Filippo Caleca

Postdoctoral researcher
TU Wien · Thomas Pohl group

Artwork: spin-spin correlations spreading through a square array of atoms after a quench in the dipolar XY model — **Shake it, then read its spectrum** After a quench, correlations ripple through an array of dipolar spins; their time evolution encodes the energies of the elementary excitations. Science (2025)

Artwork: an odd-sized lattice of aligned spins next to a tower of states whose lowest level is a degenerate doublet — **Odd numbers break symmetry** With an odd number of spins, the ground state of an ordered U(1)-symmetric magnet is a degenerate doublet, so even a finite system can keep its magnetization once the field is switched off. Phys. Rev. Lett. (2025)

Artwork: a chain of trapped atoms whose spins stay locally aligned but meander along the chain, with fainter snapshots of other configurations above and below — **A quantum liquid of spins, one atom wide** In a one-dimensional Rydberg simulator, quantum fluctuations keep the spins from ever locking into an ordered magnet: instead, we observe a Tomonaga-Luttinger liquid, with power-law correlations and a linear sound mode. Phys. Rev. X (2025)

Artwork: a Bloch sphere with a squeezed collective spin on its equator, over a lattice of nearly aligned in-plane spins — **Slowness as a resource** Started at an energy inside the BKT critical phase of a 2D magnet, the collective spin decays only as a power law in time; this critical slowing down protects squeezing that grows with system size, even with short-range interactions. Phys. Rev. Lett. (2024)

Research

I am a theoretical physicist working on quantum many-body physics, at the intersection of condensed matter and quantum information. My research focuses on the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of spin-1/2 systems with long-range interactions, as realized in ultracold atomic and molecular platforms. I study these lattice models with a combination of analytical and numerical methods, including variational Monte Carlo, quantum Monte Carlo and matrix product states.

I have also worked on topics in high-energy physics, a field I continue to follow with interest.