Frustrated trio mimicked

摘要

Quantum simulation is a promising tool for navigating the complex world of many-body physics. The technique has now been employed to simulate a frustrated network of three quantum magnets by using trapped ions. Frustration can be an exciting subject. In the everyday world, we typically get frustrated when faced with a dilemma. Consider, for instance, three children playing on a see-saw. Two of them hop onto the see-saw and the third one is left behind frustrated. No matter which end of the see-saw the third child hops onto, the result is unsatisfactory. Similarly, frustration appears in physics when competing interactions between particles cannot be satisfied simultaneously. In the quantum regime, however, frustration leads to exciting physical phenomena that are hard to predict theoretically. On page 590 of this issue, Kim et al. provide a stepping stone towards getting a firmer handle on frustrated quantum systems. Their experiment mimics a frustrated magnetic quantum network by using three ytterbium atomic ions in an electromagnetic trap.