Chen Xi, Wu Ze, Jiang Min, Lü Xin-You, Peng Xinhua, Du Jiangfeng
Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Department of Modern Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
CAS Key Laboratory of Microscale Magnetic Resonance, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China.
Nat Commun. 2021 Nov 1;12(1):6281. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-26573-5.
The superradiant phase transition in thermal equilibrium is a fundamental concept bridging statistical physics and electrodynamics, which has never been observed in real physical systems since the first proposal in the 1970s. The existence of this phase transition in cavity quantum electrodynamics systems is still subject of ongoing debates due to the no-go theorem induced by the so-called A term. Moreover, experimental conditions to study this phase transition are hard to achieve with current accessible technology. Based on the platform of nuclear magnetic resonance, here we experimentally simulate the occurrence of an equilibrium superradiant phase transition beyond no-go theorem by introducing the antisqueezing effect. The mechanism relies on that the antisqueezing effect recovers the singularity of the ground state via exponentially enhancing the zero point fluctuation of system. The strongly entangled and squeezed Schrödinger cat states of spins are achieved experimentally in the superradiant phase, which may play an important role in fundamental tests of quantum theory and implementations of quantum metrology.
热平衡中的超辐射相变是连接统计物理学和电动力学的一个基本概念,自20世纪70年代首次提出以来,在实际物理系统中从未被观测到。由于所谓的A项导致的不可行定理,腔量子电动力学系统中这种相变的存在仍然是一个持续争论的话题。此外,用目前可获得的技术很难实现研究这种相变的实验条件。基于核磁共振平台,我们在此通过引入反压缩效应,实验模拟了超越不可行定理的平衡超辐射相变的发生。其机制依赖于反压缩效应通过指数增强系统的零点涨落来恢复基态的奇异性。在超辐射相中通过实验实现了自旋的强纠缠和压缩薛定谔猫态,这可能在量子理论的基础测试和量子计量学的实现中发挥重要作用。