Laser fields can be shaped on a subwavelength scale as to have a specific distribution in spin angular momentum, orbital structure, or topology. We study how these various features affect the strongly nonlinear electron dynamics. Specifically, we derive closed expressions for the wave function of an unbound electron subject to a generally structured, intense laser field and demonstrate its use for imprinting the orbital angular momentum of a propagating optical vortex onto photoelectrons emitted from atoms and traveling through the optical vortex. It is also shown that photoelectrons can be accelerated or momentum textured when moving through a focused, intense laser field whose spin angular momentum is modulated as to have a radial polarization, which also implies the presence of a strong electrical longitudinal component. Further results are presented on the subwavelength spatiotemporal imaging of a laser field topology, as demonstrated explicitly for the field's spin and orbital distributions of lossless propagating optical skyrmions sampled by photoelectrons.

Maxwell's equations can be satisfied not only by plane electromagnetic waves, but also by more exotic space-time nonseparable electromagnetic pulses which cannot be represented as a product of time- and space-dependent functions. A family of such pulses with finite energy was identified by Ziolkowski [Phys. Rev. A 39, 2005 (1989)]. Later, Hellwarth and Nouchi [Phys. Rev. E 54, 889 (1996)] highlighted a subset of Ziolkowski's pulses, now known as flying donuts, a formation of polarization singularities of toroidal topology traveling at the speed of light. Spurred by recent advances in ultrafast and topological optics, space-time nonseparable electromagnetic excitations are now becoming the focus of growing experimental efforts as they hold promise for topological information transfer, probing and inducing transient excitations in matter such as anapole and toroidal modes. Here we demonstrate that the flying donut can be constructed from an ensemble of monochromatic plane waves with continuous spatial and frequency spectrum and hence can be generated by converting broadband conventional transverse electromagnetic pulses.

Recent experiments involving the interaction of optical vortices with atoms in quadrupole transitions have shown it to be accompanied by the exchange of orbital angular momentum (OAM) between the electronic states of the atom and the optical vortex field. Earlier work, both theoretical and experimental, had ruled out the transfer of a vortex OAM to the electronic degrees of freedom in an electric dipole atomic transition and it has been confirmed that the lowest multipolar order involving an OAM transfer to the electronic motion is indeed the electric quadrupole. Hitherto, the quadrupole transition involving optical vortices has not been quantified and we thus set out to evaluate the absorption rate accompanied by an OAM transfer with reference to the $6{}^{2}S_{1/2}\to 5{}^{2}D_{5/2}$ in Cs when cesium atoms are subject to the field of a linearly polarized optical vortex. Our results assuming typical experimentally accessible parameters indicate that the absorption rate for moderate light intensities is lower than the quadrupole spontaneous emission rate but should still be within the measurement capabilities of modern spectroscopic techniques.

Quantum nondemolition (QND) measurements of photons is a much pursued endeavor in the field of quantum optics and quantum information processing. Here, we propose a hybrid optoelectromechanical platform that integrates a cavity system with a hybrid electromechanical probe for QND photon counting. Building upon a mechanical-mode-mediated nonperturbative electro-optical dispersive coupling, our protocol performs the QND photon counting measurement by means of the current-voltage characteristics of the probe. In particular, we show that the peak voltage shift of the differential conductance is linearly dependent on the photon occupation number, thus providing a sensitive measure of the photon number, especially in the strong optomechanical coupling regime. Given that our proposed hybrid system is compatible with state-of-the-art experimental techniques, we discuss its implementations and anticipate applications in quantum optics and polariton physics.

Designing a high-quality control is crucial for reliable quantum computation. Among the existing approaches, closed-loop leaning control is an effective choice. Its efficiency depends on the learning algorithm employed, thus deserving algorithmic comparisons for its practical applications. Here we assess three representative learning algorithms, including GRadient Ascent Pulse Engineering (GRAPE), improved Nelder-Mead (NMplus), and Differential Evolution (DE), by searching for high-quality control pulses to prepare the Bell state. We first implement each algorithm experimentally in a nuclear magnetic resonance system and then conduct a numerical study considering the impact of some possible significant experimental uncertainties. The experiments report the successful preparation of the high-fidelity target state by the three algorithms, while NMplus converges fastest, and these results coincide with the numerical simulations when potential uncertainties are negligible. However, under certain significant uncertainties, these algorithms possess distinct performance with respect to their resulting precision and efficiency, and DE shows the best robustness. This study provides insight to aid in the practical application of different closed-loop learning algorithms in realistic physical scenarios.

Employing the Bethe ansatz approach and numerical simulations of measurements of particles' positions we investigate a post-quench many-body dynamics of attractively interacting bosons on a ring, which in the mean-field approach corresponds to the so-called breather solution. Despite the fact that the initial many-body ground state is translationally invariant, the measurements reveal breather dynamics if quantum fluctuations of the center of mass of the system are extracted. Moreover, the analysis of the many-body evolution shows signatures of dissociation of the solitons that form the breather.

We studied a system of atomic Bose-Einstein condensate coupled to a ring cavity within the mean-field theory. Due to the interaction between atoms and light field, the atoms can be self-trapped. This is verified with both variational and numerical methods. We examined the stability of these self-trapped states. For a weakly pumped cavity, they spread during the evolution; while at strong pumping, they can maintain the shape for a long time. We also studied the moving dynamics of these self-trapped waves, and found out that it can be strongly affected by the cavity decay rate. For a small cavity decay rate, the self-trapped waves undergo a damped oscillation. Increasing the cavity decay rate will lead to a deceleration of the self-trapped waves. We also compared the main results with the semiclassical theory in which atoms are treated as classical particles.

We study superfluid states in a two-dimensional fermionic attractive Hubbard model with Zeeman coupling to an external field. Focusing our attention on singlet pairing in both weak and strong coupling regimes, we reveal a rich phase diagram of finite-momentum condensates which exhibits both Fulde-Ferrell and Larkin-Ovchinnikov orders at zero temperature. The latter are commensurate stripe states that spontaneously break a lattice symmetry; many stable ordering wave vectors are found as a function of particle density and a Zeeman field. Stronger coupling significantly enhances the stability of the finite-momentum condensates, but our numerical mean-field calculations underestimate the effect of fluctuations and indicate a possible localization near half filling.

We predict a dynamical resonant effect, which is driven by externally applied linear and quadratic Zeeman fields, in a spin-orbit-coupled spin-1 Bose-Einstein condensate. The Bose-Einstein condensate is assumed to be initialized in some superposed state of Zeeman sublevels and subject to a sudden shift of the trapping potential. It is shown that the time-averaged center-of-mass oscillation and the spin polarizations of the Bose-Einstein condensate exhibit remarkable resonant peaks when the Zeeman fields are tuned to certain strengths. The underlying physics behind this resonance can be traced back to the out-of-phase interference of the dynamical phases carried by different spin-orbit states. By analyzing the single-particle spectrum, the resonant condition is summarized as a simple algebraic relation, connecting the strengths of the linear and quadratic Zeeman fields. This property is potentially applicable in quantum information and quantum precision measurement.

We propose a scheme to demonstrate spatiotemporal-vortex four-wave mixing (FWM) in an asymmetric semiconductor double quantum-well nanostructure. It is found that the orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) phase is transferred entirely from a unique OAM mode to the FWM field. Interestingly, by adjusting the detuning or the intensity of a control field, one can effectively modulate the phase and intensity of the FWM field. Also, we perform the superposition modes created by the interference between the FWM field and a same-frequency Laguerre-Gaussian mode, which show many interesting properties. Moreover, the conversion efficiency and quality of the output FWM field are studied. It is shown that the generated FWM mode has a maximum fidelity of approximately 100%. Our result may find potential applications in fundamental research and quantum technologies based on OAM light in solids.

We perform a detailed study of the connection between hidden momentum and the Abraham-Minkowski debate about the electromagnetic momentum density in material media. The results of a previous work on the subject [P. L. Saldanha and J. S. Oliveira Filho, Phys. Rev. A 95, 043804 (2017)] are extended to the continuous medium limit, where some subtleties arise. We consider a polarized and magnetized continuous medium with applied electric and magnetic static fields, where the medium polarization can be due to either an electric charge density or a hypothetical magnetic current density and the medium magnetization can be due to either an electric current density or a hypothetical magnetic charge density. Each model leads to a different expression for the system material hidden momentum and for the electromagnetic momentum density in the medium. We show that the main results of the cited reference are sustained in the continuous medium limit: Abraham momentum is compatible with a model for the medium where the polarization is due to electric charges and the magnetization is due to magnetic charges, Minkowski momentum is compatible to a model where the polarization is due to magnetic currents and the magnetization is due to electric currents, and the expression ${\varepsilon }_0\mathbf{E}\times \mathbf{B}$ is compatible with a model where the polarization is due to electric charges and the magnetization is due to electric currents, which is the natural model. These results are illustrated with the example of a uniformly polarized and magnetized sphere.

The quantum noise in photocurrent fluctuations usually gives incomplete information about the quantum state of spectral sideband modes of bright light beams involved in the detection. Each frequency component of the noise spectrum corresponds to two sideband modes symmetrically located around the bright optical field. In the case of the usual homodyne detection, it limits the ability to recover discriminated information of each mode involved. We theoretically show that complete reconstruction of the two-mode quantum state can be obtained by using phase-locked (coherent) resonator detection, even for non-Gaussian states. We experimentally demonstrate the technique by measuring a two-mode displaced coherent state.

Recent work has shown that quantum annealing for machine learning, referred to as QAML, can perform comparably to state-of-the-art machine learning methods with a specific application to Higgs boson classification. We propose QAML-Z, an algorithm that iteratively zooms in on a region of the energy surface by mapping the problem to a continuous space and sequentially applying quantum annealing to an augmented set of weak classifiers. Results on a programmable quantum annealer show that QAML-Z matches classical deep neural network performance at small training set sizes and reduces the performance margin between QAML and classical deep neural networks by almost 50% at large training set sizes, as measured by area under the receiver operating characteristic curve. The significant improvement of quantum annealing algorithms for machine learning and the use of a discrete quantum algorithm on a continuous optimization problem both opens a class of problems that can be solved by quantum annealers and suggests the approach in performance of near-term quantum machine learning towards classical benchmarks.

Adiabatic quantum computation requires that the system remains in its ground state. However, an adiabatic process often loses partly or entirely its quantumness, such as entanglement in its long runtime, due to the system-environment interactions. Here we put forward an effective quantum control technique to realize the adiabatic quantum search algorithm in a nonadiabatic regime and in the presence of environment. Using the non-Markovian quantum state diffusion equation approach, we numerically study the system dynamics characterized by the success probability. The results show that the probability increases with decreasing coupling strength and temperature. In particular, non-Markovianity from the environment can help to enhance the success probability. By choosing a suitable pulse intensity and period, a high success probability can be obtained in a short runtime for weak system-bath coupling, low temperature, and strong non-Markovian heat baths.

We report state-of-the-art ab initio calculations of the potential energy curve for the $a{}^3{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_u^{+}$ state of the lithium dimer, conducted to achieve spectroscopic accuracy ($<1{\mathrm{cm}}^{-1}$) without any prior adjustment to fit the corresponding experimental data. The nonrelativistic clamped-nuclei component of the interaction energy is calculated with a composite method involving a six-electron coupled cluster and full configuration interaction theories combined with basis sets of Slater-type orbitals ranging in quality from double to sextuple zeta. We additionally include both the leading-order relativistic and adiabatic corrections, and find both of these effects to be non-negligible within the present accuracy standards. The potential energy curve developed by us allowed us to calculate molecular parameters ($D_e, D_0, {\omega }_e$, etc.) for this system, as well as the corresponding vibrational energy levels, with an error of only about $0.2–0.4 {\mathrm{cm}}^{-1}$. We also report an ab initio value for the scattering length of two ${}^{2}S$ lithium atoms.

A recently proposed experimental protocol for quantum gravity induced entanglement of masses (QGEM) requires in principle realizable, but still very ambitious, set of parameters in matter-wave interferometry. Motivated by easing the experimental realization, in this paper, we consider the parameter space allowed by a slightly modified experimental design, which mitigates the Casimir potential between two spherical neutral test masses by separating the two macroscopic interferometers by a thin conducting plate. Although this setup will reintroduce a Casimir potential between the conducting plate and the masses, there are several advantages of this design. First, the quantum gravity induced entanglement between the two superposed masses will have no Casimir background. Secondly, the matter-wave interferometry itself will be greatly facilitated by allowing both the mass ${10}^{-16}–{10}^{-15}\mathrm{kg}$ and the superposition size $\mathrm{\Delta }x\sim 20\mu \mathrm{m}$ to be a one-two order of magnitude smaller than those proposed earlier, and thereby also two orders of magnitude smaller magnetic field gradient of ${10}^4{\mathrm{Tm}}^{-1}$ to create that superposition through the Stern-Gerlach effect. In this context, we will further investigate the collisional decoherences and decoherence due to vibrational modes of the conducting plate.

The present work focuses on the conditions required to understand time-dependent ultrafast charge migration in oriented and floppy chiral molecules. Ultrashort linearly polarized laser pulses are used to drive an ultrafast charge migration process by the excitation of a small number of low-lying excited states from the ground electronic state of R- and S-epoxypropane. Control over electron dynamics is achieved by choosing the different orientations of the linearly polarized pulse. For oriented and floppy molecules, we find that the charge migration is different for enantiomers when the polarization of the pulse lies in the mirror plane defining the enantiomer pair, or when it is strictly perpendicular to it. Ultimately the choice of polarization of the linearly polarized pulse determines the properties of the charge migration process in the chiral molecules, i.e., the direction of the electronic current densities.

For polar molecules, the degree of orientation is an essential variable with many interesting manifestations in strong-field phenomena. However, there is no direct way to measure the orientation degree in experiments. On the other hand, current indirect methods based on high-order harmonic generation (HHG) require specific laser conditions for characterization. In this study, we propose a general method to probe the whole range of orientation degrees by calibrating the time profile of harmonics. To develop the method, we first study the sensitivity of the harmonic time profile to the degree of orientation and then present a detailed procedure to extract this quantity from the harmonic time profile, which in turn is obtained from the HHG measurements. In our study, the “experimental” HHG data emitted from CO molecules are simulated by numerically solving the time-dependent Schrödinger equation. A strong point of the suggested method is its universal applicability with arbitrary laser pulse parameters. Moreover, not only the magnitude but also the sign of the degrees of orientation can be extracted accurately.