Scientific Calendar Event



Starts 18 Jul 2017 11:00
Ends 18 Jul 2017 12:30
Central European Time
ICTP
Leonardo Building - Luigi Stasi Seminar Room
Generically, driving a many-body system simply heats up the system. However, by using smart driving protocols one can achieve more interesting steady states of quantum matter, for example states with extremely low effective temperatures. This is what happens in the so-called thermal mixing method, which is used to cool nuclear spins (in preparation for NMR).
The technique consists in driving non-linearly a system of disordered electronic spins, which drives it to an ultra-cold steady state, whose temperature is transmitted to the nuclei. Interestingly the cooling effect is optimized by working in the vicinity of an electron's many-body localization crossover.
I will explain the physical principles at work and discuss how similar mechanisms could be used in the context of cold atoms or specific ferro-magnets.