TY  - JOUR
KW  - Science & Technology
KW  -  Physical Sciences
KW  -  Optics
KW  -  Physics
KW  -  Atomic
KW  -  Molecular & Chemical
KW  -  Physics
KW  -  GAS
KW  -  EXCITATION
KW  -  BLOCKADE
KW  -  SYSTEMS
KW  -  REGIME
KW  -  RANGE
KW  -  ATOMS
KW  -  MODEL
N2  - We investigate the quantum melting of one-dimensional crystals that are realized in an atomic lattice in which ground state atoms are laser excited to two Rydberg states. We focus on a regime where both, intra- and interstate density-density interactions as well as coherent exchange interactions contribute. We determine stable crystalline phases in the classical limit and explore their melting under quantum fluctuations introduced by the excitation laser as well as two-body exchange. We find that within a specific parameter range quantum fluctuations introduced by the laser can give rise to a devil's staircase structure which one might associate with transitions in the classical limit. The melting through exchange interactions is shown to also proceed in a steplike fashion, in the case of small crystals, due to the proliferation of Rydberg spin waves.
ID  - discovery10066560
PB  - AMER PHYSICAL SOC
TI  - Quantum melting of two-component Rydberg crystals
AV  - public
Y1  - 2016/11/11/
EP  - 6
JF  - Physical Review A
A1  - Lan, Z
A1  - Li, W
A1  - Lesanovsky, I
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.94.051603
SN  - 2469-9934
IS  - 5
N1  - This version is the version of record. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher?s terms and conditions.
VL  - 94
ER  -