Atomic Josephson Parametric Amplifier

Abstract: We study the dynamics of a driven atomic Josephson junction that we propose as a parametric amplifier. By periodically modulating the position of the barrier, we induce a small current across the junction, serving as our input signal. The pump field is implemented by modulating the barrier height at twice the Josephson plasma frequency. The resulting dynamics exhibit parametric amplification of the signal through nonlinear mixing between the signal and pump fields, which is reflected by specific patterns of density waves and phase excitations. We employ a classical-field dynamics method and benchmark our results against driven circuit dynamics. This work paves the way for tunable quantum amplifiers in atomtronic circuits, with potential applications in several fields including precision measurements and quantum information processing.