Research overview: Our group is studying quantum systems that are composed of many particles. Exact computer simulations of these systems are extremely demanding as the required resources scale exponentially with the number of constituents. The challenge is to simplify these problems in a way that either analytical solutions become possible or that numerical simulations become tractable. Once this is achieved one is in position to uncover and characterise complex and emergent phenomena such as the formation of many-body phases and transitions between them.

The specific research problems we are interested in are located at the interface of atomic physics, condensed matter physics, quantum optics as well as statistical and soft-matter physics. For example we exploit the properties of highly excited atoms, so-called Rydberg atoms, for quantum information processing and the exploration of non-equilibrium phenomena in open and closed many-body quantum systems. This allows to address a wide variety of subjects, ranging from research on hybrid systems and quantum simulators to the characterisation of non-equilibrium phase transition and the realisation of synthetic forms of quantum matter, such as quantum glasses, with excited atomic gases.

We have a strong focus on establishing connections with experimentalists on questions concerning, for example, the quantum simulation of interacting many-body systems and the development of matter wave interferometers as well as collectively enhanced electric field sensors.

We are member of the

• DFG Excellence Cluster Machine Learning: New Perspectives for Science
• DFG Research Unit FOR 5413 Long-range interacting quantum spin systems out of equilibrium: Experiment, theory and mathematics
• DFG Research Unit FOR 5522 Quantum thermalization, localization, and constrained dynamics with interacting ultracold atoms
• EU EIC Pathfinder Project Brisk Rydberg Ions for Scalable Quantum Processors
• QuantERA Project CoQuaDis Collective quantum phenomena in dissipative systems – towards time-crystal applications in sensing and metrology