Observation of string breaking on a (2 + 1)D Rydberg quantum simulator

• Main Authors: Gonzalez-Cuadra, Daniel, Hamdan, Majd, Zache, Torsten V, Braverman, Boris, Kornjaca, Milan, Lukin, Alexander, Cantu, Sergio H, Liu, Fangli, Wang, Sheng-Tao, Keesling, Alexander, Lukin, Mikhail D, Zoller, Peter, Bylinskii, Alexei
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 21-10-2024
• Subjects: Physics - High Energy Physics - Lattice; Physics - Quantum Physics; Physics - Strongly Correlated Electrons
• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2410.16558

Lattice gauge theories (LGTs) describe a broad range of phenomena in
condensed matter and particle physics. A prominent example is confinement,
responsible for bounding quarks inside hadrons such as protons or neutrons.
When quark-antiquark pairs are separated, the energy stored in the string of
gluon fields connecting them grows linearly with their distance, until there is
enough energy to create new pairs from the vacuum and break the string. While
such phenomena are ubiquitous in LGTs, simulating the resulting dynamics is a
challenging task. Here, we report the observation of string breaking in
synthetic quantum matter using a programmable quantum simulator based on
neutral atom arrays. We show that a (2+1)D LGT with dynamical matter can be
efficiently implemented when the atoms are placed on a Kagome geometry, with a
local U(1) symmetry emerging from the Rydberg blockade, while long-range
Rydberg interactions naturally give rise to a linear confining potential for a
pair of charges, allowing us to tune both their masses as well as the string
tension. We experimentally map out the corresponding phase diagram by
adiabatically preparing the ground state of the atom array in the presence of
defects, and observe substructure of the confined phase, distinguishing regions
dominated by fluctuating strings or by broken string configurations. Finally,
by harnessing local control over the atomic detuning, we quench string states
and observe string breaking dynamics exhibiting a many-body resonance
phenomenon. Our work paves a way to explore phenomena in high-energy physics
using programmable quantum simulators.