M. Li

As the simplest and most fundamental model describing the interaction between light and matter, a breakdown in the rotating wave approximation of the Rabi model leads to phase transition versus coupling strength when the frequency of the qubit greatly surpasses that of the oscillator. Besides the phase transition revealed in the ground state, we show that the dynamics of physical quantities can reflect such a phase transition for this model. In addition to the excitation of the bosonic field in the ground state, we show that the witness of inseparability (entanglement), mutual information, quantum Fisher information, and the variance of cavity quadrature can be employed to detect the phase transition in quench. We also reveal the negative impact of temperature on checking the phase transition by quench. This model can be implemented using trapped ions, superconducting artificial atoms coupled bosonic modes, and quantum simulations. By reflecting the phase transition in a fundamental quantum optics model without imposing the thermodynamic limit, this work offers an idea to explore phase transitions by non-equilibrium process for open quantum systems.

Quantitative measure of disorder or randomness based on the entropy production characterizes thermodynamical irreversibility, which is relevant to the conventional second law of thermodynamics. Here we report, in a quantum mechanical fashion, the first theoretical prediction and experimental exploration of an information-theoretical bound on the entropy production. Our theoretical model consists of a simplest two-level dissipative system driven by a purely classical field, and under the Markovian dissipation, we find that such an information-theoretical bound, not fully validating quantum relaxation processes, strongly depends on the drive-to-decay ratio and the initial state. Furthermore, we carry out experimental verification of this information-theoretical bound by means of a single spin embedded in an ultracold trapped $^{40}$Ca$^{+}$ ion. Our finding, based on a two-level model, is fundamental to any quantum thermodynamical process and indicates much difference and complexity in quantum thermodynamics with respect to the conventionally classical counterpart.

In this work, visible and extreme ultraviolet spectra of W7+ are measured using the high-temperature superconducting electron-beam ion trap (EBIT) at the Shanghai EBIT Laboratory under extremely low-energy conditions (lower than the nominal electron-beam energy of 130 eV). The relevant atomic structure is calculated using the flexible atomic code package based on the relativistic configuration interaction method. The GRASP2K code, in the framework of the multiconfiguration Dirac-Hartree-Fock method, is employed as well for calculating the wavelength of the M1 transition in the ground configuration of W7+. A line from the W7+ ions is observed at a little higher electron-beam energy than the ionization potential for W4+, making this line appear to be from W5+. A hypothesis for the charge-state evolution of W7+ is proposed based on our experimental and theoretical results; that is, the occurrence of W7+ ions results from indirect ionization caused by stepwise excitation between some metastable states of lower-charge-state W ions, at the nominal electron-beam energy of 59 eV.