2019/09/17 by Alexander Mil, Torsten V. Zache, Apoorva Hegde +6 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #cond-mat.quant-gas #hep-ph #physics.atom-ph #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1126/science.aaz5312
arxiv created 2019/09/17 · arxiv updated 2020/03/09
In the fundamental laws of physics, gauge fields mediate the interaction between charged particles. An example is quantum electrodynamics -- the theory of electrons interacting with the electromagnetic field -- based on U(1) gauge symmetry. Solving such gauge theories is in general a hard problem for classical computational techniques. While quantum computers suggest a way forward, it is difficult to build large-scale digital quantum devices required for complex simulations. Here, we propose a fully scalable analog quantum simulator of a U(1) gauge theory in one spatial dimension. To engineer the local gauge symmetry, we employ inter-species spin-changing collisions in an atomic mixture. We demonstrate the experimental realization of the elementary building block as a key step towards a platform for large-scale quantum simulations of continuous gauge theories.