changing the power of the pump laser at a given density of the Fermi gas, the lasing transition is concomitant with the spontaneous formation of a charge density wave oscillating with 1=Q in real space. Tuning the ratiojkFj=jQj allows to generate a cavity spectrum with “broadband light” in certain spectral ranges or, for energies outside the particle-hole continuum of the fermions, light with relatively narrow linewidth. The normal mode splitting of the cavity by a single atom is completely replaced by many-body Ω |kF| Q
The quantum dynamics of the electromagnetic light mode of an optical cavity filled with a coherently driven Fermi gas of ultracold atoms strongly depends on the geometry of the Fermi surface. Superradiant light generation and self-organization of the atoms can be achieved at low pumping threshold due to resonant atom-photon umklapp processes, where the fermions are scattered from one side of the Fermi surface to the other by exchanging photon momenta. The cavity spectrum exhibits sidebands that, despite strong atom-light coupling and cavity decay, retain narrow linewidth, due to absorptionless transparency windows outside the atomic particle-hole continuum and the suppression of broadening and thermal fluctuations in the collisionless Fermi gas.
Cavity quantum electrodynamics (QED) studies the interaction between atoms and a single electromagnetic mode. When the atoms form a degenerate quantum gas, the resulting lightâ matter interaction reflects the underlying quantum statistics of the particles. Recently, degenerate Fermi gases have been coupled to optical cavities, enabling the exploration of strongly correlated fermionic systems with interactions mediated by cavity photons. Remarkably, when disorder is introduced into such systems, the resulting model realizes fermions with random, long-range interactions characteristic of the Sachdevâ Yeâ Kitaev Hamiltonian. This platform therefore offers a possible route toward the experimental investigation of holographic duality, linking strongly interacting quantum matter to black hole physics through the AdS/CFT correspondence. As a step toward realizing this model, we developed a new technology: the cavity microscope. This device combines the strong light-matter coupling of cavity QED with the micrometer-scale spatial resolution provided by high-numerical-aperture optics. This thesis presents the operation and the first experimental results obtained with this new platform. First, the high-resolution addressing capability of the cavity microscope was used to locally modify the level structure of thermal atoms within the cavity mode. This allowed us to extract spatially resolved information about the atomic density from a global cavity measurement. In doing so, we overcome a longstanding limitation of cavity QED experiments, where the spatial structure of the light-matter interaction is typically fixed by the cavity mode and cannot be freely tuned. Second, we implemented a tightly focused optical trap that enabled the extraction of a small degenerate Fermi gas from a larger atomic cloud, coupled to the cavity mode. We then systematically investigated the light-matter interaction between this tweezer-trapped Fermi gas and the cavity mode by studying the superradiant phase transition of atoms in the cavity. We find that the transition can be either facilitated or suppressed by the fermionic occupation of phase space. The crossover between these two regimes occurs when the scattering wavevector becomes approximately twice the Fermi wavevector, revealing the crucial role of Fermi statistics in cavity-mediated interactions. These results pave the way toward the deterministic preparation of few-fermion systems inside an optical cavity, enabling the study of finite-size and trap-filling effects in cavity QED. In an upgraded version of the cavity microscope, the number of atoms can approach the cavity cooperativity, bringing the system into a new regime where entanglement can extend across the entire ensemble. Finally, by introducing time-dependent randomization of cavity-mediated interactions, this platform could realize low-rank SYK models, opening the door to experimental investigations of fast scrambling, thermalization, and quantum chaos in strongly interacting quantum matter.
A new class of laser, which harnesses coherence in both light and atoms, is possible with ultracold alkaline-earth-metal atoms trapped in an optical lattice inside an optical cavity. Different lasing regimes, including superradiance, superradiant, and conventional lasing, are distinguished by the relative coherence stored in the atoms and in the cavity mode. We analyze the physics in two different experimentally achievable regions of the superradiant lasing regime. Our calculations confirm the narrow linewidth of superradiant lasing for the doubly forbidden clock transition ${}^{3}{P}_{0}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{}^{1}{S}_{0}$ of 87Sr atoms. Under strong driving of the dipole-forbidden transition ${}^{3}{P}_{1}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{}^{1}{S}_{0}$ of 88Sr atoms, the superradiant linewidth narrows further due to the coherent excitation of the cavity field.
Coupling Bose-Einstein condensates to optical cavities has enabled the study of many-body states with long-range interactions. However, equivalent experiments with ultracold Fermi gases have remained largely unexplored. Here, we report an experimental realization of a superradiant quantum phase transition of a degenerate Fermi gas in a transversely pumped optical cavity. The self-ordering checkerboard density pattern of Fermi gases and superradiant transitions of the cavity field spontaneously emerge by increasing the pumping intensity above a threshold value. The effects of Fermi statistics are manifested by an inverse square root scaling of the threshold with atom number and the slow dynamics of low–atomic momentum states. Our work provides an ideal platform for studying nonequilibirium dynamics of many-body states for long-range interacting Fermi gases.
Strong quantum correlations in matter are responsible for some of the most extraordinary properties of materials, from magnetism to high-temperature superconductivity, but their integration in quantum devices requires a strong, coherent coupling with photons, which still represents a formidable technical challenge in solid state systems. In cavity quantum electrodynamics, quantum gases such as Bose-Einstein condensates or lattice gases have been strongly coupled with light. However, neither Fermionic quantum matter, comparable to electrons in solids, nor atomic systems with controlled interactions, have thus far been strongly coupled with photons. Here we report on the strong coupling of a quantum-degenerate unitary Fermi gas with light in a high finesse cavity. We map out the spectrum of the coupled system and observe well resolved dressed states, resulting from the strong coupling of cavity photons with each spin component of the gas. We investigate spin-balanced and spin-polarized gases and find quantitative agreement with ab initio calculation describing light-matter interaction. Our system offers complete and simultaneous control of atom-atom and atom-photon interactions in the quantum degenerate regime, opening a wide range of perspectives for quantum simulation.
We review the recent developments and the current status in the field of quantum-gas cavity QED. Since the first experimental demonstration of atomic self-ordering in a system composed of a Bose–Einstein condensate coupled to a quantized electromagnetic mode of a high-Q optical cavity, the field has rapidly evolved over the past decade. The composite quantum-gas-cavity systems offer the opportunity to implement, simulate, and experimentally test fundamental solid-state Hamiltonians, as well as to realize non-equilibrium many-body phenomena beyond conventional condensed-matter scenarios. This hinges on the unique possibility to design and control in open quantum environments photon-induced tunable-range interaction potentials for the atoms using tailored pump lasers and dynamic cavity fields. Notable examples range from Hubbard-like models with long-range interactions exhibiting a lattice-supersolid phase, over emergent magnetic orderings and quasicrystalline symmetries, to the appearance of dynamic gauge potentials and non-equilibrium topological phases. Experiments have managed to load spin-polarized as well as spinful quantum gases into various cavity geometries and engineer versatile tunable-range atomic interactions. This led to the experimental observation of spontaneous discrete and continuous symmetry breaking with the appearance of soft-modes as well as supersolidity, density and spin self-ordering, dynamic spin-orbit coupling, and non-equilibrium dynamical self-ordered phases among others. In addition, quantum-gas-cavity setups offer new platforms for quantum-enhanced measurements. In this review, starting from an introduction to basic models, we pedagogically summarize a broad range of theoretical developments and put them in perspective with the current and near future state-of-art experiments.