We propose an approach to determine the residual phase distortion directly in the interaction region of few-cycle laser radiation with a gaseous target. We describe how the spectra of the generated high harmonics measured as a function of externally introduced dispersion into the driving few-cycle laser pulse can be used to decode small amounts of second- and third-order spectral phase, including the sign. The diagnosis is based on the analysis of several key features in the high-harmonic spectrum: the depth of spectral modulation, the position of the cutoff, and the symmetry of the spectrum with respect to the introduced dispersion. The approach is applicable to pulses without carrier-envelope phase (CEP) stabilization. Surprisingly, we find that for nearly-single-cycle pulses with nonstabilized CEP, deep spectral modulations in the harmonic spectra emerge for positively rather than negatively chirped pulses, in contrast to the case of CEP-stabilized pulses.

We consider the interaction of one- and two-photon pulses in a waveguide with two two-level systems (TLSs) that are also able to interact directly either through an exchange- or a dipole-type interaction. We focus on the system's transport properties and show how the presence of a second TLS increases the control options, especially when direct interactions are also allowed. We also obtain, within a Markov (long-pulse) approximation, exact results for the nonlinear or entangled terms that arise in the two-photon case and discuss both their potential applications and ways to minimize their effects.

Inspired by a recent work [F. Reiter, D. Reeb, and A. S. Sørensen, Phys. Rev. Lett. 117, 040501 (2016)], we present a simplified proposal for dissipatively preparing a Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) state of three Rydberg atoms in a cavity. The $Z$ pumping is implemented under the action of the spontaneous emission of $\mathrm{\Lambda }$-type atoms and the quantum Zeno dynamics induced by strong continuous coupling. In the meantime, a dissipative Rydberg pumping breaks up the stability of the state $|{\mathrm{GHZ}}_{+}\rangle$ in the process of $Z$ pumping, making $|{\mathrm{GHZ}}_{-}\rangle$ the unique steady state of the system. Compared with the former scheme, the number of driving fields acting on atoms is greatly reduced and only a single-mode cavity is required. The numerical simulation of the full master equation reveals that a high fidelity $\sim 98\%$ can be obtained with the currently achievable parameters in the Rydberg-atom-cavity system.

We present visible spectra of Ag-like ($4d^{10}4f$) and Cd-like ($4d^{10}4f^2$) ions of Ho (atomic number $Z=67$), Er (68), and Tm (69) observed with a compact electron beam ion trap. For Ag-like ions, prominent emission corresponding to the M1 transitions between the ground state fine-structure splitting $4f_{5/2}\text{−}4f_{7/2}$ is identified. For Cd-like ions, several M1 transitions in the ground state configuration are identified. The transition wavelength and the transition probability are calculated with the relativistic many-body perturbation theory and the relativistic CI + all-order approach. Comparisons between the experiments and the calculations show good agreement.

We study level crossings and spin flips in a system consisting of a spin-1 (an electron spin triplet) coupled to a nuclear spin of arbitrary size $K$, in the presence of a uniform magnetic field and the electron spin-spin interaction within the triplet. Through an analytical diagonalization based on the $\mathrm{SU}\left(3\right)$ Lie algebra, we find that the electron spin-spin interaction not only removes the curious degeneracy which appears in the absence of the interaction, but also produces some level anticrossings (LACs) for strong interactions. The real-time dynamics of the system shows that periodic spin flips occur at the LACs for arbitrary $K$, which might provide an option for nuclear or electron spin polarization.

We perform Feshbach spectroscopy in an ultracold mixture of ${}^{23}\mathrm{Na}$ and ${}^{40}\mathrm{K}$ with different spin-state combinations. We observed 24 new interspecies Feshbach resonances at magnetic fields up to 350 G. A full coupled-channel calculation is performed to assign these resonances. Among them, 12 resonances are identified as $d$-wave Feshbach resonances. These $d$-wave Feshbach resonances are about 5 G systematically smaller than the predictions based on the previous model potential. Taking into account these experimental results, we improve the Born-Oppenheimer potentials between Na and K and achieve good agreement between the theory and experiment for all the observed Feshbach resonances.

We report integral and differential cross sections for positron collisions with allene, calculated with the Schwinger multichannel method. The cross sections were computed in the static-polarization approximation for energies up to 7 eV. We have tested a series of single-particle basis sets and different polarization schemes to improve the description of low-energy positron scattering by the allene molecule. We have found that the use of extra centers with no net charge with additional single-particle $s$- and $p$-type functions centered at them are essential in order to accurately reproduce the polarization potential and, hence, obtain proper scattering cross sections. The choice of the allene molecule was due to the fact that it is a highly symmetric molecule with no permanent dipole moment and would allow several different calculations. Our cross sections are compared to the available experimental data for the total cross section with a reasonable agreement after correcting their results due to the low angular discrimination of their apparatus. Also, a virtual state was observed in the integral cross section that became a bound state when the description of the polarization potential is improved. We also observed a Ramsauer-Townsend minimum in the cross section whose location varies from 2.7 to 3.4 eV, depending on the polarization scheme used in the calculations.

We provide a nonperturbative theory for photoionization of transparent solids, which consistently accounts for the selection rules related to the parity of the number of absorbed photons (odd or even). We derive closed-form analytical expressions for the photoionization rate within the two-band structure model. Our model exhibits excellent agreement with measurements for the frequency dependence of the two-photon absorption and nonlinear refractive index coefficients in sapphire and silica, two highly relevant materials for industrial applications. We demonstrate the crucial role of the interference of the transition amplitudes, which in the semiclassical limit can be interpreted in terms of interfering quantum trajectories that were disregarded in Keldysh's foundational work of laser physics [Keldysh, Sov. Phys. JETP 20, 1307 (1965)], resulting in the violation of selection rules.

We present the prospects for photoassociation, optical control of interspecies scattering lengths, and, finally, the production of ultracold absolute ground-state molecules in the Rb+Hg system. We use the state-of-the-art ab initio methods for the calculations of ground- [CCSD(T)] and excited-state (EOM-CCSD) potential curves. The RbHg system, thanks to the wide range of stable Hg bosonic isotopes, offers possibilities for mass tuning of ground-state interactions. The optical lengths describing the strengths of optical Feshbach resonances near the Rb transitions are favorable even at large laser detunings. Ground-state RbHg molecules can be produced with efficiencies ranging from about 20% for deeply bound to at least 50% for weakly bound states close to the dissociation limit. Finally, electronic transitions with favorable Franck-Condon factors can be found for the purposes of a STIRAP transfer of the weakly bound RbHg molecules to the absolute ground state using commercially available lasers.

We propose a scheme to obtain the Heisenberg-limited parameter estimation precision by immersing atoms in a thermally equilibrated quasi-one-dimensional dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate reservoir. We show that the collisions between the dipolar atoms and the immersed atoms can result in a controllable nonlinear interaction through tuning the relative strength and the sign of the dipolar and contact interaction. We find that the repulsive dipolar interaction reservoir is preferential for the spin squeezing and the appearance of an entangled non-Gaussian state. As a useful resource for quantum metrology, we also show that the non-Gaussian state results in the phase estimation precision in the Heisenberg scaling, outperforming that of the spin-squeezed state.

An unexplored nonperturbative deep strong coupling (npDSC) achieved in superconducting circuits has been studied in the anisotropic Rabi model by the generalized squeezing rotating-wave approximation. Energy levels are evaluated analytically from the reformulated Hamiltonian and agree well with numerical ones in a wide range of coupling strength. Such improvement ascribes to deformation effects in the displaced-squeezed state presented by the squeezed momentum variance, which are omitted in previous displaced states. The atom population dynamics confirms the validity of our approach for the npDSC strength. Our approach offers the possibility to explore interesting phenomena analytically in the npDSC regime in qubit-oscillator experiments.

We study the phase diagram of fermionic polar molecules in a bilayer system, with an imbalance of molecular densities of the layers. For the imbalance exceeding a critical value, the system undergoes a transition from the uniform interlayer superfluid to the Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO) state with mostly a stripe structure, and at sufficiently large imbalance a transition from the FFLO to normal phase. Compared to the case of contact interactions, the FFLO regime is enhanced by the long-range character of the interlayer dipolar interaction, which can combine the $s$-wave and $p$-wave pairing in the order parameter.

A quantum random-number generator (QRNG) can produce true randomness by utilizing the inherent probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics. Recently, the spontaneous-emission quantum phase noise of the laser has been widely deployed for quantum random-number generation, due to its high rate, its low cost, and the feasibility of chip-scale integration. Here, we perform a comprehensive experimental study of a phase-noise-based QRNG with two independent lasers, each of which operates in either continuous-wave (CW) or pulsed mode. We implement the QRNG by operating the two lasers in three configurations, namely, CW + CW, CW + pulsed, and pulsed + pulsed, and demonstrate their trade-offs, strengths, and weaknesses.

We consider Casimir-Polder and Casimir forces with finite dissipation by coupling heat baths to the dipoles introducing, this way, dissipation from first principles. We derive a representation of the free energy as an integral over real frequencies, which can be viewed as an generalization of the remarkable formula introduced by Ford et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 55, 2273 (1985)]. For instance, we obtain a nonperturbative representation for the atom-atom and atom-wall interactions. We investigate several limiting cases. From the limit $T\to 0$ we show that the third law of thermodynamics cannot be violated within the given approach, where the dissipation parameter cannot depend on temperature by construction. We conclude that the given approach is insufficient to resolve the thermodynamic puzzle connected with the Drude model when inserted into the Lifshitz formula. Further, we consider the transition to the Matsubara representation and discuss modifications of the contribution from the zeroth Matsubara frequency.

Based on the theory of macroscopic quantum electrodynamics, we generalize the expression of the Casimir force for nonreciprocal media. The essential ingredient of this result is the Green's tensor between two nonreciprocal semi-infinite slabs, including a reflexion matrix with four coefficients that mixes optical polarizations. This Green's tensor does not obey Lorentz's reciprocity and thus violates time-reversal symmetry. The general result for the Casimir force is analyzed in the retarded and nonretarded limits, concentrating on the influences arising from reflections with or without change of polarization. In a second step, we apply our general result to a photonic topological insulator whose nonreciprocity stems from an anisotropic permittivity tensor, namely InSb. We show that there is a regime for the distance between the slabs where the magnitude of the Casimir force is tunable by an external magnetic field. Furthermore, the strength of this tuning depends on the orientation of the magnetic field with respect to the slab surfaces.

We study the response of ${\mathrm{HeH}}^{+}$ to an intense, few-cycle laser pulse. Specifically, we present the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) dependence of the kinetic-energy-release spectrum, the spatial asymmetry, and the total dissociation probability in two-cycle pulses with an intensity of ${10}^{14}{\mathrm{W}/\mathrm{cm}}^2$ and wavelengths of 3200 and 4000 nm. Strong spatial asymmetries are found in spite of the fact that the electron always becomes localized as He+${\mathrm{H}}^{+}$, demonstrating that control of such asymmetries can be obtained via control of the nuclear degrees of freedom—as opposed to its usual interpretation as control over the electronic degrees of freedom. We explain these CEP effects in terms of our photon-phase representation.

We theoretically investigate the macroscopic quantum coherence and the mechanical squeezing of a mechanical oscillator in a hybrid optomechanical system consisting of a suspended graphene sheet and an ultracold atomic ensemble trapped inside a Fabry-Pérot cavity. In the study the vacuum is used to mediate an effective optomechanical coupling between the graphene oscillator and the cavity field driven by an external laser beam. We find that in the presence of this coupling, the macroscopic quantum coherence and the mechanical squeezing of the graphene sheet can be attained in a certain range of driving power. In particular, the quantum coherence in the optomechanical system can be transferred from the optical field to the mechanical oscillator. We also investigate in detail the spectrum and the squeezing of the output field and the attained results may be used to study the mechanical squeezing of a graphene sheet.

The coherent process that a single photon simultaneously excites two qubits has recently been theoretically predicted by Garziano et al. [L. Garziano, V. Macrì, R. Stassi, O. Di Stefano, F. Nori, and S. Savasta, One Photon Can Simultaneously Excite two or More Atoms, Phys. Rev. Lett. 117, 043601 (2016)]. We propose a different approach to observe a similar dynamical process based on a superconducting quantum circuit, where two coupled flux qubits longitudinally interact with the same resonator. We show that this simultaneous excitation of two qubits (assuming that the sum of their transition frequencies is close to the cavity frequency) is related to the counter-rotating terms in the dipole-dipole coupling between two qubits, and the standard rotating-wave approximation is not valid here. By numerically simulating the adiabatic Landau-Zener transition and Rabi-oscillation effects, we clearly verify that the energy of a single photon can excite two qubits via higher-order transitions induced by the longitudinal couplings and the counter-rotating terms. Compared with previous studies, the coherent dynamics in our system only involves one intermediate state and, thus, exhibits a much faster rate. We also find transition paths which can interfere. Finally, by discussing how to control the two longitudinal-coupling strengths, we find a method to observe both constructive and destructive interference phenomena in our system.

We propose a dissipative method for the preparation of many-body steady entangled states in spin and fermionic chains. The scheme is accomplished by means of an engineered set of Lindbladians acting over the eigenmodes of the system, whose spectrum is assumed to be resolvable. We apply this idea to prepare a particular entangled state of a spin chain described by the $XY$ model, emphasizing its generality and experimental feasibility. Our results show that our proposal is capable of achieving high fidelities and purities for a given target state, even when dephasing and thermal dissipative processes are taken into account. Moreover, the method exhibits a remarkable robustness against fluctuations in the model parameters.