Generation of doubly excited Rydberg states based on Rydberg antiblockade in a cold atomic ensemble (original) (raw)
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Physical Review Letters, 2004
We report on the observation of ultralong range interactions in a gas of cold Rubidium Rydberg atoms. The van-der-Waals interaction between a pair of Rydberg atoms separated as far as 100,000 Bohr radii features two important effects: Spectral broadening of the resonance lines and suppression of excitation with increasing density. The density dependence of these effects is investigated in detail for the Sand P-Rydberg states with main quantum numbers n ∼ 60 and n ∼ 80 excited by narrow-band continuous-wave laser light. The density-dependent suppression of excitation can be interpreted as the onset of an interaction-induced local blockade.
Observation of collective excitation of two individual atoms in the Rydberg blockade regime
Nature Physics, 2009
When two quantum systems interact strongly with each other, their simultaneous excitation by the same driving pulse may be forbidden. The phenomenon is known as blockade of excitation. Recently, extensive studies have been devoted to the so-called Rydberg blockade between neutral atoms, which appears when the atoms are in highly excited electronic states, owing to the interaction induced by the accompanying large dipole moments. Rydberg blockade has been proposed as a basic tool in quantum-information processing with neutral atoms 1-5 , and can be used to deterministically generate entanglement of several atoms. Here, we demonstrate Rydberg blockade between two atoms individually trapped in optical tweezers at a distance of 4 µm. Moreover, we show experimentally that collective two-atom behaviour, associated with the excitation of an entangled state between the ground and Rydberg levels, enhances the allowed single-atom excitation. These observations should be a crucial step towards the deterministic manipulation of entanglement of two or more atoms, with possible implications for quantum-information science, as well as for quantum metrology, the study of strongly correlated systems in many-body physics, and fundamental studies in quantum physics.
Coherent Atom-Light Interactions in Rydberg Systems
2021
This thesis investigates the effects of strong Rydberg-Rydberg interactions in the presence of three-level coherent phenomena such as electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), Autler-Townes splitting (ATS) and coherent population trapping (CPT). As a result of their remarkable properties, highly excited Rydberg atoms have great potential for applications in diverse areas. The interaction-induced dipole blockade between the Rydberg atoms has been proposed as a fundamental tool in quantum information processing with neutral atoms. Yet, they require an increasing level of understanding and control. A many-body theory is developed for the Rydberg excitation dynamics in various atomic systems with different densities and velocity distributions such as for atoms in a vapour cell, ultracold atoms in magneto-optical and optical dipole traps, or a system of optical lattices or dipole trap arrays. The systems were investigated by solving the optical Bloch equations numerically for a two...
Cooperative Atom-Light Interaction in a Blockaded Rydberg Ensemble
Physical Review Letters, 2010
By coupling a probe transition to a Rydberg state using electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) we map the strong dipole-dipole interactions onto an optical field. We characterize the resulting cooperative optical non-linearity as a function of probe strength and density. We show that the effect of dipole blockade cannot be described using a mean-field but requires an N-atom cooperative model. Good quantitative agreement is obtained for three atoms per blockade with the n = 60 Rydberg state. We place an upper-limit on the dephasing rate of the blockade spheres of < 110 kHz.
Two-Photon Dynamics in Coherent Rydberg Atomic Ensemble
Physical Review Letters, 2014
We study the interaction of two photons in a Rydberg atomic ensemble under the condition of electromagnetically induced transparency, combining a semi-classical approach for pulse propagation and a complete quantum treatment for quantum state evolution. We find that the blockade regime is not suitable for implementing photon-photon cross-phase modulation due to pulse absorption and dispersion. However, approximately ideal cross-phase modulation can be realized based on relatively weak interactions, with counter-propagating and transversely separated pulses.
Observation of Rydberg blockade between two atoms
2009
We demonstrate experimentally that a single Rb atom excited to the 79d 5/2 level blocks the subsequent excitation of a second atom located more than 10 µm away. The observed probability of double excitation of ∼ 30 % is consistent with a theoretical model based on calculations of the long range dipoledipole interaction between atoms.
Local Blockade of Rydberg Excitation in an Ultracold Gas
Physical Review Letters, 2004
In the laser excitation of ultracold atoms to Rydberg states, we observe a dramatic suppression caused by van der Waals interactions. This behavior is interpreted as a local excitation blockade: Rydberg atoms strongly inhibit excitation of their neighbors. We measure suppression, relative to isolated atom excitation, by up to a factor of 6.4. The dependence of this suppression on both laser irradiance and atomic density are in good agreement with a mean-field model. These results are an important step towards using ultracold Rydberg atoms in quantum information processing.
Physical Review A, 2013
We study two-photon excitation of Rydberg states of atoms under stimulated adiabatic passage with delayed laser pulses. We find that the combination of strong interaction between the atoms in Rydberg state and the spontaneous decay of the intermediate exited atomic state leads to the Rydberg excitation of precisely one atom within the atomic ensemble. The quantum Zeno effect offers a lucid interpretation of this result: the Rydberg blocked atoms repetitively scattering photons effectively monitor a randomly excited atom which therefore remains in the Rydberg state. This system can be used for deterministic creation and, possibly, extraction of Rydberg atoms or ions one at a time. The sympathetic monitoring via decay of ancilla particles may find wider applications for state preparation and probing of interactions in dissipative many-body systems.
Journal of Physics B: Atomic, Molecular and Optical Physics
We study the population dynamics in a two-atom setup in which each atom is driven independently by different light fields, but coupling the same Rydberg state. In particular, we look at how an offset in the Rabi frequencies between two atoms influences the dynamics. We find novel features such as amplifying the Rabi frequency of one atom, together with strong Rydberg-Rydberg interactions freezes the dynamics in the second atom. We characterize the Rydberg-biased freezing phenomenon in detail, with effective Hamiltonians obtained for various limits of the system parameters. In the absence of Rabi-offset, the doubly excited state population exhibits a Lorentzian profile as a function of interaction, whereas for very small offsets it shows splitting and thus peaks. Using an effective Hamiltonian as well as the perturbation theory for weak interactions, we show that the peak arises from a competition between Rabi-offset and Rydberg-Rydberg interactions when both are sufficiently small, together with the Rydberg blockade at large interactions. The effective Hamiltonians provide us with analytical results which are in an excellent agreement with full numerical solutions. Also, we analyze the growth and the dynamics of quantum correlations such as entanglement entropy and quantum discord for the coherent dynamics. We extend our studies to the dissipative case in which the spontaneous emission from the Rydberg state is taken into account and in particular, we look at the purity and quantum discord of the steady states. To conclude, our studies reveal that the local manipulation of an atom using Rabi-offset can be an ideal tool to control the quantum correlations and in general, quantum states of the composite two-qubit systems.