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Abstract |
We theoretically analyze a novel evaporative cooling scheme applicable
to Rydberg chains. We consider an initially thermal chain of circular
Rydberg atoms confined to a one-dimensional (1D) setting in the
absence of periodic potentials. We show that the evaporation of about
one half of the atoms of the chain brings it near its quantum ground
state, which is a 1D Rydberg crystal. We describe the scheme
thermodynamically, applying the truncated Boltzmann distribution to
the collective excitations of the chain, and show that it leads to a
novel quasi-equilibrium many-body state. The evaporation is driven by
slowly compressing the chain. For a given atom number, this process is
adiabatic down to a minimal chain size. At this point, a single atom
is expelled, causing the energy and entropy per particle to decrease.
Then, adiabatic compression resumes. For longer chains, comprising
about 1000 atoms, we emphasize the quasi-universality of the
evaporation curve.
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