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  • Letter
  • Open Access

N-body antibunching in a degenerate Fermi gas of He*3 atoms

Kieran F. Thomas1,*, Shijie Li1, A. H. Abbas1,2,†, Andrew G. Truscott1, and Sean S. Hodgman1,‡

  • 1Department of Quantum Science and Technology, Research School of Physics, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
  • 2Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, Cairo University, Giza 12613, Egypt

  • *Present Address: Q-CTRL, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
  • †Present Address: Artificial Intelligence and Cyber Futures Institute, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, NSW 2795, Australia.
  • ‡sean.hodgman@anu.edu.au
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Phys. Rev. Research 6, L022003 – Published 3 April, 2024

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.6.L022003

Abstract

A key set of observables for investigating quantum systems are the n-body correlation functions, which provide a powerful tool for experimentally determining coherence and directly probing the many-body wave function. While the (bosonic) correlations of photonic systems are well explored, the correlations present in matter-wave systems, particularly for fermionic atoms, are still an emerging field. In this work, we use the unique single-atom detection properties of He*3 atoms to perform simultaneous measurements of the n-body quantum correlations, up to the fifth order, of a degenerate Fermi gas. In a direct demonstration of the Pauli exclusion principle, we observe clear antibunching at all orders and find good agreement with predicted correlation volumes. Our results pave the way for using correlation functions to probe some of the rich physics associated with fermionic systems.

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Phys. Rev. Research 6, L022003– Published 3 April, 2024
  • Received 15 December 2023
  • Accepted 14 March 2024
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