journal article·2016-07

Quantum chaos and breaking of all anti-unitary symmetries in Rydberg excitons

Marc Aßmann, Johannes Thewes, Dietmar Fröhlich, Manfred Bayer

Nature Materials· Volume 15· Issue 7
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Abstract

Symmetries are the underlying principles of fundamental interactions in nature. Chaos in a quantum system may emerge from breaking these symmetries. Compared to vacuum, crystals are attractive for studying quantum chaos, as they not only break spatial isotropy, but also lead to novel quasiparticles with modified interactions. Here we study yellow Rydberg excitons in cuprous oxide which couple strongly to the vacuum light field and interact significantly with crystal phonons, leading to inversion symmetry breaking. In a magnetic field, time-reversal symmetry is also broken and the exciton states show a complex splitting pattern, resulting in quadratic level repulsion for small splittings. In contrast to atomic chaotic systems in a magnetic field, which show only a linear level repulsion, this is a signature of a system where all anti-unitary symmetries are broken simultaneously. This behaviour can otherwise be found only for the electro-weak interaction or engineered billiards.
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Research context

OpenAlex topics: Quantum chaos and dynamical systems · Cold Atom Physics and Bose-Einstein Condensates · Spectroscopy and Quantum Chemical Studies

SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.

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