Atoms Interlinked by Light: Programming Interactions and Probing Entanglement

Monika Schleier-Smith
Stanford (US)
ICAP 2022
Monday, Jul 18, 2:00 PM

Atoms Interlinked by Light: Programming Interactions and Probing Entanglement

The graph of interactions in a quantum many-body system is crucial for governing the flow of information and the structure of correlations. We engineer programmable nonlocal interactions in an array of atomic ensembles within an optical resonator, where photons convey information between distant atomic spins. In our system of spin-1 atoms, the photon-mediated interactions manifest in the formation of correlated atom pairs. We verify the resulting entanglement by observations of spin-nematic squeezing. We furthermore demonstrate versatile tools for controlling the graph of interactions and the structure of multimode entanglement, including (1) programming the spectrum of a drive field and (2) supplementing global cavity-mediated interactions with local addressing. These techniques open opportunities in simulating quantum gravity, exploring quantum optimization paradigms, and generating entangled resource states for sensing and computation.