A dissipatively stabilized Mott insulator of photons
Open accessAbstract
Superconducting circuits are a competitive platform for quantum computation because they offer controllability, long coherence times and strong interactions-properties that are essential for the study of quantum materials comprising microwave photons. However, intrinsic photon losses in these circuits hinder the realization of quantum many-body phases. Here we use superconducting circuits to explore strongly correlated quantum matter by building a Bose-Hubbard lattice for photons in the strongly interacting regime. We develop a versatile method for dissipative preparation of incompressible many-body phases through reservoir engineering and apply it to our system to stabilize a Mott insulator of photons against losses. Site- and time-resolved readout of the lattice allows us to investigate the microscopic details of the thermalization process through the dynamics of defect propagation and removal in the Mott phase. Our experiments demonstrate the power of superconducting circuits for studying strongly correlated matter in both coherent and engineered dissipative settings. In conjunction with recently demonstrated superconducting microwave Chern insulators, we expect that our approach will enable the exploration of topologically ordered phases of matter.
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Such a parametric strategy was experimentally put into practice to generate a Mott insulator state of impenetrable photons.
“Such a strategy was experimentally put into practice in [64] to generate a Mott insulator state of impenetrable photons.”
From How to exploit driving and dissipation to stabilize and manipulate quantum many-body states (2025) · cites this paper as [64]
Section III (pp. 6–7) reports experimental stabilization of a photonic Mott insulator with strongly suppressed on-site number fluctuations. But the paper describes the preparation strategy as coherent driving combined with engineered dissipation, not as a parametric strategy; it also does not establish that the photons are strictly impenetrable. (LLM, conf=0.83)
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References 60 · Cited by 352
- Authors
- Ma, R., Saxberg, B., Owens, C., Leung, N., Lu, Y., Simon, J., & Schuster, D. I.
- Affiliations
- University of Chicago (US)
- Corresponding author
- Ma, Ruichao
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2019-02-06
- Volume
- 566
- Issue
- 7742
- Pages
- 51-57
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- OpenAlex
- W2884325170
- Cited by
- 352
- References
- 60
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 51 · 2024: 45 · 2023: 38 · 2022: 66 · 2021: 58 · 2020: 55 · 2019: 21
- FWCI
- 21.98
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Update notices
- correction (2019-05-27)
- Open access
- green
- arxiv.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics › Strong Light-Matter Interactions
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Quantum Information and Cryptography
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics › Cold Atom Physics and Bose-Einstein Condensates
- Keywords
- Mott insulator, photons, superconducting circuits, Bose-Hubbard model, dissipative stabilization, reservoir engineering, photon loss, strongly correlated quantum matter, thermalization, defect propagation, microwave photonics
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