Marcela Herrera, Posdoc (as of 2021-)

• Research project: Non-local correlations and out-of-equilibrium thermodynamics in quantum systems

• Research fields: Quantum information, quantum thermodynamics

In this project we designed and experimentally implemented a two-qubit correlated SWAP heat engine using an IBM quantum processor. We showed that initial qubit correlations enable to boost the amount of extractable work with respect to engine’s cycle in the absence of correlations. This allows to achieve an efficiency above the standard Carnot limit, and to extract work in a wider qubits’ energy-gap ratio window.

NAIRO TORRES FIESCO

• Research project: Characterization of microphysical and radiative properties of atmospheric components in a subtropical monsoon climate from measurements made with locally developed in situ and laser remote sensing technologies

• Research fields: Atmospheric Physics and Climate Change

Collaborative project with Universidad EAFIT, Universidad de la Salle and Universidad Nacional to study atmospheric dynamics and air quality. The atmospheric physics laboratory performs measurements with an atmospheric Lidar system and participates in measurement campaigns in Medellín and Cali.

MATEO LONDOÑO CASTELLANOS 

Physicist from the Universidad del Valle. 

Currently master student of the program on physics at the Universidad del Valle.  

• Research project: Few body effects on quantum many body systems

• Research fields: Random walks and Brownian motion, Non-equilibrium processes, Cold atoms and optical lattices

By means of molecuar dynamics simulation, stochastic models and tools of few body physics we study the effects of few body phenomenal in quantum many body systems, as for example, hybrid ion-atom traps. 

WILLIAM ESTEBAN SALAZAR ESTRADA 

Physicist from the Universidad del Valle. 

Currently master student of the program on physics at the Universidad del Valle.

• Research project: Quantum chaos and information scrambling in complex quantum systems

• Research fields: Quantum computation and quantum information, Quantum chaos, Matrix models.

With the help of analytical methods we study different types of correlation functions as probes to identify signatures of quantum chaos and information scrambling in arbitrary complex quantum systems.

VÍCTOR ALFONSO LOAIZA MORENO

Physicist from the Universidad del Valle. 

Master student of the program on physics at the Universidad del Valle.

• Research project: Numerical study of the 1D Schrödinger-Poison equation for Ultralight Cold Dark Matter

• Research fields: Formation of cosmological structures

The large scale structures on the universe are best described by the the cold dark matter model which only fails on sub-galaxy scales known as the small scale crisis. However a new model of dark matter where cold dark matter is modeled as a complex scalar field which follows a non-linear Schrödinger equation that on large scales approximates the results of the standard cold dark matter model and on small scales presents some properties that could help to solve some problems on the small scale crisis. In this work we will do a numerical scheme to solve these non-linear Schrödinger equation in 1D using B Splines under periodic boundary conditions.

JHONATHAN DAMIAN GUERRERO MONTOYA 

Physicist from the Universidad del Valle. 

Master student of the program on physics at the Universidad del Valle.

• Research project: Coherent quantum control in molecular systems

• Research fields: Ultrafast spectroscopy

Using ultrashort light pulses (on a phentomsecond scale) we manipulate the dynamics of a MeLPPP-type molecule

LAURA MARIA MUÑOZ MARTINEZ

Physicist from the Universidad de Nariño. 

Master student of the program on physics at the Universidad del Valle.

• Research project: Photophysical characterization of molecular systems for the implementation of single photon sources.

• Research fields: Ultrafast spectroscopy

Techniques such as transient state spectroscopy and two-photon absorption spectroscopy are developed and applied to characterize the dynamics of molecular systems and artificial atoms with potential applications as single photon sources in the visible and near-infrared range.

ANA CAROLINA NOGUERA VELASCO 

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Cold atom-atom-ion three body recombination in RF traps.

• Research field:  Non-equilibrium processes, Cold atoms and optical lattices, Trapped ions

Through molecular dynamics simulations, we explore the formation of complexes in atom-atom-ion collisions assisted by a radiofrequency field. From the results, we propose parameter spaces that optimize the control in this type of reaction.

KRYSTIFER CAMPOS MUÑOZ

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Quantum computation and quantum information.

• Research field:  Foundations of the generalized eigenstate thermalization hypothese (ETH)

The Eigenstate thermalization hypothesis (ETH) has for a long time been the standard argument for explaining the emergence of thermal behavior in closed quantum systems. Recently, It was pointed out by S. Pappalardi that upper correlations within the ETH ansatz share many similarities with the cumulants of free random variables. This observation connected the ETH with the arena of free probability, to create what is now been called the  generalized ETH ansatz. In this project we revisit the relationship between ETH predicted correlations and free-probability by inquiring and analyzing the tensor structure of the earlier.

JUAN MANUEL SCARPETTA RAMIREZ 

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Artificial intelligence on the identification of non-dispersive wave packets in the driven helium atom.

• Research field:  Artificial intelligence in atomic physics

The application of artificial intelligence algorithms is proposed to the identification of states in the helium atom, taking advantage of the properties and characteristics of various unsupervised learning algorithms. Along with a database consisting of probability densities in the configuration and phase spaces is constructed an image recognition algorithm for the identification of special states known as non-dispersive wave packets. The classification processes obtained are compared with previous results. This project aims to optimize and replace the manual classification of data retrieved from numerical solutions of atomic systems.

NIKOLAS ECHEVERRY  

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Transport in molecuar systems

• Research field: Transport in molecuar systems

JUAN CAMILO RODRÍGUEZ BETANCOURT

Undergraduate student of the chemistry program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: to be determined

• Research field: to be determined

ISABELLA BECERRA 

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: The anisotropic Bose-Hubbard dimer in the mean field approximation

• Research field: Cold atoms and optical lattices

The system formed by two coupled Bose-Einstein condensates, also known as the bosonic Josephson junction, is studied in a double-well model in which ultracold atoms are trapped. Special attention will be given to the case little studied in the literature of asymmetric wells, which can be produced by an external static field (Wannier-Stark effect) or by gravity. A large number of particles is considered, which allows the use of the semiclassical mean-field approximation.

JEISON STIVEN LENIS TRUJILLO

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Schrödinger-Poisson model for the growth of cosmic structures

• Research field: Formation of cosmological structures

The Schrödinger-Poisson model provides a novel method for the study of the formation of structures in the universe. The Schrödinger-Poisson equation (SPE) is obtained from the Vlasov-Poisson equation which is derived in a perturbation regime of the fluid equations in the Newtonian regime. The SPE is restricted to one dimension and numerically integrated using a representation in a B-Splines basis and the Crank-Nicolson method, under the Magnus approximation, for the time propagation. Using different dark energy models we obtain the cold dark matter dynamics and the matter power spectrum. We discuss the effects of these models paying special attention to the comparison with the $\Lambda$-CDM model.

CARLOS ANDRÉS JARAMILLO BEDOYA 

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy of single organic molecules composed of a conjugated polymer.

• Research field:  Ultrafast spectroscopy

Using time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy, the photophysical properties of individual MeLPPP (methyl-substituted ladder-type conjugated polymer poly(para-phenylene)) molecules, such as the absorption, the emission and the energy levels involved in the electronic transitions, will be characterized. The coherence properties of the molecular fluorescent emission will be determined, with a view to identifying whether the molecule can act as a single photon source and its potential applicability to emergent quantum technologies.

JUAN ESTEBAN MURILLO

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Using a Hong-Ou-Mandel interferometer to characterize single-photon pair indistinguishability and carry out a quantum optical coherence tomography protocol

• Research field:  Quantum optics

The Hong-Ou-Mandel (HOM) interference is a two-photon interference phenomenon that has shown a great potential to be applied in different (quantum) optical tasks, namely the study of the degree of indistinguishability for a pair of photons or the morphology of a sample through the so-called quantum optical coherence tomography (QOCT) protocol. In this work, we implement a HOM interferometer to carry out such mentioned tasks: for one hand, characterizing how indistinguishable the entangled photon pairs generated from the spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) process occurring in a β-BBO nonlinear crystal, and on the other hand, characterizing the internal structure of a single-layer transparent sample.

BREYNER ANDRES MONROY MORENO

Undergraduate student of the physics program at the Universidad del Valle

• Research project: Implementation of a learning quantum model for classification task

• Research field:  Quantum computation and quantum information

The aim of this work is to implement a machine learning model involving quantum computing algorithms to solve a classification problem. Specifically, we seek to implement the equivalent of a neural network, but quantum, which will be trained to differentiate mathematical functions.