We show that the critical exponent of a quantum phase transition in a damped-driven open system is determined by the spectral density function of the reservoir. We consider the open-system variant of the Dicke model, where the driven boson mode and a
lso the large N-spin couple to independent reservoirs at zero temperature. The critical exponent, which is $1$ if there is no spin-bath coupling, decreases below 1 when the spin couples to a sub-Ohmic reservoir.
We present a general theory for calculating the damping rate of elementary density wave excitations in a Bose-Einstein condensate strongly coupled to a single radiation field mode of an optical cavity. Thereby we give a detailed derivation of the hug
e resonant enhancement in the Beliaev damping of a density wave mode, predicted recently by Konya et al., Phys.~Rev.~A 89, 051601(R) (2014). The given density-wave mode constitutes the polariton-like soft mode of the self-organization phase transition. The resonant enhancement takes place, both in the normal and ordered phases, outside the critical region. We show that the large damping rate is accompanied by a significant frequency shift of this polariton mode. Going beyond the Born-Markov approximation and determining the poles of the retarded Greens function of the polariton, we reveal a strong coupling between the polariton and a collective mode in the phonon bath formed by the other density wave modes.
The dispersive interaction of a Bose-Einstein condensate with a single mode of a high-finesse optical cavity realizes the radiation pressure coupling Hamiltonian. In this system the role of the mechanical oscillator is played by a single condensate e
xcitation mode that is selected by the cavity mode function. We study the effect of atomic s-wave collisions and show that it merely renormalizes parameters of the usual optomechanical interaction. Moreover, we show that even in the case of strong harmonic confinement---which invalidates the use of Bloch states---a single excitation mode of the Bose-Einstein condensate couples significantly to the light field, that is the simplified picture of a single mechanical oscillator mode remains valid.
The quantum phase transition of the Dicke-model has been observed recently in a system formed by motional excitations of a laser-driven Bose--Einstein condensate coupled to an optical cavity [1]. The cavity-based system is intrinsically open: photons
can leak out of the cavity where they are detected. Even at zero temperature, the continuous weak measurement of the photon number leads to an irreversible dynamics towards a steady-state which exhibits a dynamical quantum phase transition. However, whereas the critical point and the mean field is only slightly modified with respect to the phase transition in the ground state, the entanglement and the critical exponents of the singular quantum correlations are significantly different in the two cases.
We develop a mean-field model describing the Hamiltonian interaction of ultracold atoms and the optical field in a cavity. The Bose-Einstein condensate is properly defined by means of a grand-canonical approach. The model is efficient because only th
e relevant excitation modes are taken into account. However, the model goes beyond the two-mode subspace necessary to describe the self-organization quantum phase transition observed recently. We calculate all the second-order correlations of the coupled atom field and radiation field hybrid bosonic system, including the entanglement between the two types of fields.
A Bose-Einstein condensate of ultracold atoms inside the field of a laser-driven optical cavity exhibits dispersive optical bistability. We describe this system by using mean-field approximation and by analyzing the correlation functions of the linea
rized quantum fluctuations around the mean-field solution. The entanglement and the statistics of the atom-field quadratures are given in the stationary state. It is shown that the mean-field solution, i.e. the Bose-Einstein condensate is robust against entanglement generation for most part of the phase diagram.
Quantum fluctuations of a cavity field coupled into the motion of ultracold bosons can be strongly amplified by a mechanism analogous to the Petermann excess noise factor in lasers with unstable cavities. For a Bose-Einstein condensate in a stable op
tical resonator, the excess noise effect amounts to a significant depletion on long timescales.
The spatial self-organization of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) in a high-finesse linear optical cavity is discussed. The condensate atoms are laser-driven from the side and scatter photons into the cavity. Above a critical pump intensity the homog
eneous condensate evolves into a stable pattern bound by the cavity field. The transition point is determined analytically from a mean-field theory. We calculate the lowest lying Bogoliubov excitations of the coupled BEC-cavity system and the quantum depletion due to the atom-field coupling.
In the radiation field of an optical waveguide, the Rayleigh scattering of photons is shown to result in a strongly velocity-dependent force on atoms. The pump field, which is injected in the fundamental branch of the waveguide, is favorably scattere
d by a moving atom into one of the transversely excited branches of propagating modes. All fields involved are far detuned from any resonances of the atom. For a simple polarizable particle, a linear friction force coefficient comparable to that of cavity cooling can be achieved.
In two recent articles, Meiser and Meystre describe the coupled dynamics of a dense gas of atoms and an optical cavity pumped by a laser field. They make two important simplifying assumptions: (i) the gas of atoms forms a regular lattice and can be r
eplaced by a fictitious mirror, and (ii) the atoms strive to minimize the dipole potential. We show that the two assumptions are inconsistent: the configuration of atoms minimizing the dipole potential is not a perfect lattice. Assumption (ii) is erroneous, as in the strong coupling regime the dipole force does not arise from the dipole potential. The real steady state, where the dipole forces vanish, is indeed a regular lattice. Furthermore, the bistability predicted by Meiser and Meystre does not occur in this system.
