Quench dynamics of a disordered array of dissipative coupled cavities

Abstract

We investigate the mean-field dynamics of a system of interacting photons in an array of coupled cavities in the presence of dissipation and disorder. We follow the evolution of an initially prepared Fock state, and show how the interplay between dissipation and disorder affects the coherence properties of the cavity emission, and show that these properties can be used as signatures of the many-body phase of the whole array. © 2014 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.