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Velocity gauge formulation of nonlinear optical response in Floquet quantum systems

S. Sajad Dabiri, Reza Asgari

Published Jul 21, 2025• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Using the velocity gauge formalism, we develop a theoretical framework for computing the nonlinear optical responses of time-periodic quantum systems. This approach complements the length gauge formulation and offers distinct advantages in both numerical and analytical treatments, particularly for atomic and solid-state systems with well-defined momentum-space structures. By applying our framework to the Rabi model, we derive numerical solutions in the velocity gauge and compare them with the length gauge, demonstrating full agreement between the two formulations. Our findings reveal rich optical phenomena, including photon-assisted transitions, frequency mixing effects, and emergent Floquet-induced photocurrents that are absent in static systems. We demonstrate that nonlinear responses in Floquet-driven systems exhibit resonances at integer multiples of the driving frequency, providing insights into ultrafast spectroscopy and Floquet engineering of quantum materials. The present formulation establishes a bridge between theoretical models and experimental observations in driven quantum systems, with potential applications in quantum optics, photonics, and next-generation optoelectronic devices.

DOI
10.21468/scipostphyscore.8.3.049

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Using the velocity gauge formalism, we develop a theoretical framework for computing the nonlinear optical responses of time-periodic quantum systems. This approach complements the length gauge formulation and offers distinct advantages in both numerical and analytical treatments, particularly for atomic and solid-state systems with well-defined momentum-space structures. By applying our framework to the Rabi model, we derive numerical solutions in the velocity gauge and compare them with the length gauge, demonstrating full agreement between the two formulations. Our findings reveal rich optical phenomena, including photon-assisted transitions, frequency mixing effects, and emergent Floquet-induced photocurrents that are absent in static systems. We demonstrate that nonlinear responses in Floquet-driven systems exhibit resonances at integer multiples of the driving frequency, providing insights into ultrafast spectroscopy and Floquet engineering of quantum materials. The present formulation establishes a bridge between theoretical models and experimental observations in driven quantum systems, with potential applications in quantum optics, photonics, and next-generation optoelectronic devices.
Subjecting a physical system to a time-periodic drive can substantially modify its properties and applications. This Floquet-engineering approach has been extensively applied to a wide range of classical and quantum settings in view of designing synthetic systems with exotic properties. Considering a general class of two-mode nonlinear optical devices, we show that effective optical nonlinearities can be created by subjecting the light field to a repeated pulse sequence, which couples the two modes in a fast and time-periodic manner. The strength of these drive-induced optical nonlinearities, which include an emerging four-wave mixing, can be varied by simply adjusting the pulse sequence. This leads to topological changes in the system's phase space, which can be detected through light intensity and phase measurements. Our proposal builds on an effective-Hamiltonian approach, which derives from a parent quantum many-body Hamiltonian describing driven interacting bosons. As a corollary, our results equally apply to Bose-Einstein condensates in driven double-well potentials, where pair tunneling effectively arises from the periodic pulse sequence. Our scheme offers a practical route to engineer and finely tune exotic nonlinearities and interactions in photonics and ultracold quantum gases.
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Strong periodic driving of cavity-quantum electrodynamics (QED) in the ultrastrong-coupling regime creates nonequilibrium states whose dissipation is governed by Floquet quasienergies rather than undriven dressed resonances. However, modeling such a regime is a significant theoretical challenge, including a number of subtle problems such as the need to ensure gauge invariance for truncated matter-cavity systems with time-dependent driving. To fill this theoretical gap, we introduce a nonsecular Floquet generalized master equation framework for strongly driven open cavity-QED systems, formulated in the dressed basis of the quantum Rabi model and applicable to structured reservoirs without rotating-wave approximations. Our theory can thus model Floquet-driven dynamics in open ultrastrong-coupling cavity-QED, and demonstrates a wide range of quantum state control. Using strong optical pumping and parametric mechanical modulation, we compute long-time populations, fluorescence spectra, and the Floquet-Liouville eigenspectra, resolving observable resonances into hybridized quasienergy channels and decay rates. By systematically comparing with conventional time-independent dressed-basis generalized master equations, we show that static approaches only reproduce steady-state populations in restricted excitation regimes, and fail for frequency-resolved observables and break down under appropriate Floquet engineering, surprisingly, even for spectrally flat baths. Structured environments, such as Lorentzian-Ohmic reservoirs, further amplify these discrepancies through sideband-selective decay. Our results demonstrate that dissipation in driven ultrastrong cavity-QED is intrinsically quasienergy resolved and we establish Floquet-dissipative theory as an accurate and powerful framework for predicting spectra, controlling decay pathways, and engineering nonequilibrium quantum states and reservoirs.
Abstract Floquet engineering or coherent time-periodic driving of quantum systems has been successfully used to synthesize Hamiltonians with novel properties. In ultracold atomic systems, this has led to experimental realizations of artificial gauge fields, topological bandstructures, and observation of dynamical localization, to name a few. Here we present a Floquet-based framework to stroboscopically engineer Hamiltonians with spatial features and periodicity below the diffraction limit of light used to create them by time-averaging over various configurations of a 1D optical Kronig–Penney (KP) lattice. The KP potential is a lattice of narrow subwavelength barriers spaced by half the optical wavelength (λ/2) and arises from the nonlinear optical response of the atomic dark state. Stroboscopic control over the strength and position of this lattice requires time-dependent adiabatic manipulation of the dark-state spin composition. We investigate adiabaticity requirements and shape our time-dependent light fields to respect the requirements. We apply this framework to show that a λ/4-spaced lattice can be synthesized using realistic experimental parameters as an example, discuss mechanisms that limit lifetimes in these lattices, explore candidate systems and their limitations, and treat adiabatic loading into the ground band of these lattices.
Floquet engineering offers a compelling approach for designing the time evolution of periodically driven systems. We implement a periodic atom-light coupling to realize Floquet atom optics on the strontium ^{1}S_{0}-^{3}P_{1} transition. These atom optics reach pulse efficiencies above 99.4% over a wide range of frequency offsets between light and atomic resonance, even under strong driving where this detuning is on the order of the Rabi frequency. Moreover, we use Floquet atom optics to compensate for differential Doppler shifts in large momentum transfer atom interferometers and achieve state-of-the-art momentum separation in excess of 400 ℏk. This technique can be applied to any two-level system at arbitrary coupling strength, with broad application in coherent quantum control.