ITAMP Topical Lunch Discussion
Date: FRIDAY, January 24
Time: 12:00-1:30
Pizza will be served.
Location: B-106 @ Center for Astrophysics (60 Garden Street)
Directions: after entering the lobby of the CfA, turn right to enter the
hallway of the B building. In the hallway, turn right again, and B-106 is
there.
Speaker: Alexei Bylinskii (MIT)
Title: Friction under microscope in a trapped-ion optical lattice simulator
Abstract:
Friction is a ubiquitous phenomenon with rich many-body physics that is not
well understood at the nano-scale. At this scale traditional friction laws
break down and quantum mechanics may start playing a role, potentially
revealing new dynamics and phases of matter. Studying friction in this
regime could show us a way to construct more efficient and novel
nano-mechanical devices, as well as give us general insight into strongly
correlated many-body systems. We demonstrate a new experimental system that
is able to study nano-scale friction using an array of atomic ions in a 1-D
optical lattice. This simulator offers the possibility to measure and
control friction atom-by-atom and access the quantum many-body regime with
strong, long-range interactions in periodic potentials.
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