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Kumar S, Lim J, Rivera N, Wong W, Ang YS, Ang LK, Wong LJ. Strongly correlated multielectron bunches from interaction with quantum light. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2024; 10:eadm9563. [PMID: 38718122 PMCID: PMC11078178 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adm9563] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/15/2023] [Accepted: 04/04/2024] [Indexed: 05/12/2024]
Abstract
Strongly correlated electron systems are a cornerstone of modern physics, being responsible for groundbreaking phenomena from superconducting magnets to quantum computing. In most cases, correlations in electrons arise exclusively because of Coulomb interactions. In this work, we reveal that free electrons interacting simultaneously with a light field can become highly correlated via mechanisms beyond Coulomb interactions. In the case of two electrons, the resulting Pearson correlation coefficient for the joint probability distribution of the output electron energies is enhanced by more than 13 orders of magnitude compared to that of electrons interacting with the light field in succession (one after another). These highly correlated electrons are the result of momentum and energy exchange between the participating electrons via the external quantum light field. Our findings pave the way to the creation and control of highly correlated free electrons for applications including quantum information and ultrafast imaging.
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Affiliation(s)
- Suraj Kumar
- School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798, Singapore
| | - Jeremy Lim
- Science, Mathematics and Technology, Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8 Somapah Road, Singapore 487372, Singapore
| | - Nicholas Rivera
- Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge MA 02138, USA
| | - Wesley Wong
- School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798, Singapore
| | - Yee Sin Ang
- Science, Mathematics and Technology, Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8 Somapah Road, Singapore 487372, Singapore
| | - Lay Kee Ang
- Science, Mathematics and Technology, Singapore University of Technology and Design, 8 Somapah Road, Singapore 487372, Singapore
| | - Liang Jie Wong
- School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798, Singapore
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2
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Eldar M, Chen Z, Pan Y, Krüger M. Self-Trapping of Slow Electrons in the Energy Domain. PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS 2024; 132:035001. [PMID: 38307079 DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.132.035001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/29/2022] [Revised: 09/22/2023] [Accepted: 12/05/2023] [Indexed: 02/04/2024]
Abstract
The interaction of light and swift electrons has enabled phase-coherent manipulation and acceleration of electron wave packets. Here, we investigate this interaction in a new regime where low-energy electrons (∼20-200 eV) interact with a phase-matched light field. Our analytical and one-dimensional numerical study shows that slow electrons are subject to strong confinement in the energy domain due to the nonvanishing curvature of the electron dispersion. The spectral trap is tunable and an appropriate choice of light field parameters can reduce the interaction dynamics to only two energy states. The capacity to trap electrons expands the scope of electron beam physics, free-electron quantum optics and quantum simulators.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maor Eldar
- Department of Physics, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- The Helen Diller Quantum Center, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
| | - Zhaopin Chen
- Department of Physics, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- The Helen Diller Quantum Center, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
| | - Yiming Pan
- Department of Physics, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- The Helen Diller Quantum Center, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- School of Physical Science and Technology and Center for Transformative Science, ShanghaiTech University, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - Michael Krüger
- Department of Physics, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
- The Helen Diller Quantum Center, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
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Bucher T, Ruimy R, Tsesses S, Dahan R, Bartal G, Vanacore GM, Kaminer I. Free-electron Ramsey-type interferometry for enhanced amplitude and phase imaging of nearfields. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2023; 9:eadi5729. [PMID: 38134276 PMCID: PMC10745688 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adi5729] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/04/2023] [Accepted: 11/22/2023] [Indexed: 12/24/2023]
Abstract
The complex range of interactions between electrons and electromagnetic fields gave rise to countless scientific and technological advances. A prime example is photon-induced nearfield electron microscopy (PINEM), enabling the detection of confined electric fields in illuminated nanostructures with unprecedented spatial resolution. However, PINEM is limited by its dependence on strong fields, making it unsuitable for sensitive samples, and its inability to resolve complex phasor information. Here, we leverage the nonlinear, overconstrained nature of PINEM to present an algorithmic microscopy approach, achieving far superior nearfield imaging capabilities. Our algorithm relies on free-electron Ramsey-type interferometry to produce orders-of-magnitude improvement in sensitivity and ambiguity-immune nearfield phase reconstruction, both of which are optimal when the electron exhibits a fully quantum behavior. Our results demonstrate the potential of combining algorithmic approaches with state-of-the-art modalities in electron microscopy and may lead to various applications from imaging sensitive biological samples to performing full-field tomography of confined light.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tomer Bucher
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Ron Ruimy
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Shai Tsesses
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
- Department of Physics and Research Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
| | - Raphael Dahan
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Guy Bartal
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Giovanni Maria Vanacore
- Department of Material Science, University of Milano-Bicocca, Via Cozzi 55, 20121 Milano, Italy
| | - Ido Kaminer
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
- Solid State Institute, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
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Zhou Y, Ye X, Liu S, Chen S, Tang D, Fan F. Simultaneous chiral polarization and edge enhancement imaging enabled by a single geometric-phase-based element. OPTICS LETTERS 2023; 48:5085-5088. [PMID: 37773391 DOI: 10.1364/ol.500133] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/10/2023] [Accepted: 08/24/2023] [Indexed: 10/01/2023]
Abstract
In this Letter, we propose a multifunctional imaging system enabled by a single geometric-phase-based liquid crystal (LC) element, which integrates chiral polarization and edge enhancement imaging. The element is located at the frequency domain plane in a 4F imaging system, and the phase profile of the element consists of a fork grating in the x direction and a grating in the y direction, which provide edge enhancement and chiral polarization imaging capabilities. Benefiting from the tunable property of the LC, the system can be switched from a polarization and edge imaging mode to the normal conventional imaging mode which is capable of conveniently acquiring the needed image information. Experiments demonstrate that the system can easily achieve multifunctional and switchable imaging, which agrees well with our design, and our LC element can work in the broadband spectrum because of the geometric phase modulation. The multifunctional strategy used here can effectively avoid the need to increase the size of the original microscopic system and the need for additional mechanical rotation of components. We believe that the proposed system with the additional advantages of electric control and tunability can find applications in biological imaging, medical detection, and optical computing.
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Ebel S, Talebi N. Inelastic electron scattering at a single-beam structured light wave. COMMUNICATIONS PHYSICS 2023; 6:179. [PMID: 38665404 PMCID: PMC11041727 DOI: 10.1038/s42005-023-01300-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/20/2022] [Accepted: 07/06/2023] [Indexed: 04/28/2024]
Abstract
In free space, electrons undergo inelastic scattering in the presence of ponderomotive potentials generated by light pulses and standing light waves. The resulting modulated electron energy spectrum can exhibit the formation of discrete energy sidebands when multiple light beams are employed. Here, we demonstrate the inelastic scattering of slow-electron wavepackets at a propagating Hermite-Gaussian light beam. The pulsed Hermite-Gaussian beam thus forms a ponderomotive potential for the electron with sufficient momentum components, leading to the inelastic scattering and subsequent formation of discrete energy sidebands. We show that the resulting energy-gain spectra after the interaction are strongly influenced by the self-interference of the electrons in this ponderomotive potential. This effect is observable across various wavelengths, and the energy modulation can be controlled by varying the electron velocity and light intensity. By utilizing the vast landscape of structured electromagnetic fields, this effect introduces an additional platform for manipulating electron wavepackets.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sven Ebel
- Institute of Experimental and Applied Physics, Kiel University, Kiel, Germany
| | - Nahid Talebi
- Institute of Experimental and Applied Physics, Kiel University, Kiel, Germany
- Kiel Nano, Surface and Interface Science KiNSIS, Kiel University, Kiel, Germany
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Pan D, Xu H. Polarizing Free Electrons in Optical Near Fields. PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS 2023; 130:186901. [PMID: 37204889 DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.130.186901] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/18/2022] [Accepted: 03/03/2023] [Indexed: 05/21/2023]
Abstract
Polarizing electron beams using light is highly desirable but exceedingly challenging, as the approaches proposed in previous studies using free-space light usually require enormous laser intensities. Here, we propose the use of a transverse electric optical near field, extended on nanostructures, to efficiently polarize an adjacent electron beam by exploiting the strong inelastic electron scattering in phase-matched optical near fields. Intriguingly, the two spin components of an unpolarized incident electron beam-parallel and antiparallel to the electric field-are spin-flipped and inelastically scattered to different energy states, providing an analog of the Stern-Gerlach experiment in the energy dimension. Our calculations show that when a dramatically reduced laser intensity of ∼10^{12} W/cm^{2} and a short interaction length of 16 μm are used, an unpolarized incident electron beam interacting with the excited optical near field can produce two spin-polarized electron beams, both exhibiting near unity spin purity and a 6% brightness relative to the input beam. Our findings are important for optical control of free-electron spins, preparation of spin-polarized electron beams, and applications in material science and high-energy physics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Deng Pan
- State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China
- Institute of Quantum Materials and Physics, Henan Academy of Sciences, Zhengzhou 450046, China
| | - Hongxing Xu
- Institute of Quantum Materials and Physics, Henan Academy of Sciences, Zhengzhou 450046, China
- School of Physics and Technology, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
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Morimoto Y. Attosecond electron-beam technology: a review of recent progress. Microscopy (Oxf) 2023; 72:2-17. [PMID: 36269108 DOI: 10.1093/jmicro/dfac054] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/13/2022] [Revised: 10/14/2022] [Accepted: 10/20/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Electron microscopy and diffraction with ultrashort pulsed electron beams are capable of imaging transient phenomena with the combined ultrafast temporal and atomic-scale spatial resolutions. The emerging field of optical electron beam control allowed the manipulation of relativistic and sub-relativistic electron beams at the level of optical cycles. Specifically, it enabled the generation of electron beams in the form of attosecond pulse trains and individual attosecond pulses. In this review, we describe the basics of the attosecond electron beam control and overview the recent experimental progress. High-energy electron pulses of attosecond sub-optical cycle duration open up novel opportunities for space-time-resolved imaging of ultrafast chemical and physical processes, coherent photon generation, free electron quantum optics, electron-atom scattering with shaped wave packets and laser-driven particle acceleration. Graphical Abstract.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yuya Morimoto
- Ultrashort Electron Beam Science RIKEN Hakubi research team, RIKEN Cluster for Pioneering Research (CPR), RIKEN Center for Advanced Photonics (RAP), 2-1 Hirosawa, Wako, Saitama 351-0198, Japan.,Department of Nuclear Engineering and Management, Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan
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Karnieli A, Tsesses S, Yu R, Rivera N, Zhao Z, Arie A, Fan S, Kaminer I. Quantum sensing of strongly coupled light-matter systems using free electrons. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2023; 9:eadd2349. [PMID: 36598994 PMCID: PMC9812396 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.add2349] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/30/2022] [Accepted: 11/28/2022] [Indexed: 06/17/2023]
Abstract
Strong coupling in light-matter systems is a central concept in cavity quantum electrodynamics and is essential for many quantum technologies. Especially in the optical range, full control of highly connected multi-qubit systems necessitates quantum coherent probes with nanometric spatial resolution, which are currently inaccessible. Here, we propose the use of free electrons as high-resolution quantum sensors for strongly coupled light-matter systems. Shaping the free-electron wave packet enables the measurement of the quantum state of the entire hybrid systems. We specifically show how quantum interference of the free-electron wave packet gives rise to a quantum-enhanced sensing protocol for the position and dipole orientation of a subnanometer emitter inside a cavity. Our results showcase the great versatility and applicability of quantum interactions between free electrons and strongly coupled cavities, relying on the unique properties of free electrons as strongly interacting flying qubits with miniscule dimensions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aviv Karnieli
- Raymond and Beverly Sackler School of Physics and Astronomy, Tel Aviv University, Ramat Aviv 69978 Tel Aviv, Israel
| | - Shai Tsesses
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion–Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
| | - Renwen Yu
- Department of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA
| | - Nicholas Rivera
- Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
- Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
| | - Zhexin Zhao
- Department of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA
| | - Ady Arie
- School of Electrical Engineering, Fleischman Faculty of Engineering, Tel Aviv University, 69978 Tel Aviv, Israel
| | - Shanhui Fan
- Department of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA
| | - Ido Kaminer
- Andrew and Erna Viterbi Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Technion–Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000, Israel
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Harvey T. Adapting a Surface Microscopy Tool for Quantum Studies. PHYSICS 2022. [DOI: 10.1103/physics.15.80] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/05/2023]
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