We propose a new mechanism for thermal dark matter freeze-out, called codecaying dark matter. Multicomponent dark sectors with degenerate particles and out-of-equilibrium decays can codecay to obtain the observed relic density. The dark matter density is exponentially depleted through the decay of nearly degenerate particles rather than from Boltzmann suppression. The relic abundance is set by the dark matter annihilation cross section, which is predicted to be boosted, and the decay rate of the dark sector particles. The mechanism is viable in a broad range of dark matter parameter space, with a robust prediction of an enhanced indirect detection signal. Finally, we present a simple model that realizes codecaying dark matter.

The direct photodissociation of trapped ${{}^{85}\mathrm{Rb}}_2^{+}$ (rubidium) molecular ions by the cooling light for the ${}^{85}\mathrm{Rb}$ magneto-optical trap (MOT) is studied, both experimentally and theoretically. Vibrationally excited ${\mathrm{Rb}}_2^{+}$ ions are created by photoionization of ${\mathrm{Rb}}_2$ molecules formed photoassociatively in the Rb MOT and are trapped in a modified spherical Paul trap. The decay rate of the trapped ${\mathrm{Rb}}_2^{+}$ ion signal in the presence of the MOT cooling light is measured and agreement with our calculated rates for molecular ion photodissociation is observed. The photodissociation mechanism due to the MOT light is expected to be active and therefore universal for all homonuclear diatomic alkali metal molecular ions.

We report a stable double optical spring effect in an optical cavity pumped with a single optical field that arises as a result of birefringence. One end of the cavity is formed by a multilayer ${\mathrm{Al}}_{0.92}{\mathrm{Ga}}_{0.08}\mathrm{As}/\mathrm{GaAs}$ stack supported by a microfabricated cantilever with a natural mode frequency of 274 Hz. The optical spring shifts the resonance to 21 kHz, corresponding to a suppression of low frequency vibrations by a factor of about 5 000. The stable nature of the optical trap allows the cavity to be operated without any external feedback and with only a single optical field incident.

We prove that any nonzero inertia, however small, is able to change the nature of the synchronization transition in Kuramoto-like models, either from continuous to discontinuous or from discontinuous to continuous. This result is obtained through an unstable manifold expansion in the spirit of Crawford, which features singularities in the vicinity of the bifurcation. Far from being unwanted artifacts, these singularities actually control the qualitative behavior of the system. Our numerical tests fully support this picture.

We address Bloch oscillations of a spin-orbit coupled atom in periodic potentials of two types: optical and Zeeman lattices. We show that in optical lattices the spin-orbit coupling allows controlling the direction of atomic motion and may lead to complete suppression of the oscillations at specific values of the coupling strength. In Zeeman lattices the energy bands are found to cross each other at the boundaries of the Brillouin zone, resulting in period doubling of the oscillations. In all cases, the oscillations are accompanied by rotation of the pseudospin, with a dynamics that is determined by the strength of the spin-orbit coupling. The predicted effects are discussed also in terms of a Wannier-Stark ladder, which in optical lattices consist of two mutually shifted equidistant subladders.

Half-filled electron systems, even with the maximized spin angular moment, have been given little attention because of their zero-orbital angular moment according to Hund’s rule. Nevertheless, there are several measurements that show evidence of a nonzero orbital moment as well as spin-orbit coupling. Here we report for the first time the orbital order in a half-filled $4f$-electron system ${\mathrm{GdB}}_4$, using the resonant soft x-ray scattering at Gd $M_{4,5}$-edges. Furthermore, we discovered that the development of this orbital order is strongly coupled with the antiferromagnetic spin order. These results clearly demonstrate that even in half-filled electron systems the orbital angular moment can be an important parameter to describe material properties, and may provide significant opportunities for tailoring new correlated electron systems.

The photovoltaic effect due to the adiabatic quantum phase in noncentrosymmetric Weyl semimetals is studied. We particularly focus on the case in which an external ac electric field is applied. By considering a generalized Weyl Hamiltonian with nonlinear terms, we show that the photocurrent is induced by circularly, rather than linearly, polarized light. This photovoltaic current can be understood as an emergent electromagnetic induction in momentum space; the Weyl node is a magnetic monopole in momentum space, the circular motion of which induces the electric field. This result is distinct from conventional photovoltaic effects, and the estimated photocurrent is $\sim {10}^{-1}–{10}^1\mathrm{nA}$, which can be detected experimentally.

The origin of the high-temperature superconducting state observed in FeSe thin films, whose phase diagram displays no sign of magnetic order, remains a hotly debated topic. Here we investigate whether fluctuations arising due to the proximity to a nematic phase, which is observed in the phase diagram of this material, can promote superconductivity. We find that nematic fluctuations alone promote a highly degenerate pairing state, in which both $s$-wave and $d$-wave symmetries are equally favored, and $T_c$ is consequently suppressed. However, the presence of a sizable spin-orbit coupling or inversion symmetry breaking at the film interface lifts this harmful degeneracy and selects the $s$-wave state, in agreement with recent experimental proposals. The resulting gap function displays a weak anisotropy, which agrees with experiments in monolayer FeSe and intercalated ${\mathrm{Li}}_{1-x}(\mathrm{OH}{)}_x\text{FeSe}$.

The magnitude of spin-orbit torque (SOT), exerted to a ferromagnet (FM) from an adjacent heavy metal (HM), strongly depends on the amount of spin current absorbed in the FM. We exploit the large spin absorption at the Ru interface to manipulate the SOTs in $\mathrm{HM}/\mathrm{FM}/\mathrm{Ru}$ multilayers. While the FM thickness is smaller than its spin dephasing length of 1.2 nm, the top Ru layer largely boosts the absorption of spin currents into the FM layer and substantially enhances the strength of SOT acting on the FM. Spin-pumping experiments induced by ferromagnetic resonance support our conclusions that the observed increase in the SOT efficiency can be attributed to an enhancement of the spin-current absorption. A theoretical model that considers both reflected and transmitted mixing conductances at the two interfaces of FM is developed to explain the results.

The monodromy relations in string theory provide a powerful and elegant formalism to understand some of the deepest properties of tree-level field theory amplitudes, like the color-kinematics duality. This duality has been instrumental in tremendous progress on the computations of loop amplitudes in quantum field theory, but a higher-loop generalization of the monodromy construction was lacking. In this Letter, we extend the monodromy relations to higher loops in open string theory. Our construction, based on a contour deformation argument of the open string diagram integrands, leads to new identities that relate planar and nonplanar topologies in string theory. We write one and two-loop monodromy formulas explicitly at any multiplicity. In the field theory limit, at one-loop we obtain identities that reproduce known results. At two loops, we check our formulas by unitarity in the case of the four-point $\mathcal{N}=4$ super-Yang-Mills amplitude.

We show how to implement topological or Thouless pumping of interacting photons in one-dimensional nonlinear resonator arrays by simply modulating the frequency of the resonators periodically in space and time. The interplay between the interactions and the adiabatic modulations enables robust transport of Fock states with few photons per site. We analyze the transport mechanism via an effective analytic model and study its topological properties and its protection to noise. We conclude by a detailed study of an implementation with existing circuit-QED architectures.

In this Letter, coalescence-bouncing transitions of head-on binary droplet collisions are predicted by a novel macroscopic model based entirely on fundamental laws of physics. By making use of the lubrication theory of Zhang and Law [Phys. Fluids 23, 042102 (2011)], we have modified the Navier-Stokes equations to accurately account for the rarefied nature of the interdroplet gas film. Through the disjoint pressure model, we have incorporated the intermolecular van der Waals forces. Our model does not use any adjustable (empirical) parameters. It therefore encompasses an extreme range of length scales (more than 5 orders of magnitude): from those of the external flow in excess of the droplet size (a few hundred $\mu \mathrm{m}$) to the effective range of the van der Waals force around 10 nm. A state of the art moving adaptive mesh method, capable of resolving all the relevant length scales, has been employed. Our numerical simulations are able to capture the coalescence-bouncing and bouncing-coalescence transitions that are observed as the collision intensity increases. The predicted transition Weber numbers for tetradecane and water droplet collisions at different pressures show good agreement with published experimental values. Our study also sheds new light on the roles of gas density, droplet size, and mean free path in the rupture of the gas film.

Experimental studies have identified an anomalous grain size dependence associated with the critical tensile pressure that a metal may sustain before catastrophic failure by cavitation processes. Here we derive the first quantitative theory (and its associated closed-form solution) capable of explaining this phenomena. The theory agrees well with experimental measurements and atomistic calculations over a very wide range of conditions. Utilizing this theory, we are able to map out three distinct regimes in which the critical tensile pressure for cavitation failure (i) increases with decreasing grain size in accordance with conventional wisdom, (ii) nonintuitively decreases with decreasing grain size, and (iii) is independent of grain size. The theory also predicts microscopic signatures of the cavitation process which agree with available data.

${}^{75}\mathrm{As}$, ${}^{87}\mathrm{Rb}$, and ${}^{85}\mathrm{Rb}$ nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) and ${}^{87}\mathrm{Rb}$ nuclear magnetic resonance measurements in a ${\mathrm{RbFe}}_2{\mathrm{As}}_2$ iron-based superconductor are presented. We observe a marked broadening of the ${}^{75}\mathrm{As}$ NQR spectrum below $T_0\simeq 140\mathrm{K}$ which is associated with the onset of a charge order in the FeAs planes. Below $T_0$ we observe a power-law decrease in the ${}^{75}\mathrm{As}$ nuclear spin-lattice relaxation rate down to $T^{*}\simeq 20\mathrm{K}$. Below $T^{*}$ the nuclei start to probe different dynamics owing to the different local electronic configurations induced by the charge order. A fraction of the nuclei probes spin dynamics associated with electrons approaching a localization while another fraction probes activated dynamics possibly associated with a pseudogap. These different trends are discussed in light of an orbital selective behavior expected for the electronic correlations.

A heavy-fermion superconductor ${\mathrm{UPt}}_3$ is a unique spin-triplet superconductor with multiple superconducting phases. Here, we provide the first report on a first-principles analysis of the microscopic superconducting gap structure. We find that the promising gap structure is an unprecedented $E_{2u}$ state, which is completely different from the previous phenomenological $E_{2u}$ models. Our obtained $E_{2u}$ state has in-plane twofold vertical line nodes on small Fermi surfaces and point nodes with linear dispersion on a large Fermi surface. These peculiar features cannot be explained in the conventional spin $1/2$ representation, but is described by the group-theoretical representation of the Cooper pairs in the total angular momentum $j=5/2$ space. Our findings shed new light on the long-standing problems in the superconductivity of ${\mathrm{UPt}}_3$.

We study theoretically the Berry curvature of the magnon induced by the hybridization with the acoustic phonons via the spin-orbit and dipolar interactions. We first discuss the magnon-phonon hybridization via the dipolar interaction, and show that the dispersions have gapless points in momentum space, some of which form a loop. Next, when both spin-orbit and dipolar interactions are considered, we show anisotropic texture of the Berry curvature and its divergence with and without gap closing. Realistic evaluation of the consequent anomalous velocity is given for yttrium iron garnet.

The low-energy spectra of many body systems on a torus, of finite size $L$, are well understood in magnetically ordered and gapped topological phases. However, the spectra at quantum critical points separating such phases are largely unexplored for $(2+1)\mathrm{D}$ systems. Using a combination of analytical and numerical techniques, we accurately calculate and analyze the low-energy torus spectrum at an Ising critical point which provides a universal fingerprint of the underlying quantum field theory, with the energy levels given by universal numbers times $1/L$. We highlight the implications of a neighboring topological phase on the spectrum by studying the Ising* transition (i.e. the transition between a $Z_2$ topological phase and a trivial paramagnet), in the example of the toric code in a longitudinal field, and advocate a phenomenological picture that provides qualitative insight into the operator content of the critical field theory.