Daniel A. Ortuño-González – PhD student at ETH Zürich
Quantum crystals are unique phases of matter that emerge at near-zero temperatures, where quantum fluctuations, rather than thermal fluctuations, drive phase transitions. One of such type of crystals can be obtained in ultra-cold atoms interacting with an optical cavity, where the atoms undergo a symmetry breaking phase transition into a self-organized state as they become superradiant at a finite energy threshold. In contrast, Pauli crystals arise purely from the Pauli exclusion principle in confined fermionic systems even in the absence of any interparticle interactions. In this talk, we theoretically examine the interplay between the formation of Pauli crystals of few particle numbers and interaction-driven quantum crystals. In particular, we find that degeneracies/symmetries of fermionic many-body ground states can lead to zero-threshold superradiance. That is, the interplay of Pauli statistics and finite size open new pathways for quantum phases.
Recording
https://video.ethz.ch/events/2024/theory/72347971-1d5e-4ae9-89c1-d484c9887aaf.html