Non-equilibrium many-body dynamics with cold atoms in optical lattices

Tuesday, October 16, 2012 - 3:15pm - 4:15pm
Regents 109
Andrew Daley
Department of Physics, University of Pittsburgh

Over the last ten years, experimental advances with ultracold quantum gases in optical lattices have made possible the study of various interesting many-body phenomena that are difficult to observe in solid-state systems. Not only only do these systems allow the investigation of interesting quantum phases, but they offer unique opportunities for the study of non-equilibrium dynamics.

I will give an introduction to these ideas, taking examples from our recent work in both coherent and dissipative many-body dynamics. In particular, I will comment on new ideas for measuring the growth of entanglement in quantum many-body systems during non-equilibrium dynamics, and also on the decoherence of different many-body states in the presence of heating mechanisms. In these systems, heating processes are intrinsically non-equilibrium, and as a result, different many-body states can respond very differently to the same heating mechanism.

Host: Jim Freericks
Discussion Leader: Jim Freericks