The realization of a scalable architecture for quantum information processing is a major challenge for quantum science. A promising approach is based on emitters in nanostructures that are coupled by light. Here, we show that erbium dopants can be reproducibly integrated at well-defined lattice sites by implantation into pure silicon. We thus achieve a narrow inhomogeneous broadening, less than 1 GHz, strong optical transitions, and an outstanding optical coherence even at temperatures of 8 K, with an upper bound to the homogeneous linewidth of around 10 kHz. Our study thus introduces a promising materials platform for the implementation of on-chip quantum memories, microwave-to-optical conversion, and distributed quantum information processing.

Fault-tolerant quantum computing requires initializing the quantum register in a well-defined fiducial state. In solid-state systems, this is typically achieved through thermalization to a cold reservoir, such that the initialization fidelity is fundamentally limited by temperature. Here, we present a method of preparing a fiducial quantum state with a confidence beyond the thermal limit. It is based on real-time monitoring of the qubit through a negative-result measurement—the equivalent of a “Maxwell’s demon” that triggers the experiment only upon the appearance of a qubit in the lowest-energy state. We experimentally apply it to initialize an electron spin qubit in silicon, achieving a ground-state initialization fidelity of 98.9(4)%, corresponding to a $20\times$ reduction in initialization error compared to the unmonitored system. A fidelity approaching 99.9% could be achieved with realistic improvements in the bandwidth of the amplifier chain or by slowing down the rate of electron tunneling from the reservoir. We use a nuclear spin ancilla, measured in quantum nondemolition mode, to prove the value of the electron initialization fidelity far beyond the intrinsic fidelity of the electron readout. However, the method itself does not require an ancilla for its execution, saving the need for additional resources. The quantitative analysis of the initialization fidelity reveals that a simple picture of spin-dependent electron tunneling does not correctly describe the data. Our digital Maxwell’s demon can be applied to a wide range of quantum systems, with minimal demands on control and detection hardware.

The neural dynamics generating sensory, motor, and cognitive functions are commonly understood through field theories for neural population activity. Classic neural field theories are derived from highly simplified models of individual neurons, while biological neurons are highly complex cells. Integrate-and-fire models retain a key nonlinear feature of neuronal activity: Action potentials return the membrane potential to a nearly fixed reset value. This nonlinear reset of the membrane voltage after a spike is absent from classic neural field theories. Here, we develop a statistical field theory for networks of integrate-and-fire neurons with stochastic spike emission. This reveals a new mean-field theory for the activity in these networks, fluctuation corrections to the mean-field dynamics, and a mapping to a self-consistent renewal process. We use these to study the impact of the spike-driven reset of the membrane voltage on population activity. The spike reset gives rise to a multiplicative, rate-dependent leak term in the mean-field membrane voltage dynamics. This leads to bistability between quiescent and active states in the mean-field theory of homogenous and excitatory-inhibitory pulse-coupled networks. We uncover two types of fluctuation corrections to the mean-field theory, due to the nonlinear mapping from membrane voltage to spike emission and the nonlinear reset. These two fluctuation corrections can have competing effects, promoting and suppressing activity, respectively. We then examine the roles of spike resets and recurrent inhibition in stabilizing network activity. We calculate the phase diagram for inhibitory stabilization and find that an inhibition-stabilized regime occurs in wide regions of parameter space, consistent with experimental reports of inhibitory stabilization in diverse brain regions. Fluctuations narrow the region of inhibitory stabilization, consistent with their role in suppressing activity through spike resets.

We propose a microscopic picture for understanding the nonlinear rheology of supercooled liquids with soft repulsive potentials. Based on Brownian dynamics simulations of supercooled charge-stabilized colloidal suspensions, our analysis shows that the shear thinning of viscosity ($\eta$) at large enough shear rates ($\dot{\gamma }$), expressed as $\eta \sim {\dot{\gamma }}^{-\lambda }$, originates from the evolution of the localized elastic region (LER). An LER is a transient zone composed of the first several coordination shells of a reference particle. In response to the external shear, particles within the LER undergo nearly affine displacement before the yielding of the LER. The characteristic strain ($\gamma$) and size ($\xi$) of the LER, respectively, depend on the shear rate by $\gamma \sim {\dot{\gamma }}^{\epsilon }$ and $\xi \sim {\dot{\gamma }}^{-\nu }$. Three exponents, $\lambda$, $\epsilon$, and $\nu$, are related by $\lambda =1-\epsilon =4\nu$. This simple relation connects the nonlinear rheology to the elastic properties and the microscopic configurational distortion of the system. The relaxation of the LER is promoted by the large-step nonaffine particle displacement along the extensional direction of the shear geometry with the step length of 0.4 particle diameter. The elastic deformation and relaxation of the LER are ubiquitous and successive in the flow, which compose the fundamental process governing the bulk nonlinear viscoelasticity. We apply this model to analyze the rheo-small-angle neutron scattering data of sheared charge-stabilized colloidal suspensions. It is seen that our model well explains the neutron spectra and the rheological data.

The interlayer coupling is emerging as a new parameter for tuning the physical properties of two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals materials. When two identical semiconductor monolayers are stacked with a twist angle, the periodic interlayer coupling modulation due to the moiré superlattice may endow exotic physical phenomena, such as moiré excitons and correlated electronic phases. To gain insight into these new phenomena, it is crucial to unveil the underlying coupling between atomic layers. Recently, the rhombohedral-stacked transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) bilayer has attracted significant interest because of the emergence of an out-of-plane polarization from nonferroelectric monolayer constituents. However, as a key parameter responsible for the physical properties, the interlayer coupling and its relationship with ferroelectricity remain elusive. Here, we probe the asymmetric interlayer coupling between the conduction band of one layer and the valence band from the other layer in a $3R\text{−}{\mathrm{MoS}}_2$ bilayer, which can be understood as a result of a layer-dependent Berry phase winding. By performing optical spectroscopy in a dual-gated device, we show an effective type-II band alignment exists at $K$ points in the $3R\text{−}{\mathrm{MoS}}_2$ bilayer. Furthermore, by unraveling various contributions to the band offset, we quantitatively determine the asymmetric interlayer coupling and spontaneous polarization in $3R\text{−}{\mathrm{MoS}}_2$. Our results unveil the physical nature of stacking-induced ferroelectricity in TMD homostructures and have important implications for moiré physics in 2D semiconductors.

A vison is an excitation of the Kitaev spin liquid which carries a ${\mathbb{Z}}_2$ gauge flux. While immobile in the pure Kitaev model, it becomes a dynamical degree of freedom in the presence of perturbations. We study an isolated vison in the isotropic Kitaev model perturbed by a small external magnetic field $h$, an off-diagonal exchange interaction $\mathrm{\Gamma }$, and a Heisenberg coupling $J$. In the ferromagnetic Kitaev model, the dressed vison obtains a dispersion linear in $\mathrm{\Gamma }$ and $h$ and a fully universal low-$T$ mobility, $\mu =6\hslash v_m^2/(k_{B}T{)}^2$, where $v_m$ is the velocity of Majorana fermions. In contrast, in the antiferromagnetic (AFM) Kitaev model interference effects suppress coherent propagation and an incoherent Majorana-assisted hopping leads to a $T$-independent mobility. The motion of a single vison due to Heisenberg interactions is strongly suppressed for both signs of the Kitaev coupling. Vison bands in AFM Kitaev models can be topological and may lead to characteristic features in the thermal Hall effects in Kitaev materials. Furthermore, we argue that vison diffusion leads to universal signatures in quench experiments.

We introduce a new, general-purpose, range-separated hybrid van der Waals density functional termed vdW-DF2-ahbr within the nonempirical vdW-DF method [Hyldgaard, et al. J. Phys. Condens. Matter 32, 393001 (2020)]. It combines a correlation from vdW-DF2 with a screened Fock exchange that is fixed by a new model of exchange effects in the density-explicit vdW-DF-b86r or rev-vdW-DF2 functional [Hamada, Phys. Rev. B 89, 121103(R) (2014)]. The new vdW-DF2-ahbr prevents spurious exchange binding and has a small-density-gradient form set from many-body perturbation analysis. It is accurate for bulk as well as layered materials, and it systematically and significantly improves the performance of the present vdW-DFs for molecular problems. Importantly, vdW-DF2-ahbr also outperforms present-standard (dispersion-corrected) range-separated hybrids on a broad collection of noncovalent-interaction benchmark sets, while at the same time successfully mitigating the density-driven errors that often affect the description of molecular transition states and isomerization calculations. vdW-DF2-ahbr furthermore improves on state-of-the-art density-functional-theory approaches by succeeding at challenging problems. For example, it (1) correctly predicts both the substrate structure and the site preference for CO adsorption on Pt(111), (2) it outperforms existing nonempirical vdW-DFs for the description of ${\mathrm{CO}}_2$ adsorption in both a functionalized and in a simple metal-organic framework, and (3) it is highly accurate for the set of base-pair interactions in a model of DNA assembly.

Monitored quantum circuits can exhibit an entanglement transition as a function of the rate of measurements, stemming from the competition between scrambling unitary dynamics and disentangling projective measurements. We study how entanglement dynamics in nonunitary quantum circuits can be enriched in the presence of charge conservation, using a combination of exact numerics and a mapping onto a statistical mechanics model of constrained hard-core random walkers. We uncover a charge-sharpening transition that separates different scrambling phases with volume-law scaling of entanglement, distinguished by whether measurements can efficiently reveal the total charge of the system. We find that while Rényi entropies grow sub-ballistically as $\sqrt{t}$ in the absence of measurement, for even an infinitesimal rate of measurements, all average Rényi entropies grow ballistically with time $\sim t$. We study numerically the critical behavior of the charge-sharpening and entanglement transitions in U(1) circuits, and show that they exhibit emergent Lorentz invariance and can also be diagnosed using scalable local ancilla probes. Our statistical mechanical mapping technique readily generalizes to arbitrary Abelian groups, and offers a general framework for studying dissipatively stabilized symmetry-breaking and topological orders.

Relativity opens the door to a counterintuitive fact: A state can be stable to perturbations in one frame of reference and unstable in another one. For this reason, the job of testing the stability of states that are not Lorentz invariant can be very cumbersome. We show that two observers can disagree on whether a state is stable or unstable only if the perturbations can exit the light cone. Furthermore, we show that, if a perturbation exits the light cone and its intensity changes with time due to dissipation, then there are always two observers that disagree on the stability of the state. Hence, “stability” is a Lorentz-invariant property of dissipative theories if and only if the principle of causality is respected. We present 14 applications to physical problems from all areas of relativistic physics ranging from theory to simulation.

Gaussian boson sampling is a quantum computing concept based on drawing samples from a multimode nonclassical Gaussian state using photon-number resolving detectors. It was initially posed as a near-term approach to achieve quantum advantage, and several applications have been proposed since, including the calculation of graph features. For the first time, we use a time-bin encoded interferometer to implement Gaussian boson sampling experimentally and extract samples to enhance the search for dense subgraphs in a graph. Our results indicate an improvement over classical methods for subgraphs of sizes three and four in a graph containing ten nodes. In addition, we numerically explore the role of imperfections in the optical circuit and on the performance of the algorithm.

Identifying phase transitions and classifying phases of matter is central to understanding the properties and behavior of a broad range of material systems. In recent years, machine-learning (ML) techniques have been successfully applied to perform such tasks in a data-driven manner. However, the success of this approach notwithstanding, we still lack a clear understanding of ML methods for detecting phase transitions, particularly of those that utilize neural networks (NNs). In this work, we derive analytical expressions for the optimal output of three widely used NN-based methods for detecting phase transitions. These optimal predictions correspond to the results obtained in the limit of high model capacity. Therefore, in practice, they can, for example, be recovered using sufficiently large, well-trained NNs. The inner workings of the considered methods are revealed through the explicit dependence of the optimal output on the input data. By evaluating the analytical expressions, we can identify phase transitions directly from experimentally accessible data without training NNs, which makes this procedure favorable in terms of computation time. Our theoretical results are supported by extensive numerical simulations covering, e.g., topological, quantum, and many-body localization phase transitions. We expect similar analyses to provide a deeper understanding of other classification tasks in condensed matter physics.

Interfacing electrons and light enables ultrafast electron microscopy and quantum control of electrons, as well as new optical elements for high-sensitivity imaging. Here, we demonstrate for the first time programmable transverse electron-beam shaping in free space based on ponderomotive potentials from short intense laser pulses. We can realize both convex and concave electron lenses with a focal length of a few millimeters, comparable to those in state-of-the-art electron microscopes. We further show that we can realize almost arbitrary deflection patterns by shaping the ponderomotive potentials using a spatial light modulator. Our modulator is lossless and programmable, has unity fill factor, and could pave the way to electron wave-front shaping with hundreds of individually addressable pixels.

Recent series of theoretical and experimental reports have driven attention to time-reversal symmetry-breaking spintronic and spin-splitting phenomena in materials with collinear-compensated magnetic order incompatible with conventional ferromagnetism or antiferromagnetism. Here we employ an approach based on nonrelativistic spin-symmetry groups that resolves the conflicting notions of unconventional ferromagnetism or antiferromagnetism by delimiting a third basic collinear magnetic phase. We derive that all materials hosting this collinear-compensated magnetic phase are characterized by crystal-rotation symmetries connecting opposite-spin sublattices separated in the real space and opposite-spin electronic states separated in the momentum space. We describe prominent extraordinary characteristics of the phase, including the alternating spin-splitting sign and broken time-reversal symmetry in the nonrelativistic band structure, the planar or bulk $d$-, $g$-, or $i$-wave symmetry of the spin-dependent Fermi surfaces, spin-degenerate nodal lines and surfaces, band anisotropy of individual spin channels, and spin-split general, as well as time-reversal invariant momenta. Guided by the spin-symmetry principles, we discover in ab initio calculations outlier materials with an extraordinary nonrelativistic spin splitting, whose eV-scale and momentum dependence are determined by the crystal potential of the nonmagnetic phase. This spin-splitting mechanism is distinct from conventional relativistic spin-orbit coupling and ferromagnetic exchange, as well as from the previously considered anisotropic exchange mechanism in compensated magnets. Our results, combined with our identification of material candidates for the phase ranging from insulators and metals to a parent crystal of cuprate superconductors, underpin research of novel quantum phenomena and spintronic functionalities in high-temperature magnets with light elements, vanishing net magnetization, and strong spin coherence. In the discussion, we argue that the conflicting notions of unconventional ferromagnetism or antiferromagnetism, on the one hand, and our symmetry-based delimitation of the third phase, on the other hand, favor a distinct term referring to the phase. The alternating spin polarizations in both the real-space crystal structure and the momentum-space band structure characteristic of this unconventional magnetic phase suggest a term altermagnetism. We point out that $d$-wave altermagnetism represents a realization of the long-sought-after counterpart in magnetism of the unconventional $d$-wave superconductivity.

Cell migration in confining physiological environments relies on the concerted dynamics of several cellular components, including protrusions, adhesions with the environment, and the cell nucleus. However, it remains poorly understood how the dynamic interplay of these components and the cell polarity determine the emergent migration behavior at the cellular scale. Here, we combine data-driven inference with a mechanistic bottom-up approach to develop a model for protrusion and polarity dynamics in confined cell migration, revealing how the cellular dynamics adapt to confining geometries. Specifically, we use experimental data of joint protrusion-nucleus migration trajectories of cells on confining micropatterns to systematically determine a mechanistic model linking the stochastic dynamics of cell polarity, protrusions, and nucleus. This model indicates that the cellular dynamics adapt to confining constrictions through a switch in the polarity dynamics from a negative to a positive self-reinforcing feedback loop. Our model further reveals how this feedback loop leads to stereotypical cycles of protrusion-nucleus dynamics that drive the migration of the cell through constrictions. These cycles are disrupted upon perturbation of cytoskeletal components, indicating that the positive feedback is controlled by cellular migration mechanisms. Our data-driven theoretical approach therefore identifies polarity feedback adaptation as a key mechanism in confined cell migration.

Biological evolution of a population is governed by the fitness landscape, which is a map from genotype to fitness. However, a fitness landscape depends on the organism’s environment, and evolution in changing environments is still poorly understood. We study a particular model of antibiotic resistance evolution in bacteria where the antibiotic concentration is an environmental parameter and the fitness landscapes incorporate trade-offs between adaptation to low and high antibiotic concentration. With evolutionary dynamics that follow fitness gradients, the evolution of the system under slowly changing antibiotic concentration resembles the athermal dynamics of disordered physical systems under external drives. Exploiting this resemblance, we show that our model can be described as a system with interacting hysteretic elements. As in the case of the driven disordered systems, adaptive evolution under antibiotic concentration cycling is found to exhibit hysteresis loops and memory formation. We derive a number of analytical results for quasistatic concentration changes. We also perform numerical simulations to study how these effects are modified under driving protocols in which the concentration is changed in discrete steps. Our approach provides a general framework for studying motifs of evolutionary dynamics in biological systems in a changing environment.

Quantum spin liquids (QSLs) as novel phases of matter with long-range entanglement and deconfined quantum critical points (DQCPs) as descriptions for unconventional phase transitions between two ordered states beyond the standard paradigm, such as the transition between antiferromagnetic (AFM) and valence-bond solid (VBS) phases, are two representative emerging phenomena. These implications for understanding correlated materials and developing theoretical frameworks for many-body physics are of crucial importance. Here, we show that a gapless QSL can naturally emerge from a DQCP. Via large-scale tensor network simulations of a square-lattice spin-$1/2$ frustrated Heisenberg model, both QSL-state and DQCP-type AFM-VBS transitions are observed. By tuning the coupling constants, the AFM-VBS transition vanishes, and instead, a gapless QSL phase gradually develops in between. Remarkably, along the phase boundaries of AFM-QSL and QSL-VBS transitions, we always observe the same correlation-length exponents, $\nu \approx 1.0$, which is intrinsically different from the one of the DQCP-type transition, indicating new types of universality classes. Our results explicitly demonstrate a new scenario for understanding the emergence of gapless QSL from an underlying DQCP. The discovered QSL phase survives in a large region of tuning parameters, and we expect its experimental realization in solid-state materials or quantum simulators.

We present the first demonstration of multi-GeV laser wakefield acceleration in a fully optically formed plasma waveguide, with an acceleration gradient as high as $25\mathrm{GeV}/\mathrm{m}$. The guide was formed via self-waveguiding of $<15\mathrm{J}$, 45 fs ($<\sim 300\mathrm{TW}$) pulses over 20 cm in a low-density hydrogen gas jet, with accelerated electron bunches driven up to 5 GeV in quasimonoenergetic peaks of relative energy width as narrow as $\sim 15\%$, with divergence down to $\sim 1\mathrm{mrad}$ and charge up to tens of picocoulombs. Energy gain is inversely correlated with on-axis waveguide density in the range $N_{e0}=(1.3–3.2)\times {10}^{17}{\mathrm{cm}}^{-3}$. We find that shot-to-shot stability of bunch spectra and charge are strongly dependent on the pointing of the injected laser pulse and gas jet uniformity. We also observe evidence of pump depletion-induced dephasing, a consequence of the long optical guiding distance.

Discrete time crystals represent a paradigmatic nonequilibrium phase of periodically driven matter. Protecting its emergent spatiotemporal order necessitates a mechanism that hinders the spreading of defects, such as localization of domain walls in disordered quantum spin chains. In this work, we establish the effectiveness of a different mechanism arising in clean spin chains: the confinement of domain walls into “mesonic” bound states. We consider translationally invariant quantum Ising chains periodically kicked at arbitrary frequency, and we discuss two possible routes to domain-wall confinement: longitudinal fields and interactions beyond nearest neighbors. We study the impact of confinement on the order-parameter evolution by constructing domain-wall-conserving effective Hamiltonians and analyzing the resulting dynamics of domain walls. On the one hand, we show that for arbitrary driving frequency, the symmetry-breaking-induced confining potential gets effectively averaged out by the drive, leading to deconfined dynamics. On the other hand, we rigorously prove that increasing the range $R$ of spin-spin interactions $J_{i,j}$ beyond nearest neighbors enhances the order-parameter lifetime exponentially in $R$. Our theory predictions are corroborated by a combination of exact and matrix-product-state simulations for finite and infinite chains, respectively. The long-lived stability of spatiotemporal order identified in this work does not rely on Floquet prethermalization nor on eigenstate order, but rather on the nonperturbative origin of vacuum-decay processes. We point out the experimental relevance of this new mechanism for stabilizing a long-lived time-crystalline response in Rydberg-dressed spin chains.