Synthetic Topological Vacua of Yang-Mills Fields in Bose-Einstein Condensates

Abstract

Topological vacua are a family of degenerate ground states of Yang-Mills fields with zero field strength but nontrivial topological structures. They play a fundamental role in particle physics and quantum field theory, but have not yet been experimentally observed. Here we report the first theoretical proposal and experimental realization of synthetic topological vacua with a cloud of atomic Bose-Einstein condensates. Our setup provides a promising platform to demonstrate the fundamental concept that a vacuum, rather than being empty, has rich spatial structures. The Hamiltonian for the vacuum of topological number n = 1 is synthesized and the related Hopf index is measured. The vacuum of topological number n = 2 is also realized, and we find that vacua with different topological numbers have distinctive spin textures and Hopf links. Our work opens up opportunities for exploring topological vacua and related long-sought-after instantons in tabletop experiments.

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• Non-Abelian quantum geometric tensor in degenerate topological semimetals
• Realizing and detecting Stiefel-Whitney insulators in an optical Raman lattice
• Synthetic non-Abelian topological charges in ultracold atomic gases
• Synthetic spin-orbit coupling for the multispin models in optical lattices
• Proposal for realizing and probing topological crystalline insulators in optical lattices
• Detecting degenerate bands topological invariants in optical lattice