Roberto Vittorio Roell, Arif Warsi Laskar, Franz Richard Huybrechts, Martin Weitz:
Phys. Rev. A 107, 043302 (2023)
🔓 arXiv:2210.09874 (2022)
Quantum Hall physics is at the heart of research on both matter and artificial systems, such as cold atomic gases, with non-trivial topological order. We report on the observation of a chiral edge current in a synthetic quantum Hall system with distinct bulk and edge behavior, realized in the two-dimensional state space formed by one spatial and one synthetic dimension encoded in the J = 6 electronic spin of erbium atoms. To characterize the system, the Hall drift of the employed atomic Bose-Einstein condensate in the lowest Landau level is determined. The topological properties are verified by determining the local Chern marker, and upon performing system excitations both cyclotron and skipping orbits are observed in the bulk and edge respectively. Future prospects include studies of novel topological phases in cold atom systems.