Emergence of long distance pair coherence through incoherent local environmental coupling

Abstract

We demonstrate that quantum coherence can be generated by the interplay of coupling to an incoherent environment and kinetic processes. This joint effect even occurs in a repulsively interacting fermionic system initially prepared in an incoherent Mott insulating state. In this case, coupling a dissipative noise field to the local spin density produces coherent pairs of fermions. The generated pair coherence extends over long distances as typically seen in Bose-Einstein condensates. This conceptually surprising approach provides a novel path towards a better control of quantum many-body correlations.