Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: The Anderson orthogonality catastrophe (AOC) is a paradigmatic many-body phenomenon in which a local perturbation induces a macroscopic response of a Fermi sea. We probe signatures of the AOC by coherently driving heavy Fermi polarons in an ultracold $^6$Li-$^{133}$Cs mixture. We observe a power-law dependence of the measured Rabi frequency on the drive strength, with exponents consistent with AOC predictions. Finite-temperature simulations quantitatively reproduce the observed scaling, indicating that AOC signatures persist beyond the idealized zero-temperature, infinite-mass limit. The damping of the Rabi oscillations provides access to polaron dephasing and reveals a nonmonotonic drive dependence, qualitatively consistent with current theories. Our results establish coherently driven impurities as a versatile probe of quantum many-body dynamics through local coherent control.
Source: arXiv (Cornell University)
Language: English
Subfield: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7212048081