Berry’s phase in cavity QED: Proposal for observing an effect of field quantization

We propose a feasible experiment to investigate quantum effects in geometric phases, arising when a classical source drives not a single quantum system, but two interacting ones. In particular, we show how to observe a signature of the quantization of the electromagnetic field through a vacuum effect in Berry’s phase. To do so, we describe the interaction of an atom and a quantized cavity mode altogether driven by an external quasiclassical field. We also analyze the semiclassical limit recovering the usual Berry’s phase results.