A two-dimensional algebraic quantum liquid produced by an atomic simulator of the
quantum Lifshitz model
#MMPMID26268154
Po HC
; Zhou Q
Nat Commun
2015[Aug]; 6
(?): 8012
PMID26268154
show ga
Bosons have a natural instinct to condense at zero temperature. It is a
long-standing challenge to create a high-dimensional quantum liquid that does not
exhibit long-range order at the ground state, as either extreme experimental
parameters or sophisticated designs of microscopic Hamiltonians are required for
suppressing the condensation. Here we show that synthetic gauge fields for
ultracold atoms, using either the Raman scheme or shaken lattices, provide
physicists a simple and practical scheme to produce a two-dimensional algebraic
quantum liquid at the ground state. This quantum liquid arises at a critical
Lifshitz point, where a two-dimensional quartic dispersion emerges in the
momentum space, and many fundamental properties of two-dimensional bosons are
changed in its proximity. Such an ideal simulator of the quantum Lifshitz model
allows experimentalists to directly visualize and explore the deconfinement
transition of topological excitations, an intriguing phenomenon that is difficult
to access in other systems.