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How to Directly Measure Floquet Topological Invariants in Optical Lattices.

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

Change log

Authors

Ünal, F Nur 
Seradjeh, Babak 
Eckardt, André 

Abstract

The classification of topological Floquet systems with time-periodic Hamiltonians transcends that of static systems. For example, spinless fermions in periodically driven two-dimensional lattices are not completely characterized by the Chern numbers of the quasienergy bands, but rather by a set of winding numbers associated with the gaps. We propose a feasible scheme for measuring these winding numbers in a periodically driven optical lattice efficiently and directly. It is based on the construction of a one-parameter family of drives, continuously connecting the Floquet system of interest to a trivial reference system. The winding numbers are then determined by the identification and the tomography of the band-touching singularities occurring on the way. As a by-product, we also propose a method for probing spectral properties of time evolution operators via a time analog of crystallography.

Description

Keywords

5108 Quantum Physics, 51 Physical Sciences

Journal Title

Phys Rev Lett

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

0031-9007
1079-7114

Volume Title

122

Publisher

American Physical Society (APS)