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Visualizing edge states with an atomic Bose gas in the quantum Hall regime

Published

Author(s)

Ian B. Spielman, Ben Stuhl, Hsin I Lu, Lauren M. Aycock, Dina Genkina

Abstract

We engineered a two-dimensional magnetic lattice in an elongated strip geometry, with effective per-plaquette flux $\approx4/3$ times the flux quanta. We imaged the localized edge and bulk states of atomic Bose-Einstein condensates in this strip. Further, we observed both the skipping orbits of excited atoms traveling down our system's edges, analogues to edge magnetoplasmons in 2-D electron systems\cite{Kern1991,Ashoori1992}, and a dynamical Hall effect for bulk excitations\cite{LeBlanc2012}. Our lattice's long direction consisted of the sites of an optical lattice and its three-site wide narrow direction consisted of the internal atomic spin states\cite{Celi2014,Mancini2015}, effectively giving single lattice-site imaging resolution along the narrow direction. Our technique has minimal heating, a feature that will be important for spectroscopic measurements of the Hofstadter butterfly\cite{Hofstadter1976,Celi2014} and realizations of Laughlin's charge pump\cite{Laughlin1981}.
Citation
Science

Citation

Spielman, I. , Stuhl, B. , , H. , Aycock, L. and Genkina, D. (2016), Visualizing edge states with an atomic Bose gas in the quantum Hall regime, Science (Accessed October 6, 2024)

Issues

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Created May 19, 2016, Updated February 19, 2017