Nov 21, 2025: Congratulations Aubrey!

10/31/2025: Xylo’s synchronization manuscript appeared on arXiv

Congratulations to Xylo, undergraduate student researcher in the Blume group! Xylo’s work on synchronization of a spin-1 system just appeared on the arXiv and can be found here. Congratulations to Xylo and all co-authors! Xylo’s theory analysis is very neat and we are hoping to compare with experimental values soon.

September 2025: Reagan presenting at FiO/LS Symposium

Reagan presented a talk in Denver at the FiO/LS Symposium based on his work he has been doing during the spring and summer. This was Reagan’s first conference outside of OU. Great job, Reagan!

09/03/2025: Jacob’s few-atom manuscript appeared on arXiv

Congratulations to Jacob, undergraduate student researcher in the Blume group! Jacob’s work on three and four one-dimensional particles under external harmonic confinement just appeared on the arXiv and can be found here. Jacob did a fantastic job of pushing analytical calculations to devise a novel efficient and numerically stable scheme for calculating energy spectra.

08/15/2025: Shan and Aidan’s light storage and retrieval work up on arXiv

Congratulations to Shan Zhong, postdoc in the Marino group, and Aidan Sudler, recent OU graduate and undergraduate researcher in the Blume group, for completing a very nice joint experiment-theory project. Congratulations to all! You can read about the work here.

August 2025: Spinor work by Guan, Blume, and Lewis-Swan out in PRA

Congratulations to all! It’s great to see our work on dynamical phase transitions in spinor Bose-Einstein condensates out in Physical Review A. Check it out here.

Wishing Aidan all the best in Denmark – Thank you Aidan for all your contributions!

June 26, 2025: Tai’s paper with collaborators March, Busch, and Fogarty out in NJP

Tai’s paper entitled “Quantum correlations and spatial localization in trapped one-dimensional ultra-cold Bose-Bose-Bose mixtures” just got accepted in New Journal Physics. Congratulations, Tai — great work!

Tai, Sagarika, and Jacob at DAMOP 2025

May 28, 2025: Paper on trapping atoms using elliptically polarized light out in PRA

Congratulations to Anal! Anal’s work on trapping of Rydberg states using elliptically (nonlinearly) polarized light appeared in PRA. Great work. Check it out at https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.111.053120

May 2025: Two “1D anyons” manuscripts up on arXiv

In collaboration with Raul Hidalgo-Sacoto and Thomas Busch, both from OIST, we recently posted two manuscripts on 1D anyons on the arXiv. Check out arXiv:2505.17669 and arXiv:2505.23127.

Congratulations to Xylo for receiving travel support from CAS

Xylo’s travel in June/July to the synchronization workshop in Dresden, Germany, will be partially supported through travel support from CAS. Thank you Dodge Family College of Arts and Sciences! Congratulations Xylo! We are very much looking forward to your poster presentation.

May 2025: Anal’s work up on arXiv

Anal’s work on the use of non-linearly polarized light has been posted: arXiv:2505.01071. The paper is entitled “Forces on alkali Rydberg atoms due to non-linearly polarized light” and the abstract reads: “Trapped Rydberg atoms are highly promising candidates for quantum science experiments. While several approaches have been put forward to exert (trapping) forces on isolated Rydberg atoms, a widely applicable lossless technique is lacking. This paper proposes a robust versatile alternative technique that avoids lifetime compromising losses. Our proposal leverages the vector polarizability, which is induced by non-linearly polarized light and is shown to be several orders of magnitude larger than the usual scalar and tensor polarizabilities for commonly used alkali Rydberg series such as the nS, nP, and nD series with principal quantum number n as low as 30. The resulting force can be used to trap isolated Rydberg atoms over long times, which constitutes a key advance that is expected to impact quantum simulation applications, as well as to generate large light–Rydberg-atom hybrid states, which possess non-trivial position-dependent forces.” Congratulations to Anal – great work!

Welcome to graduate students Jackson, Lennon, and Luka

We are excited to welcome graduate students Jackson Stoppel, Lennon Kirby Rivera, and Luka Vilshanskyy to the group. We are very much looking forward to working with them on summer research projects!

Congratulations to Jacob for receiving Student Participation grant

Jacob’s travel to the DAMOP meeting will be partially supported through a Student Participation grant. Thank you DAMOP! Congratulations Jacob! We are very much looking forward to your poster presentation.

May 1, 2025: Congratulations to Christian, Reagan, Jacob, Xylo, and Aidan!

All five undergraduates in the group were recognized during the departmental award ceremony. It’s an amazing group of students to work with! Excellent work. Many congratulations!

April 15, 2025: Reagan has been awarded UReCA award

Congratulations to undergraduate Reagan for being awarded one of the Provost’s 2025 Summer Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity Fellowship! Reagan’s application was selected from 117 high-quality proposals. Excellent job, Reagan!

April 9, 2025: Doerte Receives Distinguished Professorship

Doerte has been awarded a George Lynn Cross Research Professorship. See here for the announcement. The George Lynn Cross Research Professorship is the highest research and creative activity honor given by The University of Oklahoma to a faculty member who has demonstrated outstanding leadership over a period of years in his or her field of learning or creative activity.

03/21/2025: Paper on He-Ne dimers out in The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters

Work led by graduate student Jan Kruse (Goethe University, Frankfurt, Germany) just appeared: J. Kruse, J. Schroeder, D. Blume, R. Doerner, and M. Kunitski, Imaging the Rovibrational Ground State of the Helium-Neon Dimers ⁴He²⁰Ne and ⁴He²²Ne, J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 16, 3225 (2025). Check out the beautiful agreement between experiment and theory!

03/14/2025: “Dynamical Phase Diagram of Spinor BEC” work on arXiv

Our spin-1 BEC results appeared on the arXiv:2503.10563: Q. Guan, D. Blume, and R. J. Lewis-Swan, Controlling the dynamical phase diagram of a spinor BEC using time-dependent potentials. The abstract reads: “We theoretically investigate the spin-mixing dynamics of a spinor BEC subject to a time-dependent confining potential. Our study provides a theory framework for the experimental results reported in Phys. Rev. A 109, 043309 (2024). We exploit the disparity of energy scales associated with the spatial and internal (spin) degrees of freedom under typical experimental conditions to develop an effective few-mode description of the spin dynamics. Our model demonstrates how the details of the potential, such as driving frequency and amplitude, can be used to independently control spin-changing and spin-preserving collision processes as well as the effective Zeeman energy of the internal states. We obtain the dynamical phase diagram of the effective model and discuss how its structure is altered relative to a spinor BEC with frozen spatial degrees of freedom. The applicability of our effective model is verified through Gross-Pitaevskii simulations that capture the interplay of spin and spatial degrees of freedom, and we identify parameter regimes that can be feasibly explored by future experiments. Our findings highlight the utility of dynamical confining potentials for the control of non-equilibrium spin-mixing dynamics in spinor BECs.”

03/13/2025: Journal of Physics B paper out

We are happy to report that our theory paper on the neon dimer dynamics has appeared in the special Few-Body Physics issue of the Journal of Physics B. Many thanks to collaborators Qingze Guan, Jan Kruse, Maksim Kunitski, and Reinhard Doerner! Take a look at our work at this link.

02/28/2025: Welcome to postdoc Tai Tran

We are delighted to welcome postdoc Tai Tran to the group. Tai is a Dodge postdoc in the department and we are looking forward to many fruitful collaborations!

02/24/2025: Sagarika and co-workers put out arXiv preprint

Congratulations to Sagarika and coworkers Jia-Jia Luo, Han Pu, and Xi-Wen Guan on their new exciting results. Please check out arXiv:2502.17171 to read about their work entitled “Universal charge and spin Drude weights in one-dimensional Hubbard model.”

Feb. 2025: Sagarika awarded GFB travel award

Congratulations to Sagarika for being awarded a travel grant through the Topical Few-Body Group of the American Physical Society (GFB). Sagarika will be presenting a talk and a poster at DAMOP in June 2025.

Feb. 11, 2025: PRA selected as Editor’s Suggestion

Here’s the abstract of our PRA (many thanks to collaborators Qingze Guan, Jan Kruse, Maksim Kunitski, and Reinhard Doerner!) entitled “Modeling the laser-pulse-induced helium trimer dynamics,” which was selected as an Editor’s Suggestion by the PRA Editors: Motivated by ongoing pump-probe spectroscopy experiments, this work develops a theoretical framework for describing the rovibrational wave-packet dynamics that ensues when a single weakly bound van der Waals trimer is exposed to a short, subpicosecond linearly polarized pump laser pulse. The intensity 𝐼 of the pump laser is chosen such that excitation and ionization of the electronic degrees of freedom are negligible, while excitation of the wave packet in the nuclear degrees of freedom is non-negligible. The numerical treatment, which takes advantage of the fact that the laser pulse is very short compared to typical molecular time scales, is based on a wave-packet decomposition that utilizes hyperspherical coordinates. The framework is applied to the extremely floppy bosonic helium trimer. A convergence analysis of the partial-wave decomposition is conducted. The kinetic-energy release and orientation dynamics are presented. While the dynamics of more strongly bound van der Waals trimers such as, e.g., the argon trimer, display negligible coupling between vibrational and rotational degrees of freedom, rendering a description within a rigid-body picture appropriate, those of weakly bound trimers display non-negligible coupling between vibrational and rotational degrees of freedom, rendering a description within a rigid-body picture inappropriate. It is shown that a model that constructs the helium trimer dynamics from the dynamics of the helium dimer captures a number of key characteristics of the alignment signal, including the interference between different angular momentum wave-packet components.

Feb. 6, 2025: Theory predictions for helium trimer dynamics on posted arXiv

We are very happy to share that our theory work on the helium trimer dynamics is out on the arXiv (see arXiv:2502.04031). This collaboration with our friends Qingze Guan (WSU) and Jan Kruse, Maksim Kunitski, and Reinhard Doerner (Frankfurt University) has been great fun. When we started the project, we really didn’t know if our approach would work. This said, the dynamics came out beautifully…

Jan. 3, 2025: Welcome to Raul Hidalgo from OIST

A warm welcome to Raul Hidalgo, a graduate student in Thomas Busch’s Quantum Systems Unit at OIST! We are excited that Raul will be working with us for the next three months.

11/11/2024: New arXiv post on “Ro-vibrational Dynamics of the Neon Dimer”

Take a look at the collaborative work involving OU (Doerte Blume), WSU (Qingze Guan) and Frankfurt University (Jan Kruse, Maksim Kunitski, and Reinhard Doerner). The arXiv identifier is arXiv:2411.06756. Our work looks at the coupling between vibrational and rotational degrees of freedom in laser-induced alignment.

10/23/2024: Congratulations to Anal et al.!

The paper entitled “Double, triple, and quadruple magic wavelengths for cesium ground, excited, and Rydberg states,” which was led by postdoctoral researcher Anal Bhowmik and conducted in collaboration with postdoctoral researcher Marius Gaudesius and OU faculty member Grant Biedermann, is out in Physical Review A. The abstract reads something like this: Dynamic polarizabilities of cesium Rydberg states, explicitly 𝑛S, 𝑛P, and 𝑛P states, where the principal quantum number 𝑛 is 40–70, are presented for linearly polarized light. The dynamic polarizability is calculated using the sum-over-state approach. We identify double magic wavelengths in the range of 1000-2000 nm for simultaneous trapping of the ground state and a Rydberg state, which are red detuned and blue detuned, respectively, with respect to a low-lying excited auxiliary state. Based on calculations of the radiative lifetime, blackbody-radiation-induced transitions, and population transfer out of the Rydberg and auxiliary states (estimated within two-state and master-equation models), we conclude that magic wavelength trapping is particularly promising experimentally for two D Rydberg series, using trap depths as large as 1 µK. Moreover, by tuning the angle between the quantization axis and the polarization vector of the light, we identify triple and quadruple magic wavelengths, for which the polarizabilities of the ground state, a Rydberg state, and, respectively, one and two low-lying excited states are equal. Our comprehensive theoretical study provides much needed guidance for ongoing experimental efforts on cesium Rydberg-state-based quantum simulations that operate on timescales up to several microseconds. Congratulations to all!

09/23/2024: Aidan and Xylo presenting at FiO/LS Symposium

Aidan and Xylo attended the FiO/LS Symposium on Undergraduate Research, which was held on Monday afternoon, September 23 at the DLS meeting (Sep 23 – 26) in Denver, CO. Aidan presented a talk while Xylo presented a poster. Great work! Many thanks to Professors Samir Bali and Harold Metcalf for putting this together!

August 14, 2024: Equation-of-State paper by Gao, Blume, and Yan out in PRR

We are happy to see our paper entitled “Exact thermodynamics for weakly interacting normal-phase quantum gases: Equations of state for all partial waves” out in Physical Review Research. Check it out here. It was a joy to collaborate with Xin-Yuan Gao and Yangqian Yan from CUHK on this. The abstract reads: “While the thermodynamics for bosonic systems with weak 𝑠-wave interactions has been known for decades, a general and systematic extension to higher partial waves has not yet been reported. We provide closed-form expressions for the equations of state for weakly interacting systems with arbitrary partial waves in the normal phase. Thermodynamics, including contact, loss rate, and compressibility, are derived over the entire temperature regime. Our results offer an improved thermometer for ultracold atoms and molecules with weak high-partial wave interactions.”

August 2024: Delighted to announce new NSF grant

The Blume group has been awarded a new 3-year NSF grant entitled “Dynamics of Few-Body Systems” — we are extremely grateful for the continued support through the NSF AMOP theory program. Thank you!!!

June 2024: Welcome to postdoc Sagarika Basak

We are delighted to welcome Dr. Sagarika Basak to the group. Sagarika is joining us from Rice University, where she received her Ph.D. under the guidance of Professor Han Pu.

June 4, 2024: Anal’s manuscript on multi-magic wavelengths involving Rydberg states on arXiv

We are delighted to report that the magic wavelength trapping work by postdoc Anal Bhowmik is up on the arXiv. This work, conducted in collaboration with postdoc Marius Gaudesius and Grant Biedermann (both from OU), predicts multi-magic wavelength conditions for cesium. Anal identified two nD Rydberg series that are particularly promising, thanks to exceptionally large detunings, comparatively small Rabi coupling strengths, and comparatively long lifetimes of the auxiliary states. Please check out the W.M. Keck Foundation supported results (arXiv:2406.00927).

May 30/31: “Non-equilibrium physics: Spinor BECs and beyond” mini-workshop at OU

We had the honor to host Ceren Dag (ITAMP/Harvard), Peter Engels (Washington State University), Lea Santos (University of Connecticut), Dan Stamper-Kurn (UC Berkeley), and Emilia Witkowska (IFPAN, Poland) for a 2-day mini-workshop at OU. The workshop featured 1.5 days of talks, including talks by OU postdocs Anal Bhowmik, Hoang Van Do, Yicheng Zhang, and Shan Zhong, as well as a poster session that showcased AMO research led by OU undergraduate students, graduate students, and postdocs and tours of AMO and condensed matter labs in Lin Hall, which meets NIST-A specifications. The mini-workshop was made possible through the Dodge Family Distinguished Visitor and Workshop Fund.

May 29, 2024: Manuscript with collaborators Xin-Yuan Gao and Yangqian Yan posted on arXiv

We are excited to report that our manuscript entitled “Exact Thermodynamics For Weakly Interacting Normal-Phase Quantum Gases: Equations of State For All Partial Waves” is up on the arXiv (arXiv:2405.17183). If the s-wave results from Kerson Huang’s Statistical Mechanics textbook have always intrigued you, you might like our manuscript… It obtains analytical results for p-wave interacting single-component Fermi gases in the normal phase. Congratulations to graduate student Xin-Yuan Gao from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and his advisor Professor Yangqian Yan for obtaining these beautiful results!

Welcome to REU students Jacob and Madie

We are excited to welcome Jacob Norris and Madie van Staveren. Jacob and Madie are undergraduates at OU, who are participating in the department’s 2024 REU rendition. We are looking forward to an exciting summer!

May 17, 2024: Synchronization paper out in Physical Review A

Congratulations to Aidan and Jugal! The study on “Driven generalized quantum Rayleigh–van der Pol oscillators: Phase localization and spectral response,” led by undergraduate Aidan Sudler, just appeared in Physical Review E. The image below shows an Arnold tongue-like plot for the Rayleigh oscillator (left column), the Rayleigh-van der Pol oscillator (middle column), the van der Pol oscillator (right column), and two in-between oscillators. The images do not show synchronization but a localization/delocalization measures that shows Arnold-tongue behavior, just as the phase localization. Check out the paper for a comparison of the two observables.

Oklahoma in May

04/19/2024: Aidan Sudler named Goldwater Scholar

Aidan Sudler, OU undergraduate student and member of the Blume group since 2021, was named Goldwater Scholar — this is a wonderful recognition of Aidan’s accomplishments! The OU press release quotes Aidan as saying: “By taking the time to positively reflect on my research experiences at OU, I feel clear about the specific research areas in physics that interest me and the steps I should take to further explore my interests,” Sudler said. “I am honored to receive the Goldwater scholarship, and I would like to thank those who have helped me thus far, including Prof. Doerte Blume, Prof. Qingze Guan, and the other professors, students, and family members who have encouraged me along the way.” Way to go, Aidan!

April 10, 2024: Driven-lattice paper out in PRA

Congratulations to the OSU-OU-WSU collaboration! The paper titled “Engineering dynamical phase diagrams with driven lattices in spinor gases” just got published in Physical Review A. This effort was led by OSU graduate student Jarred O. Austin-Harris. The abstract reads: “We experimentally demonstrate that well-designed driven lattices are versatile tools to simultaneously tune multiple key parameters (spin-dependent interactions, spinor phase, and quadratic Zeeman energy) for manipulating phase diagrams of spinor gases with negligible heating and atom losses. This opens avenues for studying engineered Hamiltonians and dynamical phase transitions. Modulation-induced harmonics generate progressively narrower separatrices at driving-frequency-determined higher magnetic-field strengths. This technique enables exploration of multiple, previously inaccessible parameter regimes of spinor dynamics (notably high magnetic-field strengths, tunable spinor phase, and individually tunable spin-preserving and spin-changing collisions) and widens the range of cold-atom applications, e.g., in quantum sensing and studies of nonequilibrium dynamics.” Great work!

01/09/2024: Aidan’s manuscript up on arXiv

Congratulations to lead-author Aidan Sudler, who finished a really cool work on driven generalized Rayleigh-van der Pol oscillators, just before heading off to Denmark for a semester abroad. The manuscript can be found here. The abstract reads: “Driven classical self-sustained oscillators have been studied extensively in the context of synchronization. Using the master equation, this work considers the classically driven generalized quantum Rayleigh-van der Pol oscillator, which is characterized by linear dissipative gain and loss terms as well as three non-linear dissipative terms. Since two of the non-linear terms break the rotational phase space symmetry, the Wigner distribution of the quantum mechanical limit cycle state of the undriven system is, in general, not rotationally symmetric. The impact of the symmetry-breaking dissipators on the long-time dynamics of the driven system are analyzed as functions of the drive strength and detuning, covering the deep quantum to near-classical regimes. Phase localization and frequency entrainment, which are required for synchronization, are discussed in detail. We identify a large parameter space where the oscillators exhibit appreciable phase localization but only weak or no entrainment, indicating the absence of synchronization. Several observables are found to exhibit the analog of the celebrated classical Arnold tongue; in some cases, the Arnold tongue is found to be asymmetric with respect to vanishing detuning between the external drive and the natural oscillator frequency.” Really nice work — congratulations to undergraduate student Aidan Sudler and former OU graduate student Jugal Talukdar!

December 1, 2023: Postdoc opening in Blume group — please spread the word

The Blume group from the Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy and the Center for Quantum Research and Technology at the University of Oklahoma (OU) invites applications for a postdoctoral researcher position in theoretical atomic, molecular, and optical (AMO) physics. Topics of interest include synchronization at the classical to quantum transition, quantum self-organization, non-equilibrium dynamics, ultracold atoms and molecules, controlling and utilizing Rydberg atoms, transition from few- to many-body physics, and atomic ensembles and few-level systems in the presence of classical and quantum drives. The position offers several opportunities to collaborate with experimental groups, both at OU and elsewhere. The group’s website is located at https://doerteblume.com.

Applicants must have a Ph.D. in Physics or a related area. Experience in the areas of quantum optics, atomic physics, cold atom physics, dissipative dynamics, and numerical techniques will be considered favorably. The initial appointment is for two years with the possibility of an extension for a total of three years, contingent on satisfactory performance and availability of funds. The start date of the appointment is flexible and can be as early as April 1, 2024. Compensation for the position is competitive and travel support is available.

To apply, please send your application materials [cover letter, curriculum vitae (including a list of publications), statement of research interests and plans (up to two pages), and contact information for three letters of reference] to doerte.blume-1@ou.edu. Please also arrange for three letters of reference to be send directly to the same address.

Applications will be given full consideration till the position is filled. For questions, please contact Prof. Doerte Blume at doerte.blume-1@ou.edu. We are committed to building a culturally diverse educational environment and strongly encourage applications from members of historically marginalized groups.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement: The University supports diversity and is committed to maintaining employment, educational, and health care settings that are multicultural, multiracial, multiethnic, and all-inclusive. Respecting differences is one of the University’s missions. The University, in compliance with all applicable federal and state laws and regulations, does not discriminate or permit discrimination by any member of its community against any individual based on the individual’s race, color, religion, political beliefs, national origin, age, sex, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender identity, gender expression, disability, or veteran status in matters of admissions, employment, financial aid, housing, services in educational programs or activities, or health care services that the University operates or provides.

Diversity Statement: The University of Oklahoma is committed to achieving a diverse, equitable and inclusive university community by recognizing each person’s unique contributions, background, and perspectives. The University of Oklahoma strives to cultivate a sense of belonging and emotional support for all, recognizing that fostering an inclusive environment for all is vital in the pursuit of academic and inclusive excellence in all aspects of our institutional mission. 

November 8, 2023: Tunneling paper out in PRA

Congratulations to all! It’s so great to see the tunneling paper on sodium spinor gases, a joint collaboration between OSU, OU, and WSU, in print. Check it out here.

September 4, 2023: On the arXiv–Driven lattices provide access to dynamical phase diagrams

Check out the new OSU-OU-WSU collaboration on engineering dynamical phase diagrams with driven lattices in spinor gases. You can read about the work here: Engineering Dynamical Phase Diagrams with Driven Lattices in Spinor Gases, arxiv:2309.00592.

August 4, 2023: Congratulations to Claire, Dave, and Jugal!

Congratulations to Claire and Dave: their paper the hybridization in finite SSH chains just appeared in Physical Review A. And congratulations to Jugal: His latest paper appeared in the same Physical Review A issue. Great job — it’s very nice to see these works in print!!!

July 25, 2023: Paper out in Physical Review Letters

Doerte had the pleasure to work with lead-author Xin-Yuan Gao and his advisor Yangqian Yan from the Chinese University of Hong Kong on an exciting project that just appeared in PRL. Here is a bit of context: In a recent groundbreaking experiment, scientists cooled a fermionic KRb molecular gas to quantum degeneracy, marking a significant milestone in ultracold molecule research. Unexpectedly, the experiment observed the suppression of the two-body loss rate in the deep quantum degenerate regime. We develop a simple yet robust first-principle theory, which not only explains the puzzling experimental observation but also opens the door for several new directions in ultracold atomic and molecular gases with anisotropic p-wave interactions. Building on previous work from the literature, our investigation showcases the pivotal role of the “p-wave contact,” linking the dynamic two-body loss rate with the thermodynamics of a weakly interacting, single-component Fermi gas. The consistent incorporation of microscopic few-body physics into quantifiable quantum statistical mechanics over a wide temperature range, from the deep quantum degenerate to the non-degenerate regime, allowed us to successfully reproduce the puzzling experimental observation of the “quantum suppression of the loss rate”, shedding light on its underlying mechanisms. Our conclusions provide vital guidance for future experiments and hold potential for a range of other applications. 

July 10, 2023: Congratulations to Dr. Jugal Talukdar!

Here is a picture of Jugal during his Ph.D. defense talk — very nice job, Jugal! Congratulations and the very best wishes for the postdoc at UCLA!

June 28, 2023: New paper on p-wave contact and losses out on the arXiv

Graduate student Xin-Yuan Gao from the Chinese University of Hong Kong took the lead, under the supervision of Professor Yangqian Yan, in developing a simple yet powerful theory that reproduces and explains recent experimental results on the loss rate in reactive fermionic KRb molecules in the ultracold regime. See Xin-Yuan Gao, D. Blume, and Yangqian Yan, Temperature-dependent contact of weakly interacting single-component Fermi gases and loss rate of degenerate polar molecules, arXiv:2306.15904 (2003).

June 9, 2023: New paper on tunneling in spinor BECs out on the arXiv

We are excited about our new arXiv paper with colleagues from OSU, WSU, and OU. It’s cool to see that tunneling of a spinor Bose-Einstein condensate in a moving optical lattice shares characteristics with that of a scalar BEC in a moving optical lattice. You are invited to check out the arXiv paper here: “Nonlinear multi-state tunneling dynamics in a spinor Bose-Einstein condensate” by Z. N. Hardestry-Shaw, Q. Guan, J. O. Austin-Harris, D. Blume, R. J. Lewis-Swan, and Y. Liu (arXiv:2306.05877).

Doerte and collaborators featured in OU’s Sooner Magazine

Check out OU’s Sooner Magazine. They published a nice piece on the W. M. Keck Foundation supported work by the Blume (PI), Biedermann (co-PI), and Marino (co-PI) groups. Check it out here.

June 7, 2023: DAMOP

It’s exciting to be at DAMOP in Spokane, Washington. Beautiful weather and supernice location by the river. Kevin presented a poster yesterday and Aidan gave a 10-minute talk this morning. Excellent work by Kevin and Aidan! The poster by Bala and Shan will be presented tomorrow. This DAMOP is a special reunion: Qingze Guan (now Assistant Professor at WSU), Yangqian Yan (now Assistant Professor at The Chine University of Hong Kong), Doerte, and Xiangyu (Desmond) Yin (now Editor at Physical Review A)—pictured from left to right— had a relaxing reunion dinner. Qingze, Yan, and Desmond were graduate students in the Blume group at WSU, all graduating within a two-year span.

June 1: Hosting “Optical Tweezer” workshop at OU

We are very excited to host an “Optical Tweezer” workshop with speakers from Asia, Europe, and North America. Pictured from left to right are Robert Lewis-Swan (OU), Thomas Bilitewski (Oklahoma State University), Philipp Preiss (MPQ, Munich), Grant Biedermann (OU), Doerte Blume (OU), Samuel Meek (OU), Fang Fang (Harvard University), Arghavan Safavi-Naini (University of Amsterdam), Kaden Hazzard (Rice University), Jaewook Ahn (KAIST, Korea), Yangqian Yan (The Chinese University of Hong Kong), and Arne Schwettmann (OU). The workshop was organized by Grant Biedermann, Doerte Blume, and Robert Lewis-Swan, and made possible through the Dodge Family Distinguished Visitor and Workshop Fund.

May 2023: Excited to welcome visitors Xin-Yuan Gao and Yangqian Yan

We are excited to host graduate student Xin-Yuan Gao and professor Yangqian Yan from the Chinese University of Hong Kong for about three weeks. Yin-Yuan and Yan have been leading an effort to understand losses in p-wave interacting molecular Fermi gases. Doerte is excited to have the opportunity to collaborate with Xin-Yuan and Yan! It has been a while since Yan received his Ph.D. from WSU for work done in Doerte’s group. Xin-Yuan (left) and Yan (right) are pictured here with Shan Zhong, a postdoc in Alberto Marino’s group.

Spring 2023: Congratulations to former postdoc Dr. Jianwen Jie

Former postdoc Jianwen Jie started a new position — he is now Assistant Professor in the College of Engineering Physics at Shenzhen Technology University. Congratulations to Jianwen! We are looking forward to continued interactions and collaborations!

Spring 2023: Former REU student Claire Kvande awarded NSF GRFP

This is awesome news: Claire Kvande, who did an REU summer internship with the Blume group in summer 2021, was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship (GRFP). From the NSF website: “The purpose of the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) is to ensure the quality, vitality, and diversity of the scientific and engineering workforce of the United States. GRFP seeks to broaden participation in science and engineering of underrepresented groups, including women, minorities, persons with disabilities, and veterans. The five-year fellowship provides three years of financial support inclusive of an annual stipend of $37,000.” Congratulations to Claire! And good luck with the last few weeks at Kalamazoo College and a great start at UW in fall 2023!

April 1, 2023: Welcome to postdoc Anal Bhowmik

We are excited to welcome new group member Dr. Anal Bhowmik. Anal is joining us as a postdoc. Most recently, Anal worked with Prof. Ofir Alon in Israel. Welcome!

February 2023: Kevin Presenting at ITAMP/B2 Winter Graduate School

Graduate student Kevin Mack-Fisher presented his work on the “Tunneling dynamics of small two-component Fermi systems” at the ITAMP/B2 Winter Graduate School “Cold Molecules for Quantum Information Technologies and Fundamental Physics.” Thank you to the fantastic lecturers John John, Simon Cornish, David DeMille, Kang-Kuen Ni, Gerhard Rempe, Timur Tscherbul, and Nicholas Hutzler.

February 2023: Jugal Presenting in Israel

Graduate student Jugal Talukdar presented his most recent work on effective spin Hamiltonian and droplet-like states at the Minerva-Gentner Symposium on “Coherent manipulation of few-body complexes” at the David Lopatie Conference Centre Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehevot, Israel. Many thanks to the organizers (Roee Ozeri, Lev Khaykovich, Reinhard Doerner, Maksim Kunitski, and Tobias Schaetz) for generously supporting student travel. Thank you for the fantastic talks, posters, and physics discussions—and thank you for the trips to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv!

02/06/23: Women in Physics (WiP) Hosted Prof. Maren Mossman

The Women in Physics group of the Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics Astronomy hosted Prof. Maren Mossman from the University of San Diego. Maren presented during the Professional Development Series Luncheon on “A path to community building in higher-education physics departments”. It was a great pleasure to host Maren and to discuss community building, departmental efforts, DEI, and physics.

1/16/23: Beyond the SMA work up on arXiv

Work led by Jianwen Jie on the theory side and Shan Zhong on the experimental side is out on the arXiv. The manuscript is entitled “Dynamical mean-field driven spinor condensate physics beyond the single-mode approximation.” Congratulations to theorists and experimentalists alike. It’s really nice to see the agreement between the experimental data from Arne Schwettmann’s lab and the Gross-Pitaevskii theory.

1/6/23: Spinor BEC work out on arXiv

Zach Hardest-Shaw, graduate student in the OSU group led by Yingmei Liu, uploaded our sodium spinor BEC manuscript to the arXiv. The manuscript is entitled “Manipulation of nonequilibrium spin dynamics of an ultracold gas in a moving optical lattice.” Take a look at the beautiful experimental data, taken by Zach and Jared Austin (great job Zach and Jared!). The dynamic single-mode approximation theory, developed by Qingze Guan and Robert Lewis-Swan very convincingly describes the experimental data. Congratulations to all!

September 2022

Welcome to postdoc Balakrishnan Viswanathan! We are looking forward to working together.

New paper out in Physical Review A

Check out Jugal’s new article at: Physical Review A 106, 013722 (2022).

07/29/2022: New funding from the W. M. Keck Foundation

We are grateful to the W. M. Keck Foundation for generously supporting a new project with collaborators Professors Grant Biedermann and Alberto Marino from OU on the transition from classical to quantum synchronization. It’s an exciting project!!! The VPRP Office ran a nice news story on this. Check it out here.

07/21/2022: New paper out on arXiv!

Congratulations to Jugal! Jugal’s newest manuscript, which has just been accepted for publication in Physical Review A, is up on the arXiv: see arXiv:2207.10207. The paper is entitled “Undamped Rabi oscillations due to polaron-emitter hybrid states in non-linear photonic wave guide coupled to emitters.” Great job Jugal!

July 1, 2022: Opening for postdoctoral researcher

Please pass the opening for a postdoctoral position in the Blume group on to interested candidates. The advertisement can be found here.

Paper out in Physical Review A

Check out Jugal’s new article at: Physical Review A 105, 063501 (2022).

05/05/2022: Jugal’s paper accepted by Physical Review A

Jugal’s paper entitled “Two emitters coupled to a bath with Kerr-like nonlinearity: Exponential decay, fractional populations, and Rabi oscillations,” co-authored with Doerte, has been accepted for publication in Physical Review A. Congratulations Jugal!!! The schematic above illustrates the system Hamiltonian and Hilbert space structure.

05/05/2022: Departmental Award Ceremony

Congratulations to Kevin for receiving the department Neil E. Shafer-Ray Physics Award!!! The good news were announced at the departmental end-of-the-semester spring fling. In addition, group members Aidan, Dave, Jugal, and Kevin received Certificates of Appreciation for their work on the departmental Undergraduate Studies Committee (Aidan), on the departmental Graduate Studies Committee (Dave), on the departmental Graduate Recruiting and Selection Committee (Kevin), and as G-PSI President (Jugal). Way to go! Aidan was also recognized for being one of the top Physics Sophomores.

04/30/2022: Aidan featured in OU’s “Young Artist Honors Concert”

Blume group member Aidan Sudler does not just have interests in physics… Aidan is also a highly accomplished pianist. Congratulations to Aidan for being selected to perform in OU’s Young Artist Honors Concert on Saturday, April 30, 3:00pm, in Catlett Music Center, Pitman Recital Hall. Presented by the School of Music, the Young Artist Honors Concert features the winners of the Young Artist Solo Competition. Eight freshman and sophomore students will perform solo works during the concert. This year’s winners are Kevin Barton, Xavier Williams, Xander McRae, Meagan Ballard, Elayna Davidson, Jace Harris, Ethan Roberts, and Aidan Sudler. You can listen to a recording at this link (it starts at minute 31) — very nice performance!!!

04/22/2022: Poster Session hosted by G-PSI

Many thanks to G-PSI—led by Jugal Talukdar, Jordan Van Ness, Hunter Campbell, and Robert Wiley Deal—for putting on a departmental graduate student poster session. It was a great success! Graduate students Dave (middle photo), Jugal (right photo), and Kevin (left photo) presented. Here they are in action.

04/09/2022: Aidan presenting at Undergraduate Research Day

Aidan presented his work on “Self-sustained quantum oscillators” at OU’s Undergraduate Research Day. Aidan did an awesome job! Aren’t the phase space images cool?

AJ’s paper published in Physical Review A

Congratulations to AJ! AJ’s first-author paper got published in Physical Review A. Check it out here: The title is “Structural properties of ⁴He_N (N=2-10) clusters for different potential models at the physical point and at unitarity”. The citation is A.J. Yates and D. Blume, Physical Review A 105, 022824 (2022). This paper is a great summary of all the work that AJ did as an undergraduate student in the Blume group. Way to go, AJ!!!

Feb. 7-18, 2022: Doerte presents invited talk at Workshop

Doerte presented the work led by graduate student Jugal Talukdar during the online workshop “Fermi Polarons: from Ultracold gases to 2D semiconductors — FermiPolar Workshop -7-18 Feb 2022”. This truly inspiring workshop was co-organized by Jonathan Keeling, Jesper Levinsen, Francesca Maria Marchetti, and Meera Parish. Thanks for putting together such a beautiful program! The workshop website can be found here.

Sudden cold in January 2022: What’s the thermodynamics behind this?

12/10/2021: Congratulations to Kevin Mack-Fisher for passing his General Exam

Kevin gave a very nice talk today and passed the written and oral parts of his General Exam. Congratulations, Kevin—great job! Many thanks go to the Committee: Profs. Eric Abraham, Grant Biedermann, Kieran Mullen, and Ying Wang for their time, questions, comments, and suggestions!

12/03/2021: Congratulations to Dave Hill for passing his General Exam

Dave gave a very nice talk today and passed the written and oral parts of his General Exam. Congratulations, Dave—great job! Many thanks go to the Committee: Profs. Howie Baer, Robert Lewis-Swan, Arne Schwettmann, and Binbin Weng for their time, questions, comments, and suggestions!

11/29/2021: Dave Hill Awarded Avenir Foundation Graduate Student Fellowship

Congratulations to graduate student Dave Hill for being awarded an Avenir Foundation Graduate Student Fellowship for Summer 2022! Keep up the great work—we are looking forward to seeing cool results on cavity-emitter systems.

Prospective Graduate Student Open House: Thursday, Dec. 9 (1-3pm Central)

If you are interested in pursuing a Ph.D. in Physics, we invite you to join the department’s “Prospective Graduate Student Open House”!!! Send an email to PA-Grad at ou.edu to obtain the Zoom link info — we are looking forward to welcoming you at the virtual open house!!!

11/15/2021: Aidan selected as a recipient of the Rita H. Lottinville Prize

Aidan has been chosen as a recipient of a Rita H. Lottinville Prize honoring the 2020-2021 freshman class! Congratulations, Aidan!!! Each year, five outstanding University of Oklahoma sophomores are selected for the prestigious Rita H. Lottinville Prize. The prize, which includes a $1,500 scholarship, is administered by the OU Foundation. The prize was established in 1952 and endowed in 1982 by the late Savoie Lottinville in honor of his wife. A 30-year trustee of the OU Foundation, Lottinville was director emeritus of the OU Press and Regents’ Professor Emeritus of History. 

10/5: Undergraduate Aidan Sudler presents poster at departmental picnic hosted by SPS

Aidan was one of the many undergraduate students presenting their research at the departmental picnic. Congratulations to all undergraduates who presented their work — truly impressive! And many thanks to the SPS for sponsoring this event!

October 4-8, 2021: Doerte is giving four lectures at virtual School

Doerte Blume, Alejandro Kievsky, and Pascal Naidon are lecturing at the School on Critical Stability of Few-Body Quantum Systems. Doerte’s lectures are entitled:

• Lecture 1: 1D fermions: statics and dynamics
• Lecture 2: Dynamics of the helium dimer dynamics: universal and non-universal features
• Lecture 3: Efimov scenario in the presence of spin-orbit coupling
• Lecture 4: Dynamics of two-level emitter(s) coupled to bath

Check out the program and lectures at this link.

Sept. 16, 2021: Thank you, thank you, and another thank you to the Dodge Family!!!

September 16, 2021 is a memorable day for the Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy — we are extremely grateful to the Dodge family for their generous gift. OU’s announcement states: “The Dodge family chose to reserve half of the historic gift for OU’s Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy, within the College of Arts and Sciences, of which Homer Dodge was a former professor and chair. The physics department was renamed the Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy in 2005. Of the funds earmarked for the Physics and Astronomy Department, the majority will benefit the Dodge Family Postdoctoral Research Fellows Fund, followed by the Research Faculty Fund, the Strategic Research Investment Fund, and the Dean’s Student Recruitment and Bridge Fund. The remainder of the Physics and Astronomy Department allocation will go to the Distinguished Visitor and Workshop Fund and the Dean’s Graduate and Postdoctoral Retention Fund.” What a monumental and transformational moment for the department!

September 2021: Bisons in the Wichita Mountains

Congratulations to Kevin Mack-Fisher

Kevin passed his last qualifier. Congratulations, Kevin! With class work and qualifiers out of the way, we are looking forward to many interesting research discussions.

08/16/2021: Undergraduate Aidan Sudler selected to receive fellowship for Fall 2021

Aidan Sudler, who joined the Blume group through the FYRE program in Spring 2021 and continued working on the classical and quantum dynamics of a damped-driven harmonic oscillator remotely during the summer 2021, has been awarded a $1,000 fellowship for Fall 2021 through the Honors Research Assistant Program (HRAP). Congratulations, Aidan—keep up the excellent work!

07/30/2021: Bittersweet farewell

Today was AJ and Claire’s last day. We are sad to see these two talented, creative, and kind students leave the group. Yet, we are immensely happy for AJ to take the next big step (graduate school) and for Claire to get ready for her fall semester in France! The chocolate cake on the terrace of Lin Hall was delicious, even in the Oklahoma summer heat…

Dr. Yangqian Yan to join Chinese University of Hong Kong as Assistant Professor

Former graduate student Yangqian Yan will be joining the Department of Physics at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in August 2021 as an Assistant Professor — congratulations, Yan! You can learn more about Yan’s most recent scientific accomplishments here. We are looking forward to continuing to interact with Yan and wish him well in establishing his own group.

Jugal takes home “Best Oral Presentation Award”

The certificate reads: “This certificate of best oral presentation award is awarded to Jugal Talukdar of Center for Quantum Research and Technology, The University of Oklahoma, Norman, USA for the oral paper entitled “Separation-dependent emission pathways of quantum emitters” and is presented in the National Conference on Emerging Trends in Physics (NCETP 2021) held on 16th of June 2021.” Congratulations, Jugal — well done!

Former grad student Dr. Debraj Rakshit joined HBU faculty

Debraj Rakshit, who earned his Ph.D. in 2012 for work on few-fermion systems, joined the faculty at the Institute of Science, HBU, Varanasi. Congratulations, Debraj! Debraj’s recent work covers topics ranging from quantum information science to quantum computing to many-body physics, including exciting new developments in the areas of Pauli crystals, quantum droplets, and twistronics.

Claire I. Kvande joins group for summer ’21

Welcome to Claire Kvande, who is working with the Blume group during the summer 2021 as part of the REU program of the Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy. Claire is visiting from Kalamazoo College, which is located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and working on understanding the time dynamics of finite-sized cavity rings. Welcome, Claire—we are excited to have you in the group!

A.J. and Jugal presenting at virtual DAMOP 2021 Meeting

05/06/2021 (departmental awards announced): Congrats to A.J. and Kevin!

Congratulations, Kevin, for being awarded a Kenneth and Joyce Harwell Scholarship — this is fantastic! Congratulations, AJ, for being awarded the outstanding graduating senior Fowler prize — this is fantastic!

A.J. Yates will be attending graduate school at Rice University in fall

Congratulations to A.J. for accepting Rice University’s offer to join their physics graduate program. Great job, A.J.! We are looking forward to working together during the summer 2021.

February 2021: Doerte named Outstanding Referee

The highly selective Outstanding Referee program annually recognizes about 150 of the roughly 71,000 currently active referees. At the start of the program, in 2008 and 2009, larger groups were selected by our Editors for the Outstanding Referee designation, in order to “catch up” and recognize referees who had already served for many years. Like Fellowship in the APS, this is a lifetime award. In this year, 2021, 151 Outstanding Referees were selected — Doerte was among them. Check out the APS announcement. Thanks to Physical Review and their staff for their excellent work, ensuring and promoting quality peer-review.

Congratulations to graduate student Dave Hill

Dave passed his last two qualifiers. Congratulations, Dave! With class work almost done, we are looking forward to great research contributions.

January 2021: Wishing postdoc Jianwen Jie all the best for the future!

All the best to postdoctoral researcher Dr. Jianwen Jie and his family.

Jianwen is returning to China after three years at the University of Oklahoma.

Safe travels!

And all the best for your and your family’s future adventures!

Hiking the Ouachita National Recreation Trail: Oklahoma/Arkansas Border

January 2021: Welcome to undergraduate Aidan Sudler

Welcome to Aidan Sudler! Aidan, a Freshman at OU, has joined the group to get involved in research. Aidan is part of OU’s FYRE program and will be exploring the classical dynamics of non-trivial harmonic oscillators, such as the van der Pol oscillator. The goal will be, down the road, to explore connections to quantum statistical mechanics descriptions.

Some press on Nature Physics article

The article entitled “Ultrafast manipulation of the weakly bound helium dimer” by Kunitski, Guan, et al., which appeared in Nature Physics on December 21, 2020, and is accompanied by a “News & Views” highlight entitled “Gently stirred not shaken” by Daniel Rolles, received quite a bit of press. See, for example “Quantum wave in helium dimer filmed for the first time: Collaboration between Goethe University and the University of Oklahoma” for a nice highlight by nanotech-now. Nature Physics had listed 14 news stories from 11 outlets on January 8, 2021.

Call for Nominations for 2021 Faddeev Medal

We are pleased to announce the call for nominations for the 2021 “Faddeev Medal” 
Prize. We are seeking nominations of scientists who have advanced the field of 
few-body physics significantly, either through ground-breaking research or due to 
crucial progress achieved over the course of their career.

The Faddeev medal was inaugurated in 2016 by the Topical Group on Few-Body Systems & Multiparticle Dynamics (GFB) of the American Physical Society and the European Research Committee on Few-Body Problems in Physics (ERCFBP) to recognize distinguished achievements in few-body physics. It is named in honor of distinguished scientist Ludwig D. Faddeev (1934-2017). It was awarded for the first time in 2018 to Vitaly Efimov and Rudi Grimm for “the theoretical discovery of a series of weakly-bound three-body quantum states known as Efimov states” and “in recognition of his ground-breaking experiments confirming the Efimov effect”, respectively.

The nomination deadline for the 2021 “Faddeev Medal” is April 15, 2021. See this link for more details.

Applications/Registrations Accepted Now for KITP Program & Conference in May/June ’22

We are very happy to announce that applications are now accepted for the KITP program entitled “Living near Unitarity“. The organizers are Olivier Dulieu, Chris Greene, Alejandro Kievsky, and Daniel Phillips. The program will take place in Santa Barbara, May 9-June 17, 2022. The application deadline is February 1, 2021!!! The program will be accompanied by the conference “Opportunities and Challenges in Few-Body Physics: Unitarity and Beyond“, coordinated by Doerte Blume, Olivier Dulieu, Chris Greene, and Alejandro Kievsky. The dates are May 23 – May 26, 2022. Let’s hope that Covid-19 will be under control by then — we are looking forward to welcoming as many friends as possible from all over the world! Let’s keep our fingers crossed. And in the meantime, please be responsible and wear a mask!

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