Dephasing in Rydberg Facilitation Due to State-Dependent Dipole Forces

TL;DR

This paper investigates how state-dependent dipole forces cause dephasing in Rydberg atoms, providing an analytic expression for the dephasing rate that aligns with numerical results, enhancing understanding of decoherence in these systems.

Contribution

It introduces a simple analytic model for dipole-force induced dephasing in Rydberg atoms, linking atomic interactions to decoherence rates.

Findings

Analytic expression for dephasing rate derived.

Dephasing rate matches numerical simulations.

Identifies dipole-force effects as a key decoherence mechanism.

Abstract

Rydberg atoms allow for the experimental study of open many-body systems and nonequilibrium phenomena. High dephasing rates are a generic feature of these systems, and therefore they can often be described by rate equations, i.e. in the classical limit. In this work, we analyze one potential origin of the decoherence in Rydberg atoms: dipole-force induced dephasing. As the wave function of the Rydberg (spin-up) state is repelled in the presence of another nearby Rydberg atom, while the ground (spin-down) state diffuses in place, the Franck-Condon overlap between the two spin components quickly decays causing a decoherence of the spin transition. With an analytic approach we obtain a simple expression for the dephasing rate of the Rydberg state depending on atomic and laser parameters, which agrees with numerical findings.