Oct 03, 2019 | |
2D topological physics from shaking a 1D wire(Nanowerk News) Limiting quantum particles to move in one, two, or three dimensions has led to the observation of many striking phenomena. A prime example is the quantization of the Hall conductance measured in 2D materials in a strong magnetic field. |
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Nowadays, gases of ultracold atoms provide a powerful platform for easily controlling the dimensionality of quantum systems. However, it is challenging in these setups to measure conductance properties, and a “cold-atomic quantum Hall effect” is yet to be observed. | |
Published in Physical Review X ("The quantized Hall conductance of a single atomic wire: A proposal based on synthetic dimensions"), this new study propose a realistic scheme to achieve this goal. The research was conducted by G. Salerno and N. Goldman from Université libre de Bruxelles' "Physics of Complex Systems and Statistical Mechanics" research unit. | |
This proposal builds on recent experiments at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, where researchers observed the transport of atoms along a 1D wire. To measure the quantum Hall effect, one must somehow extend this setup to two dimensions and include the effects of an external magnetic field. | |
Researchers solve this by introducing a novel type of conductance measurement, which allows for the study of genuine 2D effects starting from a single 1D wire. The key idea is to extend the 1D channel with an additional synthetic dimension, which is designed simply by shaking the channel: in addition to traveling along the wire direction, atoms are driven to higher transverse vibrational states, hence mimicking motion along a transverse lattice. | |
This out-of-equilibrium approach not only increases the possibilities offered by atomic wires but also offers a particularly efficient probe for topological physics in quantum-engineered matter. |
Source: Université libre de Bruxelles | |
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