Dynamics of cold gas in synthetic non-Abelian gauge fields in free space

We report on experimental results of studies of dynamics of a cold gas subjected to synthetic non-Abelian gauge fields. In sharp contrast with the Abelian case, spatially uniform non-Abelian gauge fields can induce particle non-inertial motion. We explore this intriguing phenomenon with a degenerate Fermi gas subjected to a two-dimensional synthetic SU(2) and SU(3) non-Abelian gauge fields in free space. We demonstrate the spin-Hall characteristics of the dynamics as well as its anisotropy in amplitude and frequency due to the spin texture of our SU(2) system. We draw the similarities and differences of the observed wave packet dynamics and the well-known Zitterbewegung effect. As opposed to SU(2) systems with two ladder operators viz., raising and lowering operators, SU(3) systems have additional ladder operators due to eight generators of the symmetry. We demonstrate the existence of additional ladder operators in our SU(3) system by performing two kinds of Π-pulses between the basis states.