Realizing quantum Ising models in tunable two-dimensional arrays of single Rydberg atoms

By H. Labuhn, D. Barredo, S. Ravets, Sylvain de L'es'eleuc, T. Macrì, Thierry Lahaye, Antoine Browaeys. 2015

171 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Spin models are the prime example of simplified manybody Hamiltonians used to model complex, real-world strongly correlated materials. However, despite their simplified character, their dynamics often cannot be simulated exactly on classical computers as soon as the number of particles exceeds a few tens. For this reason, the quantum simulation of spin Hamiltonians using the tools of atomic and molecular physics has become very active over the last years, using ultracold atoms or molecules in optical lattices, or trapped ions. All of these approaches have their own assets, but also limitations. Here, we report on a novel platform for the study of spin systems, using individual atoms trapped in two-dimensional arrays of optical microtraps with arbitrary geometries, where filling fractions range from 60 to 100% with exact knowledge of the initial configuration. When excited to Rydberg D-states, the atoms undergo strong interactions whose anisotropic character opens exciting prospects for simulating exotic matter. We illustrate the versatility of our system by studying the dynamics of an Ising-like spin-1/2 system in a transverse field with up to thirty spins, for a variety of geometries in one and two dimensions, and for a wide range of interaction strengths. For geometries where the anisotropy is expected to have small effects we find an excellent agreement with ab-initio simulations of the spin-1/2 system, while for strongly anisotropic situations the multilevel structure of the D-states has a measurable influence. Our findings establish arrays of single Rydberg atoms as a versatile platform for the study of quantum magnetism.

Subfields: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics, Statistical and Nonlinear Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a3d7168029f92e7c42834eb9ce63656619df8818

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In Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics

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Citations in the corpus

Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm: Performance, Mechanism, and Implementation on Near-Term Devices (2018, background): “[54] Henning Labuhn, Daniel Barredo, Sylvain Ravets, Sylvain de Léséleuc, Tommaso Macrì, Thierry Lahaye, and Antoine Browaeys, “Tunable two-dimensional arrays of single rydberg atoms for realizing quantum ising models,” Nature 534, 667 (2016).”
Quantum computing with neutral atoms (2020, background): “The most studied one is the Ising model, which is obtained when the |↓〉 state is one of the ground states and the |↑〉 a Rydberg state [25, 26, 27, 28].”