Imaginary gauge potentials in a non-Hermitian spin-orbit coupled quantum gas
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arXiv
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| Auteurs principaux: | , , , |
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| Format: | Preprint |
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2025
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| _version_ | 1866917350589071360 |
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| author | Tao, Junheng Mercado-Gutierrez, Emmanuel Zhao, Mingshu Spielman, Ian |
| author_facet | Tao, Junheng Mercado-Gutierrez, Emmanuel Zhao, Mingshu Spielman, Ian |
| contents | In 1996, Hatano and Nelson proposed a non-Hermitian lattice model containing an imaginary Peierls phase [Phys. Rev. Lett. 77 570-573 (1996)], which subsequent analyses revealed to be an instance of a new class of topological systems. Here, we experimentally realize a continuum analog to this model containing an imaginary gauge potential using a homogeneous spin-orbit coupled Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). Non-Hermiticity is introduced by adding tunable spin-dependent loss via microwave coupling to a subspace with spontaneous emission. We demonstrate that the resulting Heisenberg equations of motion for position and momentum depend explicitly on the system's phase-space distribution. First, we observe collective nonreciprocal transport in real space, with a "self-acceleration" that decreases with the BEC's spatial extent, consistent with non-Hermitian Gross-Pitaevskii simulations. We then examine localized edge states: the relatively strong interactions in our BEC suppress the formation of topological edge states, yielding instead highly excited states localized by an interplay between self-acceleration and wavefunction spreading. Finally, we confirm that our non-Hermitian description remains valid at all times by comparing to a multi-level master-equation treatment. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2504_08614 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Imaginary gauge potentials in a non-Hermitian spin-orbit coupled quantum gas Tao, Junheng Mercado-Gutierrez, Emmanuel Zhao, Mingshu Spielman, Ian Quantum Gases Atomic Physics Quantum Physics In 1996, Hatano and Nelson proposed a non-Hermitian lattice model containing an imaginary Peierls phase [Phys. Rev. Lett. 77 570-573 (1996)], which subsequent analyses revealed to be an instance of a new class of topological systems. Here, we experimentally realize a continuum analog to this model containing an imaginary gauge potential using a homogeneous spin-orbit coupled Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). Non-Hermiticity is introduced by adding tunable spin-dependent loss via microwave coupling to a subspace with spontaneous emission. We demonstrate that the resulting Heisenberg equations of motion for position and momentum depend explicitly on the system's phase-space distribution. First, we observe collective nonreciprocal transport in real space, with a "self-acceleration" that decreases with the BEC's spatial extent, consistent with non-Hermitian Gross-Pitaevskii simulations. We then examine localized edge states: the relatively strong interactions in our BEC suppress the formation of topological edge states, yielding instead highly excited states localized by an interplay between self-acceleration and wavefunction spreading. Finally, we confirm that our non-Hermitian description remains valid at all times by comparing to a multi-level master-equation treatment. |
| title | Imaginary gauge potentials in a non-Hermitian spin-orbit coupled quantum gas |
| topic | Quantum Gases Atomic Physics Quantum Physics |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.08614 |