No Arabic abstract
Laser technology has developed and accelerated photo-induced nonequilibrium physics from both scientific and engineering viewpoints. The Floquet engineering, i.e., controlling material properties and functionalities by time-periodic drives, is a forefront of quantum physics of light-matter interaction, but limited to ideal dissipationless systems. For the Floquet engineering extended to a variety of materials, it is vital to understand the quantum states emerging in a balance of the periodic drive and energy dissipation. Here we derive the general description for nonequilibrium steady states (NESS) in periodically driven dissipative systems by focusing on the systems under high-frequency drive and time-independent Lindblad-type dissipation with the detailed balance condition. Our formula correctly describes the time-average, fluctuation, and symmetry property of the NESS, and can be computed efficiently in numerical calculations. Our approach will play fundamental roles in Floquet engineering in a broad class of dissipative quantum systems such as atoms and molecules, mesoscopic systems, and condensed matter.
Bose-Einstein condensation, the macroscopic occupation of a single quantum state, appears in equilibrium quantum statistical mechanics and persists also in the hydrodynamic regime close to equilibrium. Here we show that even when a degenerate Bose gas is driven into a steady state far from equilibrium, where the notion of a single-particle ground state becomes meaningless, Bose-Einstein condensation survives in a generalized form: the unambiguous selection of an odd number of states acquiring large occupations. Within mean-field theory we derive a criterion for when a single and when multiple states are Bose selected in a non-interacting gas. We study the effect in several driven-dissipative model systems, and propose a quantum switch for heat conductivity based on shifting between one and three selected states.
We theoretically investigate basic properties of nonequilibrium steady states of periodically-driven open quantum systems based on the full solution of the Maxwell-Bloch equation. In a resonantly driving condition, we find that the transverse relaxation, also known as decoherence, significantly destructs the formation of Floquet states while the longitudinal relaxation does not directly affect it. Furthermore, by evaluating the quasienergy spectrum of the nonequilibrium steady states, we demonstrate that the Rabi splitting can be observed as long as the decoherence time is as short as one third of the Rabi-cycle. Moreover, we find that Floquet states can be formed even under significant dissipation when the decoherence time is substantially shorter than the cycle of driving, once the driving field strength becomes strong enough. In an off-resonant condition, we demonstrate that the Floquet states can be realized even in weak field regimes because the system is not excited and the decoherence mechanism is not activated. Once the field strength becomes strong enough, the system can be excited by nonlinear processes and the decoherence process becomes active. As a result, the Floquet states are significantly disturbed by the environment even in the off-resonant condition. Thus, we show here that the suppression of heating is a key condition for the realization of Floquet states in both on and off-resonant conditions not only because it prevents material damage but also because it contributes to preserving coherence.
We present a method to describe driven-dissipative multi-mode systems by considering a truncated hierarchy of equations for the correlation functions. We consider two hierarchy truncation schemes with a global cutoff on the correlation order, which is the sum of the exponents of the operators involved in the correlation functions: a hard cutoff corresponding to an expansion around the vacuum, which applies to a regime where the number of excitations per site is small; a soft cutoff which corresponds to an expansion around coherent states, which can be applied for large excitation numbers per site. This approach is applied to describe the bunching-antibunching transition in the driven-dissipative Bose-Hubbard model for photonic systems. The results have been successfully benchmarked by comparison with calculations based on the corner-space renormalization method in 1D and 2D systems. The regime of validity and strengths of the present truncation methods are critically discussed.
We present a systematic study of the nonequilibrium steady states (NESS) in Mott insulators driven by DC or AC electric fields, based on the Floquet dynamical mean-field theory. The results are analyzed using a generalized tunneling formula for the current, which is reminiscent of the Meir-Wingreen formula and provides insights into the relevant physical processes. In the DC case, the spectrum of the NESSs exhibits Wannier-Stark (WS) states associated with the lower and upper Hubbard bands. In addition, there emerge WS sidebands from many-body states. Using the tunneling formula, we demonstrate that the tunneling between these WS states leads to peaks or humps in the induced DC current. In the AC case, we cover a wide parameter range of excitation frequencies and field strengths to clarify the crossover from field-induced tunneling behavior in the DC limit to nonequilibrium states dominated by multiphoton absorption in the AC limit. In the crossover regime, the single-particle spectrum is characterized by a coexistence of Floquet sidebands and WS peaks, and the current and double occupation exhibits a nontrivial dependence on the field strength. The tunneling formula works quantitatively well even in the AC case, and we use it to discuss the potential cooperation of tunneling and multi-photon processes in the crossover regime. The tunneling formula and its simplifi
Many interesting phenomena in nature are described by stochastic processes with irreversible dynamics. To model these phenomena, we focus on a master equation or a Fokker-Planck equation with rates which violate detailed balance. When the system settles in a stationary state, it will be a nonequilibrium steady state (NESS), with time independent probability distribution as well as persistent probability current loops. The observable consequences of the latter are explored. In particular, cyclic behavior of some form must be present: some are prominent and manifest, while others are more obscure and subtle. We present a theoretical framework to analyze such properties, introducing the notion of probability angular momentum and its distribution. Using several examples, we illustrate the manifest and subtle categories and how best to distinguish between them. These techniques can be applied to reveal the NESS nature of a wide range of systems in a large variety of areas. We illustrate with one application: variability of ocean heat content in our climate system.