Disordered driven coupled cavity arrays: Non-equilibrium stochastic mean-field theory

TL;DR

This paper introduces a non-equilibrium stochastic mean-field theory to analyze how disorder, pumping, and decay affect coupled cavity arrays, revealing disorder-induced effects like washing out bistability and inducing phase disorder.

Contribution

It develops a general non-equilibrium stochastic mean-field approach applicable to various light-matter systems with disorder, driving, and dissipation.

Findings

Weak disorder can eliminate bistability in the system.

Disorder combined with decay can cause phase disorder.

The method is broadly applicable to light-matter coupled systems.

Abstract

We study the interplay of disorder with pumping and decay in coupled qubit-cavity arrays, the Jaynes-Cummings-Hubbard model. We find that relatively weak disorder can wash out the bistability present in the clean pumped system, and that moreover, the combination of disorder in on-site energies and decay can lead to effective phase disorder. To explore these questions, we present a non- equilibrium generalisation of Stochastic-Mean-Field theory, providing a simple tool to address such questions. This technique is developed for rather general forms of light-matter coupling, driving, dissipation, and on-site disorder, making it applicable to a wide range of systems.