QUROPE Quantum Information Processing and Communication in Europe

Using ultracold alkaline-earth atoms in optical lattices, we construct a quantum simulator for U(N) and SU(N) lattice gauge theories with fermionic matter based on quantum link models. These systems share qualitative features with QCD, including chiral symmetry breaking and restoration at nonzero temperature or baryon density. Unlike classical simulations, a quantum simulator does not suffer from sign problems and can address the corresponding chiral dynamics in real time.

We investigate magnetic properties of strongly interacting bosonic mixtures confined in one dimensional geometries, focusing on recently realized 87

etecting topological order in cold-atom experiments is an ongoing challenge, the resolution of which offers novel perspectives on topological matter. In material systems, unambiguous signatures of topological order exist for topological insulators and quantum Hall devices.

Using a Fermi-Bose mixture of ultracold atoms in an optical lattice, we construct a quantum simulator for a U

We show how a dressed lattice scheme can provide control over certain types of noise for atomic quantum gases in the lowest band of an optical lattice, removing the effects of global lattice amplitude noise to first order for particular choices of the dressing field parameters.

We introduce a one-dimensional system of fermionic atoms in an optical lattice whose phase diagram includes topological states of different symmetry classes with a simple possibility to switch between them. The states and topological phase transitions between them can be identified by looking at their zero-energy edge modes which are Majorana fermions.

We have implemented the gedanken experiment of an individual atom scattering a wave packet of near-resonant light, and measured the associated Wigner time-delay as a function of the frequency of the light. In our apparatus the atom behaves as a two-level system and we have found delays as large as 42 nanoseconds at resonance, limited by the lifetime of the excited state.

We investigate dissipation-induced p-wave paired states of fermions in two dimensions and show the existence of spatially separated Majorana zero modes in a phase with vanishing Chern number. We construct an explicit and natural model of a dissipative vortex that traps a single of these modes, and establish its topological origin by mapping the problem to a chiral one-dimensional wire where we observe a nonequilibrium topological phase transition characterized by an abrupt change of a topological invariant (winding number).

We discuss the preparation of many-body states of cold fermionic atoms in an optical lattice via controlled dissipative processes induced by coupling the system to a reservoir. Based on a mechanism combining Pauli blocking and phase locking between adjacent sites, we construct complete sets of jump operators describing coupling to a reservoir that leads to dissipative preparation of pairing states for fermions with various symmetries in the absence of direct inter-particle interactions. We discuss the uniqueness of these states, and demonstrate it with small-scale numerical simulations.

We present a systematic investigation of attractive binary mixtures in presence of both spin- and mass-imbalance in one dimensional setups described by the Hubbard model. After discussing typical cold atomic experimental realizations and the relation between microscopic and effective parameters, we study several many-body features of trapped Fermi-Fermi and Bose-Bose mixtures such as density profiles, momentum distributions and correlation functions by means of numerical density-matrix-renormalization-group and Quantum Monte Carlo simulations.