@article {1678, title = {Anomalous broadening in driven dissipative Rydberg systems}, journal = {Physical Review Letters}, volume = {116}, year = {2016}, month = {2016/03/16}, pages = {113001}, abstract = {We observe interaction-induced broadening of the two-photon 5s-18s transition in 87Rb atoms trapped in a 3D optical lattice. The measured linewidth increases by nearly two orders of magnitude with increasing atomic density and excitation strength, with corresponding suppression of resonant scattering and enhancement of off-resonant scattering. We attribute the increased linewidth to resonant dipole-dipole interactions of 18s atoms with spontaneously created populations of nearby np states. Over a range of initial atomic densities and excitation strengths, the transition width is described by a single function of the steady-state density of Rydberg atoms, and the observed resonant excitation rate corresponds to that of a two-level system with the measured, rather than natural, linewidth. The broadening mechanism observed here is likely to have negative implications for many proposals with coherently interacting Rydberg atoms.}, doi = {10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.113001}, url = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1510.08710}, author = {E. A. Goldschmidt and T. Boulier and R. C. Brown and S. B. Koller and J. T. Young and Alexey V. Gorshkov and S. L. Rolston and J. V. Porto} }