Recent experimental developments offer platforms to investigate the interaction between light and matter at the quantum level, encouraging the buildup of theoretical tools to describe their dynamics. The great control over the system parameters also permits to tune many-body Hamiltonians, opening the way to explore novel quantum phases. In this talk, I will first present a stochastic approach which aims at computing the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of spin-boson models. This approach permits to explore the strong coupling regime of the Rabi model, which is the simplest model of interaction between light and matter, and to investigate the quantum phase transition in the ohmic spinboson model, which describes a two-level system interacting with a dissipative environment. I will then present an hybrid setup comprising a double quantum dot coupled to a microwave cavity, which was realized recently. This system produces a highly entangled state of light and matter in relation to Kondo physics. I will finally introduce a nano-engine device composed of a quantum dot coupled to impedances, and show that vacuum symmetry breaking generates a rectified current flowing through the device.


Seminar, December 10, 2015, 12:00. Seminar Room

Hosted by Prof. Darrick Chang