Probing a Dissipative Phase Transition with a Trapped Ion through Reservoir Engineering
M.-L. Cai1†, Z.-D. Liu1†, Y. Jiang1†, Y.-K. Wu1, Q.-X. Mei1, W.-D. Zhao1, L. He1, X. Zhang2,1, Z.-C. Zhou1,3, and L.-M. Duan1*
1Center for Quantum Information, Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China 2Department of Physics, Renmin University, Beijing 100084, China 3Beijing Academy of Quantum Information Sciences, Beijing 100193, China
Abstract：Dissipation is often considered as a detrimental effect in quantum systems for unitary quantum operations. However, it has been shown that suitable dissipation can be useful resources in both quantum information and quantum simulation. Here, we propose and experimentally simulate a dissipative phase transition (DPT) model using a single trapped ion with an engineered reservoir. We show that the ion's spatial oscillation mode reaches a steady state after the alternating application of unitary evolution under a quantum Rabi model Hamiltonian and sideband cooling of the oscillator. The average phonon number of the oscillation mode is used as the order parameter to provide evidence for the DPT. Our work highlights the suitability of trapped ions for simulating open quantum systems and shall facilitate further investigations of DPT with various dissipation terms.
2022, Vol. 39 
