Controlled coherent and dissipative dynamics in optical lattices

Dieter Jaksch

Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3PU, UK

We present quantum optical methods to manipulate and analyze strongly correlated ensembles of cold atoms in optical lattices. First we will introduce the mechanism of spontaneous phonon emission in optical lattices. We will then show how irreversible loading and cooling schemes based on this mechanism can lead to virtually defect free optical crystals. Furthermore we will discuss a scheme for detecting multi partite entanglement in bosons which can be realized by controlled tunnelling of atoms between lattice sites. Finally, we will present numerical calculations on the dynamics of the Mott insulator to superfluid transition in one dimensional optical lattices. We find excellent agreement between numerics and the experiment.