Observation of a symmetry-protected topological phase of interacting bosons with Rydberg atoms

Abstract

An interacting topological phase Most topologically nontrivial systems discovered to date consist of noninteracting particles. Their properties can therefore be explained within a single-particle picture. De Léséleuc et al. engineered a topological phase of bosonic atoms in which interactions play a crucial role. The atoms, which were in highly excited Rydberg states, were held in an array of optical tweezers. Depending on the spatial arrangement of the tweezers, the dipole-dipole interactions between the atoms gave rise to two configurations with different topological properties. Science , this issue p. 775