2012/10/31 by Ming-Xia Huo, Wei Nie, Nie Wei +4
Physics and Astronomy · #Aharonov–Bohm effect #Atomic and Subatomic Physics Research #Coherence (philosophical gambling strategy) #Cold Atom Physics and Bose-Einstein Condensates #Magnetic field #Magnetic flux #Optical lattice #Physics #Quantum #Quantum mechanics #Quantum optics and atomic interactions #Rydberg atom #Rydberg formula #Solenoid #Ultracold atom #cond-mat.quant-gas #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1038/srep05992
published as Scientific Reports 4: 5992 (2014)
openalex publication_date 2014/08/08 · arxiv created 2014/08/11 · arxiv updated 2015/03/12 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Cold neutral atoms provide a versatile and controllable platform for emulating various quantum systems. Despite efforts to develop artificial gauge fields in these systems, realizing a unique ideal-solenoid-shaped magnetic field within the quantum domain in any real-world physical system remains elusive. Here we propose a scheme to generate a "hairline" solenoid with an extremely small size around 1 micrometer which is smaller than the typical coherence length in cold atoms. Correspondingly, interference effects will play a role in transport. Despite the small size, the magnetic flux imposed on the atoms is very large thanks to the very strong field generated inside the solenoid. By arranging different sets of Laguerre-Gauss (LG) lasers, the generation of Abelian and non-Abelian SU(2) lattice gauge fields is proposed for neutral atoms in ring- and square-shaped optical lattices. As an application, interference patterns of the magnetic type-I Aharonov-Bohm (AB) effect are obtained by evolving atoms along a circle over several tens of lattice cells. During the evolution, the quantum coherence is maintained and the atoms are exposed to a large magnetic flux. The scheme requires only standard optical access, and is robust to weak particle interactions.