Effective three-body interactions of neutral bosons in optical lattices

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that two-body collisions in optical lattices induce effective three- and higher-body interactions, which influence collapse and revival dynamics and can be tuned for simulating complex quantum theories.

Contribution

It reveals the generation of higher-body interactions from two-body collisions in optical lattices and discusses their impact on quantum dynamics and potential for quantum simulation.

Findings

Higher-body interactions affect collapse and revival dynamics.

Visibility of interference fringes depends on multiple energy scales.

Tuning interactions enables simulation of effective field theories.

Abstract

We show that there are effective three- and higher-body interactions generated by the two-body collisions of atoms confined in the lowest vibrational states of a 3D optical lattice. The collapse and revival dynamics of approximate coherent states loaded into a lattice are a particularly sensitive probe of these higher-body interactions; the visibility of interference fringes depend on both two-, three-, and higher-body energy scales, and these produce an initial dephasing that can help explain the surprisingly rapid decay of revivals seen in experiments. If inhomogeneities in the lattice system are sufficiently reduced, longer timescale partial and nearly full revivals will be visible. Using Feshbach resonances or control of the lattice potential it is possible to tune the effective higher-body interactions and simulate effective field theories in optical lattices.