2021/01/11 by Wei Qin, Adam Miranowicz, Hui Jing +1
Computer Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Atomic physics #Mechanical and Optical Resonators #Noise (video) #Physics #Quantum #Quantum Information and Cryptography #Quantum Mechanics and Applications #Quantum mechanics #Quantum optics and atomic interactions #Quantum state #Quantum superposition #Superposition principle #Work (physics) #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.127.093602
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 127, 093602 (2021) · 7+14 pages, 3+7 figures
openalex created_date 2021/07/19 · openalex publication_date 2021/08/23 · arxiv created 2021/08/30 · arxiv updated 2021/08/31 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/06
We propose to create and stabilize long-lived macroscopic quantum superposition states in atomic ensembles. We show that using a fully quantum parametric amplifier can cause the simultaneous decay of two atoms and, in turn, create stabilized atomic Schrödinger cat states. Remarkably, even with modest parameters these intracavity atomic cat states can have an extremely long lifetime, up to 4 orders of magnitude longer than that of intracavity photonic cat states under the same parameter conditions, reaching tens of milliseconds. This lifetime of atomic cat states is ultimately limited to several seconds by extremely weak spin relaxation and thermal noise. Our work opens up a new way toward the long-standing goal of generating large-size and long-lived cat states, with immediate interests both in fundamental studies and noise-immune quantum technologies.