Title: “Topological Crystalline Markers for Rotational-Symmetric Insulators” Abstract: “Topological insulators are materials with unique properties, featuring gapless boundary modes despite having a gapped bulk. When translational symmetry is intact, their topologically non-trivial characteristics can be identified using momentum-space based topological invariants. Yet, challenges arise when bulk disorder and defects break translational symmetry, making momentum-space approaches […]

Title: Entangled photons win the 2022 Nobel Prize! Abstract:  The 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to John Clauser, Alain Aspect, and Anton Zeilinger for experiments with entangled photons.  This may have left you wondering, “What are entangled photons, and how does one actually do experiments with them?” In this talk I will discuss questions like these and, more broadly, […]

Programming quantum materials with terahertz light Quantum materials often harbor emergent orders and phases that reveal themselves at low-energy scales, around 1 to 10 meV. To investigate these collective behaviors, we turn to the terahertz energy regime—a crucial window for probing and controlling quantum phenomena. In this talk, I will present our latest breakthroughs in […]

Condensed Matter & Biological Physics Seminar: Matthieu Wyart (EPFL and JHU)

Host: Brian Camley Condensed Matter & Biological Physics Seminar: Nathan Belliveau (UW) Bloomberg Room 462

TITLE: Quantum Many-Body Topology in Mixed States ABSTRACT: The classification of gapped quantum phases in pure states has seen significant progress over the past decades, particularly with the identification of symmetry-protected topological (SPT) phases. While much has been understood about these phases in ideal, isolated systems at zero temperature, their behavior under non-ideal conditions—such as […]

TITLE: Exploring Weird Quasiparticles at the Heart of Quantum Matter (often using Extreme Magnetic Fields) ABSTRACT:  Materials science has provided technologies to advance humanity through the millenia. In the wide range of modern materials grouped under the heading of “Quantum Matter”, electron charges and electron spins conspire in weird and collective ways to create new […]

Title: The unreasonable effectiveness of optical sum-rules in quantum many-body physics   Abstract: Inspired by the discovery of a variety of correlated insulators in the moire universe, controlled by interactions projected to a set of isolated bands with a narrow bandwidth, we examine here a variety of partial optical sum-rules restricted to low-energies. Unlike standard […]

TITLE: Is an information viewpoint useful in condensed matter experiment? ABSTRACT: Some of the most significant developments in science concern information, from artificial intelligence to quantum computation and communications. In this regard there has long been a close connection between statistical mechanics and information theory. An interesting question then is whether we can use new […]

TITLE: Liquid Crystals as Cores and Claddings ABSTRACT: Liquid crystals (LCs) refer to structured mesophases that retain the ability to flow while exhibiting broken symmetries. One simple LC is the nematic phase (NLC), which is comprised of rod-shaped molecules that co-orient with a D∞h symmetry. Their anisotropic properties can be modeled locally using a prolate […]

TITLE: Quantum geometry: how to picture bound electrons in periodic lattices ABSTRACT: The concept of quantum geometry has been at the forefront of condensed matter physics, starting from how quantized Berry curvature leads to quantized Hall conductivity, anomalous velocities in Dirac metals, or other topological responses in a growing list of so-called topological materials. Recently, […]

Condensed Matter & Biological Physics Seminar: Salem Al Mosleh (University of Maryland Eastern Shore) Host: Brian Camley