Mesoscopic Superposition States Generated by Synthetic Spin-orbit Interaction in Fock-state Lattices

TL;DR

This paper proposes a method to generate mesoscopic superposition states of photons using synthetic spin-orbit interaction in a Fock-state lattice, enabling control over photon routing and topological effects in circuit QED systems.

Contribution

It introduces a novel scheme for creating mesoscopic superpositions via modulated cavity interactions, breaking time reversal symmetry and enabling topological quantum states.

Findings

Realization of optical circulator with chiralities dependent on atomic states

Generation of mesoscopic superposition states of photons

Potential for exploring quantum information and topological physics

Abstract

Mesoscopic superposition states of photons can be prepared in three cavities interacting with the same two-level atom. By periodically modulating the three cavity frequencies around the transition frequency of the atom with $2\pi/3$ phase difference, the time reversal symmetry is broken and an optical circulator is generated with chiralities depending on the quantum state of the atom. A superposition of the atomic states can guide photons from one cavity to a mesoscopic superposition of the other two cavities. The physics can be understood in a finite spin-orbit-coupled Fock-state lattice where the atom and the cavities carry the spin and the orbit degrees of freedom, respectively. This scheme can be realized in circuit QED architectures and provides a new platform for exploring quantum information and topological physics in novel lattices.