Fig. 1: Emergence of continuous time crystals in a continuously driven-dissipative Rydberg system.
From: Observation of multiple time crystals in a driven-dissipative system with Rydberg gas
a Schematic of the experimental setup and relevant energy level. QWP: quarter-wave plate, DM: dichroic mirror. b Scanned transmission spectrum with Ωp = 2π × 25.0 MHz and Ωc = 2π × 2.3 MHz. Insets show the single-shot realization of the spontaneous self-sustained oscillation for Δ = 2π × 40 MHz and corresponding normalized single-sided amplitude spectra. c Relative crystalline fraction Ξ as a function of noise strength N. The error bars represent the standard deviation of two independent measurements. d Distribution of the time phase in the limit cycle phase for 250 independent realizations. Both the data in c and d are taken at Ωc = 2π × 2.3 MHz. e Demonstration of the single-shot realization of quench dynamics of CTC with an oscillation frequency of 9.615 kHz at Ωc = 2π × 2.9 MHz. e1–e3 Three segments of the 2-ms time window data trace, accompanied with a triangular reference waveform of frequency 9.615 kHz, corresponding to the gray marked time windows of 20-22 ms (e1), 70-72 ms (e2), and 120–122 ms (e3), respectively. It is demonstrated that the phase shift of a single realization over 140 ms time window has a negligible effect. f Measurements of the oscillation frequencies of CTC as a function of effective two-photon Rabi frequency Ωeff = ΩcΩp/2Δp. The error bars are the fitting error for the fitting of single-sided amplitude spectra. In the experiment, the Ωeff is varied by changing the coupling Rabi frequency Ωc. g Simulated oscillation frequencies of the time crystal according to the Hamiltonian in Eq. (1).
