Sprecher
Beschreibung
Exploring the fundamental structure and basic laws of the universe constitutes an essential drive to physicists. The studies of ultracold atoms have built a bridge between the principles of microscopic world and the emerging physics of the macroscopic realm. One can prepare and manipulate synthetic quantum material to simulate strongly correlated quantum many-body system with microscopic techniques to solve formidable tasks for the state-of-the-art supercomputers. I will introduce our recent research on one of such synthetic quantum material, the lattice gauge theory (LGT). We implemented a U(1) LGT Hamiltonian with ultracold atoms trapped in optical lattices and studied the relevant properties of gauge invariance, thermalization dynamics, and quantum criticality which are connected to the physical processes of quark confinement, string breaking, and false vacuum decay. This opens up a new avenue for understanding complex phenomena in related fields, such as particle physics and topological quantum matter.
