Interview for Faculty Position

Learning about dynamics of condensed matter systems from ultra-cold atoms

David Pekker

Harvard University

Understanding strongly interacting many-electron systems, and especially their dynamics, has been a long standing puzzle in the physics community. Recent progress in ultra-cold atom experiments has shed a new light on these long standing problems. Motivated by these experiments, we investigate two dynamic problems with Fermionic atoms. First, we look at the production and decay of double occupancies in optical lattices filled with strongly repelling Fermions. This problem turns out to be of interest to both solar cell and high Tc superconductor research. Second, we look at the dynamics of the formation of ferromagnetic domains after a rapid ramping up of repulsive interactions in a two-component Fermi-gas. These dynamics are related to the still poorly understood Stoner instability, which is thought to be responsible for ferromagnetism in metals.