Two-dimensional lattices of coupled micropillars etched in a planar semiconductor microcavity offer a workbench to engineer the band structure of polaritons. We report experimental studies of ...honeycomb lattices where the polariton low-energy dispersion is analogous to that of electrons in graphene. Using energy-resolved photoluminescence, we directly observe Dirac cones, around which the dynamics of polaritons is described by the Dirac equation for massless particles. At higher energies, we observe p orbital bands, one of them with the nondispersive character of a flatband. The realization of this structure which holds massless, massive, and infinitely massive particles opens the route towards studies of the interplay of dispersion, interactions, and frustration in a novel and controlled environment.
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We report on the engineering of a nondispersive (flat) energy band in a geometrically frustrated lattice of micropillar optical cavities. By taking advantage of the non-Hermitian nature of our ...system, we achieve bosonic condensation of exciton polaritons into the flat band. Because of the infinite effective mass in such a band, the condensate is highly sensitive to disorder and fragments into localized modes reflecting the elementary eigenstates produced by geometric frustration. This realization offers a novel approach to studying coherent phases of light and matter under the controlled interplay of frustration, interactions, and dissipation.
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We perform measurements of the third moment of atom number fluctuations in small slices of a very elongated weakly interacting degenerate Bose gas. We find a positive skewness of the atom number ...distribution in the ideal gas regime and a reduced skewness compatible with zero in the quasicondensate regime. For our parameters, the third moment is a thermodynamic quantity whose measurement constitutes a sensitive test of the equation of state, and our results are in agreement with a modified Yang-Yang thermodynamic prediction. Moreover, we show that the measured skewness reveals the presence of true three-body correlations in the system.
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We use coupled micropillars etched out of a semiconductor microcavity to engineer a spin-orbit Hamiltonian for photons and polaritons in a microstructure. The coupling between the spin and orbital ...momentum arises from the polarization-dependent confinement and tunneling of photons between adjacent micropillars arranged in the form of a hexagonal photonic molecule. It results in polariton eigenstates with distinct polarization patterns, which are revealed in photoluminescence experiments in the regime of polariton condensation. Thanks to the strong polariton nonlinearities, our system provides a photonic workbench for the quantum simulation of the interplay between interactions and spin-orbit effects, particularly when extended to two-dimensional lattices.
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We report on the study of a polariton gas confined in a quasiperiodic one-dimensional cavity, described by a Fibonacci sequence. Imaging the polariton modes both in real and reciprocal space, we ...observe features characteristic of their fractal energy spectrum such as the opening of minigaps obeying the gap labeling theorem and log-periodic oscillations of the integrated density of states. These observations are accurately reproduced solving an effective 1D Schrödinger equation, illustrating the potential of cavity polaritons as a quantum simulator in complex topological geometries.
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The experimental study of edge states in atomically thin layered materials remains a challenge due to the difficult control of the geometry of the sample terminations, the stability of dangling ...bonds, and the need to measure local properties. In the case of graphene, localized edge modes have been predicted in zigzag and bearded edges, characterized by flat dispersions connecting the Dirac points. Polaritons in semiconductor microcavities have recently emerged as an extraordinary photonic platform to emulate 1D and 2D Hamiltonians, allowing the direct visualization of the wavefunctions in both real- and momentum-space as well as of the energy dispersion of eigenstates via photoluminescence experiments. Here we report on the observation of edge states in a honeycomb lattice of coupled micropillars. The lowest two bands of this structure arise from the coupling of the lowest energy modes of the micropillars, and emulate the and * bands of graphene. We show the momentum-space dispersion of the edge states associated with the zigzag and bearded edges, holding unidimensional quasi-flat bands. Additionally, we evaluate polarization effects characteristic of polaritons on the properties of these states.
Owing to their strong dipole moment and long coherence times, superconducting qubits have demonstrated remarkable success in hybrid quantum circuits. However, most qubit architectures are limited to ...the GHz frequency range, severely constraining the class of systems they can interact with. The fluxonium qubit, on the other hand, can be biased to very low frequency while being manipulated and read out with standard microwave techniques. Here, we design and operate a heavy fluxonium with an unprecedentedly low transition frequency of 1.8 MHz. We demonstrate resolved sideband cooling of the “hot” qubit transition with a final ground state population of 97.7%, corresponding to an effective temperature of 23 μK. We further demonstrate coherent manipulation with coherence times T_{1}=34 μs, T_{2}^{*}=39 μs, and single-shot readout of the qubit state. Importantly, by directly addressing the qubit transition with a capacitively coupled waveguide, we showcase its high sensitivity to a radio-frequency field. Through cyclic qubit preparation and interrogation, we transform this low-frequency fluxonium qubit into a frequency-resolved charge sensor. This method results in a charge sensitivity of 33 μe/sqrtHz, or an energy sensitivity (in joules per hertz) of 2.8ℏ. This method rivals state-of-the-art transport-based devices, while maintaining inherent insensitivity to dc-charge noise. The high charge sensitivity combined with large capacitive shunt unlocks new avenues for exploring quantum phenomena in the 1–10 MHz range, such as the strong-coupling regime with a resonant macroscopic mechanical resonator.
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The LIGO Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration have cataloged eleven confidently detected gravitational-wave events during the first two observing runs of the advanced detector era. ...All eleven events were consistent with being from well-modeled mergers between compact stellar-mass objects: black holes or neutron stars. The data around the time of each of these events have been made publicly available through the gravitational-wave open science center. The entirety of the gravitational-wave strain data from the first and second observing runs have also now been made publicly available. There is considerable interest among the broad scientific community in understanding the data and methods used in the analyses. In this paper, we provide an overview of the detector noise properties and the data analysis techniques used to detect gravitational-wave signals and infer the source properties. We describe some of the checks that are performed to validate the analyses and results from the observations of gravitational-wave events. We also address concerns that have been raised about various properties of LIGO-Virgo detector noise and the correctness of our analyses as applied to the resulting data.
GW170817 is the very first observation of gravitational waves originating from the coalescence of two compact objects in the mass range of neutron stars, accompanied by electromagnetic counterparts, ...and offers an opportunity to directly probe the internal structure of neutron stars. We perform Bayesian model selection on a wide range of theoretical predictions for the neutron star equation of state. For the binary neutron star hypothesis, we find that we cannot rule out the majority of theoretical models considered. In addition, the gravitational-wave data alone does not rule out the possibility that one or both objects were low-mass black holes. We discuss the possible outcomes in the case of a binary neutron star merger, finding that all scenarios from prompt collapse to long-lived or even stable remnants are possible. For long-lived remnants, we place an upper limit of 1.9 kHz on the rotation rate. If a black hole was formed any time after merger and the coalescing stars were slowly rotating, then the maximum baryonic mass of non-rotating neutron stars is at most , and three equations of state considered here can be ruled out. We obtain a tighter limit of for the case that the merger results in a hypermassive neutron star.
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