Controlling the potential landscape and normal modes of ion Coulomb crystals by a standing-wave optical potential

Abstract

Light-induced control of ions within small Coulomb crystals is investigated. By intense intracavity optical standing-wave fields, subwavelength localization of individual ions is achieved for one-, two-, and three-dimensional crystals. Based on these findings, we illustrate numerically how the application of such optical potentials can be used to tailor the normal-mode spectra and patterns of multidimensional Coulomb crystals. The results represent, among others, important steps towards controlling the crystalline structure of Coulomb crystals, investigating heat-transfer processes at the quantum limit, and quantum simulations of many-body systems.