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When it comes to creating ever more intriguing quantum systems, a constant need is finding new ways to observe them in a wide range of physical scenarios. JILA Fellow Cindy Regal and JILA and NIST Fellow Ana Maria Rey have teamed up with Oriol Romero-Isart, a professor at the University of Innsbruck and IQOQI (Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information) to show that a trapped particle in the form of an atom readily reveals its full quantum state with quite simple ingredients, opening up opportunities for studies of the quantum state of ever larger particles.

There are many methods to determine what the limits are for certain processes. Many of these methods look to reach the upper and lower bounds to identify them for making accurate measurements and calculations. In the growing field of quantum sensing, these limits have yet to be found. That may change, thanks to research done by JILA Fellow Graeme Smith and his research team, with JILA and NIST Fellow James Thompson In a new study published in Physical Review Applied, the JILA and NIST researchers collaborated with scientists at the quantum company Quantinuum (previously Honeywell Quantum Solutions) to try and identify the upper limits of quantum sensing.

JILA and NIST Fellow Ana Maria Rey and her group, together with JILA theorist Jose D’Incao, collaborated with the University of Toronto experimentalist team led by Joseph Thywissen. They devised a method to isolate pairs of atoms in an optical lattice, a web of laser light that helps isolate and control particle interactions, then gave the particles the necessary angular momentum, or twist, for the atoms to collide via p-wave using specific laser beam frequencies. This resulted in the first observation of p-wave interactions in an experiment.

How does a scientist become interested in quantum physics? For Ana Maria Rey, both a JILA and NIST Fellow, the answer involves a rich and complicated journey. Quantum Systems Accelerator, a National QIS Research Center funded by the United States Department of Energy Office of Science, featured Rey in a new article series in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month. In this article, Rey shares her story and her current research.

Atomic clocks are essential in building a precise time standard for the world, which is a big focus for researchers at JILA. JILA and NIST Fellow Jun Ye, in particular, has studied atomic clocks for two decades, looking into ways to increase their sensitivity and accuracy. In a new paper published in Science Advances, Ye and his team collaborated with JILA and NIST Fellow Ana Maria Rey and her team to engineer a new design of clock, which demonstrated better theoretical understanding and experimental control of atomic interactions, leading to a breakthrough in the precision achievable in state-of-the-art optical atomic clocks.

In a new paper published in PRX Quantum, Rey and her team of researchers proposed a new method for seeing the quantum effects enabled by SU(n) symmetry in current experimental conditions, something that has been historically challenging for physicists.

Many researchers at JILA study and use superposition and entanglement of quantum systems, including JILA fellow Adam Kaufman. Previously, Kaufman and his research team focused on improving the coherence time of the strontium atoms’ superposition between the ground state and the “clock” state, so named because these two states form the basis for state-of-the-art atomic clocks. As reported in two new papers, researchers from this lab have extended these studies to much larger system sizes, with an atom in a superposition of hundreds of locations, and separately, demonstrating optical clock entanglement with seconds-scale coherence time.

This year, JILA celebrates its 60th anniversary. Officially established on April 13, 1962, as a joint institution between the University of Colorado Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), JILA has become a world leader in physics research. Its rich history includes three Nobel laureates, groundbreaking work in laser development, atomic clocks, underlying dedication to precision measurement, and even competitive sports leagues. The process of creating this science goliath was not always straightforward and took the dedication and hard work of many individuals.

More than 400 years later, scientists are in the midst of an equally-important revolution. They’re diving into a previously-hidden realm—far wilder than anything van Leeuwenhoek, known as the “father of microbiology,” could have imagined. Some researchers, like physicists Margaret Murnane and Henry Kapteyn, are exploring this world of even tinier things with microscopes that are many times more precise than the Dutch scientist’s. Others, like Jun Ye, are using lasers to cool clouds of atoms to just a millionth of a degree above absolute zero with the goal of collecting better measurements of natural phenomena.

For JILA and NIST Fellows Ana Maria Rey and Jun Ye, one type of phenomena they are especially interested in observing are the interactions between light and atoms, especially those at the heart of the decay of an atom prepared in the excited state. Ye’s and Rey’s groups collaborated in a joint study, and were able to find an appropriate experimental setting where they were able to observe Pauli blocking of spontaneous emission by direct measurements of the excited state population.