Workgroup Hofstetter

Group 2017 november narrow

Prof. Dr. Walter Hofstetter

Quantum Matter

Since the achievement of Bose-Einstein condensation we have witnessed enormous progress in experimental and theoretical research on ultracold quantum gases. Optical lattices have opened up the possibility to realize analog quantum simulators for strongly correlated electronic condensed matter systems, such as high-temperature superconductors, but also for bosonic and nonequilibrium quantum phase transitions, and for exotic quantum matter, as for example color superconducting phases of dense nuclear matter in neutron stars. These developments build on the pioneering ideas of R. Feynman, who already envisioned a universal quantum simulator.

In our group we investigate model systems for interacting ultracold quantum gases in optical lattices, and for correlated electronic solid-state systems. We are interested in collective phenomena and ordered states (e.g. magnetic, superfluid, or supersolid), in topological states of matter, and in nonequilibrium quantum dynamics in the presence of external driving and dissipation. We develop and apply non-perturbative simulation techniques, such as Dynamical Mean-Field Theory, its extensions to bosonic quantum statistics and non-equilibrium dynamics, and variational wave functions. Our ongoing collaborations with leading experimental groups focus on topological many-body states induced by synthetic gauge fields, and on crystalline and supersolid phases in Rydberg-dressed quantum gases.

Publications on arXiv.

Email: hofstett@itp.uni-frankfurt.de