Physicists have discovered a surprisingly simple way to reproduce one of the most fascinating models in modern physics—linked to black holes, quantum chaos, and exotic electronic materials—using ultracold atoms trapped in light.

Instead of trying to build a highly complex system from scratch, the researchers show that gently “shaking” a standard optical lattice can transform it into an accurate simulator of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model, a theoretical model known for its extreme and unusual quantum behavior.

In their approach, the team —Charles Creffield (Univ. Complutense, Madrid) and Nathan Goldman (Solvay Institutes, ULB and Collège de France, CNRS), together with Fernando Sols (Univ. Complutense, Madrid) and Marco Schiró (Collège de France, CNRS) — periodically modulates how atoms move between sites in the lattice. This carefully designed driving suppresses ordinary single-particle motion and instead creates effective interactions involving many particles at once, mimicking the SYK model’s defining feature: dense, random-like connections between all particles. Although the resulting system is not perfectly random, detailed numerical calculations show that it reproduces the key hallmarks of SYK physics, including strong quantum chaos and the rapid “scrambling” of information—behavior often associated with black holes.

Nathan Goldman says: "It is remarkable that such a complex and emblematic model of many-body quantum chaos and black-hole physics can be generated in such a simple setting, just by shaking the lattice in the proper way !"

Importantly, this method can be implemented using existing cold-atom technology, making it a realistic and experimentally accessible platform. This opens the door to studying phenomena that are otherwise extremely difficult to probe, such as how quantum information spreads in strongly interacting systems or how complex quantum matter behaves far from equilibrium. More broadly, the work demonstrates how periodic driving—adding a controlled rhythm to a system—can convert simple experimental setups into powerful tools for exploring some of the deepest ideas in modern physics.