We characterize the Mott insulating regime of a repulsively interacting Fermi gas of ultracold atoms in a three-dimensional optical lattice. We use in situ imaging to extract the central density of the gas and to determine its local compressibility. For intermediate to strong interactions, we observe the emergence of a plateau in the density as a function of atom number, and a reduction of the compressibility at a density of one atom per site, indicating the formation of a Mott insulator. Comparisons to state-of-the-art numerical simulations of the Hubbard model over a wide range of interactions reveal that the temperature of the gas is of the order of, or below, the tunneling energy scale. Our results hold great promise for the exploration of many-body phenomena with ultracold atoms, where the local compressibility can be a useful tool to detect signatures of different phases or phase boundaries at specific values of the filling.

Recently it has been argued that in Einstein gravity anti–de Sitter spacetime is unstable against the formation of black holes for a large class of arbitrarily small perturbations. We examine the effects of including a Gauss-Bonnet term. In five dimensions, spherically symmetric Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet gravity has two key features: Choptuik scaling exhibits a radius gap, and the mass function goes to a finite value as the horizon radius vanishes. These suggest that black holes will not form dynamically if the total mass-energy content of the spacetime is too small, thereby restoring the stability of anti–de Sitter spacetime in this context. We support this claim with numerical simulations and uncover a rich structure in horizon radii and formation times as a function of perturbation amplitude.

The gravitational redshift effect allows one to directly probe the gravitational potential in clusters of galaxies. Following up on Wojtak et al. [Nature (London) 477, 567 (2011)], we present a new measurement. We take advantage of new data from the tenth data release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey. We compare the spectroscopic redshift of the brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs) with that of galaxies at the outskirts of clusters, using a sample with an average cluster mass of ${10}^{14}{M}_{\odot }$. We find that these galaxies have an average relative redshift of $-11\mathrm{km}/\mathrm{s}$ compared with that of BCGs, with a standard deviation of $+7$ and $-5\mathrm{km}/\mathrm{s}$. Our measurement is consistent with that of Wojtak et al. [Nature (London) 477, 567 (2011)]. However, our derived standard deviation is larger, as we take into account various systematic effects, beyond the size of the data set. The result is in good agreement with the predictions from general relativity.

Inferring the astrophysical parameters of coalescing compact binaries is a key science goal of the upcoming advanced LIGO-Virgo gravitational-wave detector network and, more generally, gravitational-wave astronomy. However, current approaches to parameter estimation for these detectors require computationally expensive algorithms. Therefore, there is a pressing need for new, fast, and accurate Bayesian inference techniques. In this Letter, we demonstrate that a reduced order modeling approach enables rapid parameter estimation to be performed. By implementing a reduced order quadrature scheme within the LIGO Algorithm Library, we show that Bayesian inference on the 9-dimensional parameter space of nonspinning binary neutron star inspirals can be sped up by a factor of $\sim 30$ for the early advanced detectors’ configurations (with sensitivities down to around 40 Hz) and $\sim 70$ for sensitivities down to around 20 Hz. This speedup will increase to about 150 as the detectors improve their low-frequency limit to 10 Hz, reducing to hours analyses which could otherwise take months to complete. Although these results focus on interferometric gravitational wave detectors, the techniques are broadly applicable to any experiment where fast Bayesian analysis is desirable.

We apply maximally helicity violating (MHV) diagrams to the derivation of the one-loop dilatation operator of $\mathcal{N}=4$ supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory in the SO(6) sector. We find that in this approach the calculation reduces to the evaluation of a single MHV diagram in dimensional regularization. This provides the first application of MHV diagrams to an off-shell quantity. We also discuss other applications of the method and future directions.

We consider a nonperturbative approach to the thermal production of dileptons and photons at temperatures near the critical temperature in QCD. The suppression of colored excitations at low temperature is modeled by including a small value of the Polyakov loop, in a “semi”-quark-gluon plasma (QGP). Comparing the semi-QGP to the perturbative QGP, we find a mild enhancement of thermal dileptons. In contrast, to leading logarithmic order in weak coupling there are far fewer hard photons from the semi-QGP than the usual QGP. To illustrate the possible effects on photon and dilepton production in heavy-ion collisions, we integrate the rate with a simulation using ideal hydrodynamics. Dileptons uniformly exhibit a small flow, but the strong suppression of photons in the semi-QGP tends to weight the elliptical flow of photons to that generated in the hadronic phase.

Measurements of inclusive jet production are performed in $pp$ and $\mathrm{Pb}+\mathrm{Pb}$ collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=2.76\mathrm{TeV}$ with the ATLAS detector at the LHC, corresponding to integrated luminosities of 4.0 and $0.14{\mathrm{nb}}^{-1}$, respectively. The jets are identified with the anti-$k_t$ algorithm with $R=0.4$, and the spectra are measured over the kinematic range of jet transverse momentum $32<p_{\mathrm{T}}<500\mathrm{GeV}$ and absolute rapidity $|y|<2.1$ and as a function of collision centrality. The nuclear modification factor $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ is evaluated, and jets are found to be suppressed by approximately a factor of 2 in central collisions compared to $pp$ collisions. The $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ shows a slight increase with $p_{\mathit{T}}$ and no significant variation with rapidity.

We experimentally demonstrate the possibility of tuning the frequency of a laser pulse via the use of an Airy pulse-seeded soliton self-frequency shift. The intrinsically asymmetric nature of Airy pulses, typically featured by either leading or trailing oscillatory tails (relatively to the main lobe), is revealed through the nonlinear generation of both a primary and a secondary Raman soliton self-frequency shift, a phenomenon which is driven by the soliton fission processes. The resulting frequency shift can be carefully controlled by using time-reversed Airy pulses or, alternatively, by applying an offset to the cubic phase modulation used to generate the pulses. When compared with the use of conventional chirped Gaussian pulses, our technique brings about unique advantages in terms of both efficient frequency tuning and feasibility, along with the generation and control of multicolor Raman solitons with enhanced tunability. Our theoretical analysis agrees well with our experimental observations.

Spin-resolved scanning tunneling microscopy is employed to quantitatively determine the spin polarization of the magnetic field-split Kondo state. Tunneling conductance spectra of a Kondo-screened magnetic atom are evaluated within a simple model taking into account inelastic tunneling due to spin excitations and two Kondo peaks positioned symmetrically around the Fermi energy. We fit the spin state of the Kondo-screened atom with a spin Hamiltonian independent of the Kondo effect and account for Zeeman splitting of the Kondo peak in the magnetic field. We find that the width and the height of the Kondo peaks scales with the Zeeman energy. Our observations are consistent with full spin polarization of the Kondo peaks, i.e., a majority spin peak below the Fermi energy and a minority spin peak above.

We show that the transport and thermodynamic properties of a singly connected disordered conductor exhibit quantum Aharonov-Bohm oscillations as a function of the total magnetic flux through the sample. The oscillations are associated with the interference contribution from a special class of electron trajectories confined to the surface of the sample.

Recent experimental results based on multielectrode and imaging techniques have reinvigorated the idea that large neural networks operate near a critical point, between order and disorder. However, evidence for criticality has relied on the definition of arbitrary order parameters, or on models that do not address the dynamical nature of network activity. Here we introduce a novel approach to assess criticality that overcomes these limitations, while encompassing and generalizing previous criteria. We find a simple model to describe the global activity of large populations of ganglion cells in the rat retina, and show that their statistics are poised near a critical point. Taking into account the temporal dynamics of the activity greatly enhances the evidence for criticality, revealing it where previous methods would not. The approach is general and could be used in other biological networks.

The uncertainty principle being a cornerstone of quantum mechanics, it is surprising that, in nearly 90 years, there have been no direct tests of measurement uncertainty relations. This lacuna was due to the absence of two essential ingredients: appropriate measures of measurement error (and disturbance) and precise formulations of such relations that are universally valid and directly testable. We formulate two distinct forms of direct tests, based on different measures of error. We present a prototype protocol for a direct test of measurement uncertainty relations in terms of value deviation errors (hitherto considered nonfeasible), highlighting the lack of universality of these relations. This shows that the formulation of universal, directly testable measurement uncertainty relations for state-dependent error measures remains an important open problem. Recent experiments that were claimed to constitute invalidations of Heisenberg’s error-disturbance relation, are shown to conform with the spirit of Heisenberg’s principle if interpreted as direct tests of measurement uncertainty relations for error measures that quantify distances between observables.

We give the first composable security proof for continuous-variable quantum key distribution with coherent states against collective attacks. Crucially, in the limit of large blocks the secret key rate converges to the usual value computed from the Holevo bound. Combining our proof with either the de Finetti theorem or the postselection technique then shows the security of the protocol against general attacks, thereby confirming the long-standing conjecture that Gaussian attacks are optimal asymptotically in the composable security framework. We expect that our parameter estimation procedure, which does not rely on any assumption about the quantum state being measured, will find applications elsewhere, for instance, for the reliable quantification of continuous-variable entanglement in finite-size settings.

We propose an analog-digital quantum simulation of fermion-fermion scattering mediated by a continuum of bosonic modes within a circuit quantum electrodynamics scenario. This quantum technology naturally provides strong coupling of superconducting qubits with a continuum of electromagnetic modes in an open transmission line. In this way, we propose qubits to efficiently simulate fermionic modes via digital techniques, while we consider the continuum complexity of an open transmission line to simulate the continuum complexity of bosonic modes in quantum field theories. Therefore, we believe that the complexity-simulating-complexity concept should become a leading paradigm in any effort towards scalable quantum simulations.

We give exact formulas for the right-handed analog of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa (CKM) matrix in the minimal left-right symmetric theory, for the case when the left-right symmetry is generalized parity as in the original version of the theory. We derive its explicit form and give a physical reason for the known and surprising fact that the right-handed mixing angles are close to the CKM ones, in spite of the left-right symmetry being badly broken in nature. We exemplify our results on the production of the right-handed charged gauge boson and the computation of $K_L-K_S$ mass difference.

We report on an experiment performing channeling and volume reflection of a high-energy electron beam using a quasimosaic, bent silicon (111) crystal at the End Station A Test Beam at SLAC. The experiment uses beams of 3.35 and 6.3 GeV. In the channeling orientation, deflections of the beam of $400\mu \mathrm{rad}$ for both energies with about 22% efficiency are observed, while in the volume-reflection orientation, deflection of the beam by $120\mu \mathrm{rad}$ at 3.35 GeV and by $80\mu \mathrm{rad}$ at 6.3 GeV is observed with 86%–95% efficiency. Quantitative measurements of the channeling efficiency, surface transmission, and dechanneling length are taken. These are the first quantitative measurements of channeling and volume reflection using a primary beam of multi-GeV electrons.

In the presence of magnetic helicity, inverse transfer from small to large scales is well known in magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence and has applications in astrophysics, cosmology, and fusion plasmas. Using high resolution direct numerical simulations of magnetically dominated self-similarly decaying MHD turbulence, we report a similar inverse transfer even in the absence of magnetic helicity. We compute for the first time spectral energy transfer rates to show that this inverse transfer is about half as strong as with helicity, but in both cases the magnetic gain at large scales results from velocity at similar scales interacting with smaller-scale magnetic fields. This suggests that both inverse transfers are a consequence of universal mechanisms for magnetically dominated turbulence. Possible explanations include inverse cascading of the mean squared vector potential associated with local near two dimensionality and the shallower $k^2$ subinertial range spectrum of kinetic energy forcing the magnetic field with a $k^4$ subinertial range to attain larger-scale coherence. The inertial range shows a clear $k^{-2}$ spectrum and is the first example of fully isotropic magnetically dominated MHD turbulence exhibiting weak turbulence scaling.

The nature of the normal state of an ultracold Fermi gas in the BCS-BEC crossover regime is an intriguing and controversial topic. While the many-body ground state remains a condensate of paired fermions, the normal state must evolve from a Fermi liquid to a Bose gas of molecules as a function of the interaction strength. How this occurs is still largely unknown. We explore this question with measurements of the distribution of single-particle energies and momenta in a nearly homogeneous gas above $T_c$. The data fit well to a function that includes a narrow, positively dispersing peak that corresponds to quasiparticles and an “incoherent background” that can accommodate broad, asymmetric line shapes. We find that the quasiparticle’s spectral weight vanishes abruptly as the strength of interactions is modified, which signals the breakdown of a Fermi liquid description. Such a sharp feature is surprising in a crossover.