Photovoltaic Effect of Atomtronics Induced by an Artificial Gauge Field

Phys Rev Lett. 2019 Jun 7;122(22):223202. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.122.223202.

Abstract

We investigate the photovoltaic effect of atomtronics induced by an artificial gauge field in four optical potentials. Under an effective magnetic flux, the atom occupation probability would be polarized in a double-dot system, which gives rise to an atomic current. The relation between the atomic current and magnetic flux behaves like the current-phase property in a Josephson junction. A neutral particle photovoltaic cell is well defined by the atomic opened system that has an effective voltage and two different poles corresponding to two internal states of atomtronics. The atom flow is controllable by tuning the direction of incident light and other parameters. The detection of the atomic current intensity is available through an optical emission spectrum in experiments.