We propose a scheme for the emission of few-cycle dispersive waves in the midinfrared using hollow-core photonic crystal fibers filled with noble gas. The underlying mechanism is the formation of a plasma cloud by a self-compressed, subcycle pump pulse. The resulting free-electron population modifies the fiber dispersion, allowing phase-matched access to dispersive waves at otherwise inaccessible frequencies, well into the midinfrared. Remarkably, the pulses generated turn out to have durations of the order of two optical cycles. In addition, this ultrafast emission, which occurs even in the absence of a zero dispersion point between pump and midinfrared wavelengths, is tunable over a wide frequency range simply by adjusting the gas pressure. These theoretical results pave the way to a new generation of compact, fiber-based sources of few-cycle midinfrared radiation.

We observe the propagation dynamics of surface gravity water waves, having an Airy function envelope, in both the linear and the nonlinear regimes. In the linear regime, the shape of the envelope is preserved while propagating in an 18-m water tank, despite the inherent dispersion of the wave packet. The Airy wave function can propagate at a velocity that is slower (or faster if the Airy envelope is inverted) than the group velocity. Furthermore, the introduction of the Airy wave packet as surface water waves enables the observation of its position-dependent chirp and cubic-phase offset, predicted more than 35 years ago, for the first time. When increasing the envelope of the input Airy pulse, nonlinear effects become dominant, and are manifested by the generation of water-wave solitons.

Although only a handful of organic materials have shown polariton condensation, their study is rapidly becoming more accessible. The spontaneous appearance of long-range spatial coherence is often recognized as a defining feature of such condensates. In this Letter, we study the emergence of spatial coherence in an organic microcavity and demonstrate a number of unique features stemming from the peculiarities of this material set. Despite its disordered nature, we find that correlations extend over the entire spot size, and we measure $g^{(1)}(r,r^{\prime })$ values of nearly unity at short distances and of 50% for points separated by nearly $10\mu \mathrm{m}$. We show that for large spots, strong shot-to-shot fluctuations emerge as varying phase gradients and defects, including the spontaneous formation of vortices. These are consistent with the presence of modulation instabilities. Furthermore, we find that measurements with flat-top spots are significantly influenced by disorder and can, in some cases, lead to the formation of mutually incoherent localized condensates.

We present evidence that the metal-insulator transition (MIT) in a tensile-strained ${\mathrm{NdNiO}}_3$ (NNO) film is facilitated by a redistribution of electronic density and that it neither requires Ni charge disproportionation nor a symmetry change [U. Staub et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 126402 (2002); R. Jaramillo et al., Nat. Phys. 10, 304 (2014)]. Given that epitaxial tensile strain in thin NNO films induces preferential occupancy of the $e_g$ $d_{{\mathit{x}}^2-{\mathit{y}}^2}$ orbital we propose that the larger transfer integral of this orbital state with the O $2p$ orbital state mediates a redistribution of electronic density from the Ni atom. A decrease in the Ni $d_{{\mathit{x}}^2-{\mathit{y}}^2}$ orbital occupation is directly observed by resonant inelastic x-ray scattering below the MIT temperature. Furthermore, an increase in the Nd charge occupancy is measured by x-ray absorption at the Nd $L_3$ edge. Both spin-orbit coupling and crystal field effects combine to break the degeneracy of the Nd $5d$ states, shifting the energy of the Nd $e_g$ $d_{{\mathit{x}}^2-{\mathit{y}}^2}$ orbit towards the Fermi level, allowing the $A$ site to become an active acceptor during the MIT. This work identifies the relocation of electrons from the Ni $3d$ to the Nd $5d$ orbitals across the MIT. We propose that the insulating gap opens between the Ni $3d$ and O $2p$ states, resulting from Ni $3d$ electron localization. The transition seems to be neither a purely Mott-Hubbard transition nor a simple charge transfer.

We report experiment and theory on an ambipolar gate-controlled Si(111)-vacuum field effect transistor where we study electron and hole (low-temperature 2D) transport in the same device simply by changing the external gate voltage to tune the system from being a 2D electron system at positive gate voltage to a 2D hole system at negative gate voltage. The electron (hole) conductivity manifests strong (moderate) metallic temperature dependence with the conductivity decreasing by a factor of 8 (2) between 0.3 K and 4.2 K with the peak electron mobility ($\sim 18{\mathrm{m}}^2/\mathrm{V}\mathrm{s}$) being roughly 20 times larger than the peak hole mobility (in the same sample). Our theory explains the data well using random phase approximation screening of background Coulomb disorder, establishing that the observed metallicity is a direct consequence of the strong temperature dependence of the effective screened disorder.

The Wien effect is a model process for field-induced charge creation. Here it is derived for a nonelectrical system: the spin ice “magnetolyte”—a unique system showing perfect charge symmetry. An entropic reaction field, analogous to the Jaccard field in ice, opposes direct current, but a frequency window exists in which the Wien effect for magnetolyte and electrolyte are indistinguishable. The universal enhancement of monopole density speeds up the magnetization dynamics, which manifests in the nonlinear, nonequilibrium ac susceptibility. This is a rare instance where such effects may be calculated, providing new insights for electrolytes. Experimental predictions are made for ${\mathrm{Dy}}_2{\mathrm{Ti}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_7$ spin ice.

Dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP) is a promising strategy for generating a significantly increased nonthermal spin polarization in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and its applications that range from medicine diagnostics to material science. Being a genuine nonequilibrium effect, DNP circumvents the need for strong magnetic fields. However, despite intense research, a detailed theoretical understanding of the precise mechanism behind DNP is currently lacking. We address this issue by focusing on a simple instance of DNP—so-called solid effect DNP—which is formulated in terms of a quantum central spin model where a single electron is coupled to an ensemble of interacting nuclei. We show analytically that the nonequilibrium buildup of polarization heavily relies on a mechanism which can be interpreted as kinetically constrained diffusion. Beyond revealing this insight, our approach furthermore permits numerical studies of ensembles containing thousands of spins that are typically intractable when formulated in terms of a quantum master equation. We believe that this represents an important step forward in the quest of harnessing nonequilibrium many-body quantum physics for technological applications.

The effect of a constant applied external force, induced for instance by an electric or gravitational field, on the dispersion of Brownian particles in periodic media with spatially varying diffusivity, and thus mobility, is studied. We show that external forces can greatly enhance dispersion in the direction of the applied force and also modify, to a lesser extent and in some cases nonmonotonically, dispersion perpendicular to the applied force. Our results thus open up the intriguing possibility of modulating the dispersive properties of heterogeneous media by using externally applied force fields. These results are obtained via a Kubo formula that can be applied to any periodic advection diffusion system in any spatial dimension.

A recent proposal is that dark matter could be a thermal relic of $3\to 2$ scatterings in a strongly coupled hidden sector. We present explicit classes of strongly coupled gauge theories that admit this behavior. These are QCD-like theories of dynamical chiral symmetry breaking, where the pions play the role of dark matter. The number-changing $3\to 2$ process, which sets the dark matter relic abundance, arises from the Wess-Zumino-Witten term. The theories give an explicit relationship between the $3\to 2$ annihilation rate and the $2\to 2$ self-scattering rate, which alters predictions for structure formation. This is a simple calculable realization of the strongly interacting massive-particle mechanism.

Soft limits of a massless $S$ matrix are known to reflect the symmetries of the theory. In particular, for theories with Goldstone bosons, the double-soft limit of scalars reveals the coset structure of the vacuum manifold. In this Letter, we propose that such universal double-soft behavior is not only true for scalars, but also for spin-$1/2$ particles in four dimensions and fermions in three dimensions. We first consider the Akulov-Volkov theory and demonstrate that the double-soft limit of Goldstinos yields the supersymmetry algebra. More surprisingly, we also find that amplitudes in $4\le \mathcal{N}\le 8$ supergravity theories in four dimensions as well as $\mathcal{N}=16$ supergravity in three dimensions behave universally in the double-soft-fermion limit, analogous to the scalar ones. The validity of the new soft theorems at loop level is also studied. The results for supergravity are beyond what is implied by supersymmetry Ward identities and may impose nontrivial constraints on the possible counterterms for supergravity theories.

We present a class of cancellation conditions for suppressing the total contributions of Barr-Zee diagrams to the electron electric dipole moment (eEDM). Such a cancellation is of particular significance after the new eEDM upper limit was released by the ACME Collaboration, which strongly constrains the allowed magnitude of $CP$ violation in Higgs couplings and hence the feasibility of electroweak baryogenesis (EWBG). Explicitly, if both the $CP$-odd Higgs-photon-photon ($Z$ boson) and the $CP$-odd Higgs-electron-positron couplings are turned on, a cancellation may occur either between the contributions of a $CP$-mixing Higgs boson, with the other Higgs bosons being decoupled, or between the contributions of $CP$-even and $CP$-odd Higgs bosons. With a cancellation, large $CP$ violation in the Higgs sector is still allowed, yielding successful EWBG. The reopened parameter regions would be probed by future neutron, mercury EDM measurements, and direct measurements of Higgs $CP$ properties at the Large Hadron Collider Run II and future colliders.

Using an optical nanoresonator to realize extreme concentration of light at subwavelength nanoscale dimensions is of both fundamental and practical significance. Unfortunately, the optical cross section of an isotropic nanoresonator is determined by the resonant wavelength, which unfavorably limits the highest concentration ratio. Here we show that the cross section of a localized subwavelength resonator can be drastically enhanced by orders of magnitude. A single microscopic nanoresonator could exhibit a macroscopic optical cross section. We further show that the enhancement can be implemented in simple dielectric structures that are readily compatible with optoelectronic integration. The giant optical cross section of a nano-object provides a versatile platform to create extremely strong light-matter interactions at the nanoscale.

We discuss elastic instabilities of the atomic crystal lattice at zero temperature. Because of long-range shear forces of the solid, at such transitions the phonon velocities vanish, if at all, only along certain crystallographic directions, and, consequently, the critical phonon fluctuations are suppressed to a lower dimensional manifold and governed by a Gaussian fixed point. In the case of symmetry-breaking elastic transitions, a characteristic critical phonon thermodynamics arises that is found, e.g., to violate Debye’s $T^3$ law for the specific heat. We point out that quantum critical elasticity is triggered whenever a critical soft mode couples linearly to the strain tensor. In particular, this is relevant for the electronic Ising-nematic quantum phase transition in a tetragonal crystal as discussed in the context of certain cuprates, ruthenates, and iron-based superconductors.

We report on the energy- and momentum-resolved optical response of black phosphorus (BP) in its bulk form. Along the armchair direction of the puckered layers, we find a highly dispersive mode that is strongly suppressed in the perpendicular (zigzag) direction. This mode emerges out of the single-particle continuum for finite values of momentum and is therefore interpreted as an exciton. We argue that this exciton, which has already been predicted theoretically for phosphorene—the monolayer form of BP—can be detected by conventional optical spectroscopy in the two-dimensional case and might pave the way for optoelectronic applications of this emerging material.

Magnetoresistivity ${\rho }_{xx}$ and Hall resistivity ${\rho }_{xy}$ in ultrahigh magnetic fields up to 88 T are measured down to 0.15 K to clarify the multiband electronic structure in high-quality single crystals of superconducting FeSe. At low temperatures and high fields we observe quantum oscillations in both resistivity and the Hall effect, confirming the multiband Fermi surface with small volumes. We propose a novel approach to identify from magnetotransport measurements the sign of the charge carriers corresponding to a particular cyclotron orbit in a compensated metal. The observed significant differences in the relative amplitudes of the quantum oscillations between the ${\rho }_{xx}$ and ${\rho }_{xy}$ components, together with the positive sign of the high-field ${\rho }_{xy}$, reveal that the largest pocket should correspond to the hole band. The low-field magnetotransport data in the normal state suggest that, in addition to one hole and one almost compensated electron band, the orthorhombic phase of FeSe exhibits an additional tiny electron pocket with a high mobility.

We propose and experimentally realize a novel versatile protocol that allows the quantum state engineering of heralded optical coherent-state superpositions. This scheme relies on a two-mode squeezed state, linear mixing, and a $n$-photon detection. It is optimally using expensive non-Gaussian resources to build up only the key non-Gaussian part of the targeted state. In the experimental case of a two-photon detection based on high-efficiency superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors, the freely propagating state exhibits a 67% fidelity with a squeezed even coherent-state superposition with a size $|\alpha {|}^2=3$. The demonstrated procedure and the achieved rate will facilitate the use of such superpositions in subsequent protocols, including fundamental tests and optical hybrid quantum information implementations.

Nonlinear energy transfer and dissipation in Alfvén wave turbulence are analyzed in the first gyrokinetic simulation spanning all scales from the tail of the MHD range to the electron gyroradius scale. For typical solar wind parameters at 1 AU, about 30% of the nonlinear energy transfer close to the electron gyroradius scale is mediated by modes in the tail of the MHD cascade. Collisional dissipation occurs across the entire kinetic range $k_{\perp }{\rho }_i\gtrsim 1$. Both mechanisms thus act on multiple coupled scales, which have to be retained for a comprehensive picture of the dissipation range in Alfvénic turbulence.