Physique quantique

Ce cours vise à décrire l'interaction entre la matière quantique dans sa forme la plus simple, un atome, et un champ électromagnétique. Une approche semi-classique, où le champ est classique, est d'abord considérée, en incluant la relaxation de l'atome. Nous procédons ensuite à la quantification du champ électromagnétique et décrivons sa relaxation, avant que son interaction avec un atome ne soit étudiée dans un modèle quantique complet.

Since the 80’s, laser cooling has enabled the production of sub-milliKelvin dilute atomic gases - which can be further cooled to the nanoKelvin regime.

Computational physics plays a central role in all fields of physics, from classical statistical physics, soft matter problems, and hard-condensed matter. Our goal is to cover the basic concepts underlying computer simulations in classical and quantum problems, and connect these ideas to relevant and contemporary research topics in various fields of physics. In the TD’s you will also learn how to set, perform and analyse the results of simple computer simulations by yourself, covering a wide range of topics. We will use Python, but no previous knowledge of this programming language is needed.

This course is about how to describe complex systems using ideas of the renormalization group (‘coarse-graining’) and statistical field theory.

The main goal of the course is to study the light-matter interaction at the fundamental level where one two-level system interacts with a single mode of the electromagnetic field. 

The lecture will first present the fundamental concept of cavity quantum electrodynamics (Jaynes–Cummings model, resonant and dispersive interaction, Schrödinger cat states of light) and then moves to the more recent developments of circuit QED.