Coupling of polaritons to vibrational modes of ultracold atoms in an optical lattice
arXiv:1106.1272 · doi:10.1016/j.physe.2009.06.021
Abstract
The coupling of internal electronic excitations to vibrational modes of the external motion of ultracold atoms in an optical lattice is studied here in using a perturbation expansion in small atomic displacements. In the Mott insulator case with one atom per site, the resonance dipole-dipole coupling between neighboring sites can induce emission and absorption of vibrational quanta. Within a cavity in the strong exciton-photon coupling regime such coupling results in polariton-vibration interactions, which create a significant thermalization mechanism for polaritons toward their minimum energy, and leading to motional heating of the lattice atoms.
5 Pages, 4 Figures