Quantum topology in the ultrastrong coupling regime

The coupling between two or more objects can generally be categorized as strong or weak. In cavity quantum electrodynamics for example, when the coupling strength is larger than the loss rate the coupling is termed strong, and otherwise it is dubbed weak. Ultrastrong coupling, where the interaction energy is of the same order of magnitude as the bare energies of the uncoupled objects, presents a new paradigm for quantum physics and beyond. As a consequence profound changes to well established phenomena occur, for instance the ground state in an ultrastrongly coupled system is not empty but hosts virtual excitations due to the existence of processes which do not conserve the total number of excitations. The implications of ultrastrong coupling for quantum topological systems, where the number of excitations are typically conserved, remain largely unknown despite the great utility of topological matter. Here we reveal how the delicate interplay between ultrastrong coupling and topological states manifests in a one-dimensional array. We study theoretically a dimerized chain of two-level systems within the ultrastrong coupling regime, where the combined saturation and counter-rotating terms in the Hamiltonian are shown to play pivotal roles in the rich, multi-excitation effective bandstructure. In particular, we uncover unusual topological edge states, we introduce a flavour of topological state which we call an anti-edge state, and we reveal the remarkable geometric-dependent renormalizations of the quantum vaccum. Taken together, our results provide a route map for experimentalists to characterize and explore a prototypical system in the emerging field of ultrastrong quantum topology.