Strongly correlated solids are complex and fascinating quantum systems, where new electronic states continue to emerge, especially when interaction with light triggers interplay between them. In this interplay, a sub-laser-cycle electronic response is particularly attractive as a tool for the ultrafast manipulation of matter at the petahertz scale. Here we introduce a new type of nonlinear multidimensional spectroscopy, which allows us to unravel charge and energy flows in strongly correlated systems interacting with few-cycle infrared pulses and the complex interplay between different correlated states evolving on the sub-femtosecond timescale. We demonstrate that the sub-cycle spectroscopy of a single-particle electronic response is extremely sensitive to correlated many-body dynamics and provides direct access to many-body response functions. For the two-dimensional Hubbard model under the influence of ultrashort, intense electric-field transients, we resolve the sub-femtosecond pathways of charge and energy flows between localized and delocalized many-body states and the creation of a highly correlated state surviving after the end of the laser pulse. Our findings open the way towards a regime of imaging and manipulating strongly correlated materials at optical rates, beyond the multicycle approach employed in Floquet engineering, with the sub-cycle response being a key tool for accessing many-body phenomena.

强相关固体是复杂而迷人的量子系统，新的电子态不断出现，特别是当与光的相互作用触发它们之间的相互作用时。在这种相互作用中，亚激光周期电子响应作为在拍赫兹尺度上超快操纵物质的工具特别有吸引力。在这里，我们介绍了一种新型的非线性多维光谱，它使我们能够解开与少周期红外脉冲相互作用的强相关系统中的电荷和能量流，以及在亚飞秒时间尺度上演变的不同相关状态之间的复杂相互作用。我们证明单粒子电子响应的子周期光谱对相关的多体动力学极其敏感，并提供对多体响应函数的直接访问。对于超短强电场瞬变影响下的二维哈伯德模型，我们解决了局域和离域多体态之间电荷和能量流的亚飞秒路径，并创建了高度相关的状态，该状态在激光脉冲结束。我们的研究结果为以光速率成像和操纵强相关材料开辟了道路，超越了 Floquet 工程中采用的多周期方法，其中子周期响应是访问多体现象的关键工具。