The random hopping models exhibit many fascinating features, such as diverging localization length and density of states as energy approaches the band center due to its particle-hole symmetry. Nevertheless, such models are yet to be realized experimentally because the particle-hole symmetry is easily destroyed by diagonal disorder. Here we propose that a pure random hopping model can be effectively realized in ultracold atoms by modulating a disordered onsite potential in particular frequency ranges. This idea is motivated by the recent development of the phenomena called dynamical localization'' or coherent destruction of tunneling.'' Investigating the application of this idea in one dimension, we find that if the oscillation frequency of the disorder potential is gradually increased from zero to infinity, one can tune a noninteracting system from an Anderson insulator to a random hopping model with diverging localization length at the band center, and eventually to a uniform-hopping tight-binding model.
Quasiperiodicity is easily realized with ultracold atoms in optical lattices and has been used to simulate the delocalization-localization transition. Random local potentials can also be implemented by spatial light modulators. Programmable hopping disorder, however, remains difficult to realize in conventional optical lattices. Momentum-space lattice (MSL) offers a platform to address this. We implement the MSL using an
87Rb Bose-Einstein condensate via multiple Bragg diffraction and benchmark the platform by simulating wavepacket dynamics with hopping disorder on top of the generalized Aubry-André (GAA) model. We test programmable hopping disorder added to localized/delocalized backgrounds tunable by the Aubry-André potential strength, as well as systems with mobility edges. Uncorrelated hopping disorder smooths the AA transition into a crossover between weakly (large localization lengths) and strongly localized regimes; the resulting enhancement in localization suppresses wavepacket spreading. We also implement spatially correlated hopping disorder and compare its dynamics with uncorrelated disorder of the same final width, demonstrating a correlation-induced enhancement in spreading. Measured dynamics agrees with trends from ideal tight-binding simulations. Trends in non-universal features depending on microscopic structure and short-time dynamics as functions of quasiperiodic potential strength, hopping-disorder strength, and GAA deformation also match numerical results, with better agreement at larger hopping-disorder strengths. Numerical simulations of the MSL dynamics provide insights into sources of corrections. Our results demonstrate that MSL provides a versatile platform for realizing general disordered quantum systems with programmable hopping amplitudes beyond quasiperiodic models.
We consider the dynamics of rotational excitations placed on a single molecule in spatially disordered one-dimensional (1D), two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) ensembles of ultracold molecules trapped in optical lattices. The disorder arises from incomplete populations of optical lattices with molecules. This leads to a model corresponding to a quantum particle with long-range tunnelling amplitudes moving on a lattice with the same on-site energy but with forbidden access to random sites (vacancies). We examine the time and length scales of Anderson localization for this type of disorder with realistic experimental parameters in the Hamiltonian. We show that for an experimentally realized system of KRb molecules on an optical lattice this type of disorder leads to disorder-induced localization in 1D and 2D systems on a time scale t ∼ 1 s. For 3D lattices with 55 sites in each dimension and vacancy concentration 90%, the rotational excitations diffuse to the edges of the lattice and show no signature of Anderson localization. We examine the role of the long-range tunnelling amplitudes allowing for transfer of rotational excitations between distant lattice sites. Our results show that the long-range tunnelling has little impact on the dynamics in the diffusive regime but affects significantly the localization dynamics in lattices with large concentrations of vacancies, enhancing the width of the localized distributions in 2D lattices by more than a factor of 2.
We consider the dynamics of rotational excitations placed on a single molecule in spatially disordered 1D, 2D and 3D ensembles of ultracold molecules trapped in optical lattices. The disorder arises from incomplete populations of optical lattices with molecules. This leads to a model corresponding to a quantum particle with long-range tunnelling amplitudes moving on a lattice with the same on-site energy but with forbidden access to random sites (vacancies). We examine the time and length scales of Anderson localization for this type of disorder with realistic experimental parameters in the Hamiltonian. We show that for an experimentally realized system of KRb molecules on an optical lattice this type of disorder leads to disorder-induced localization in 1D and 2D systems on a time scale
t∼1 sec. For 3D lattices with
55 sites in each dimension and vacancy concentration $ 90~\%$, the rotational excitations diffuse to the edges of the lattice and show no signature of Anderson localization. We examine the role of the long-range tunnelling amplitudes allowing for transfer of rotational excitations between distant lattice sites. Our results show that the long-range tunnelling has little impact on the dynamics in the diffusive regime but affects significantly the localization dynamics in lattices with large concentrations of vacancies, enhancing the width of the localized distributions in 2D lattices by more than a factor of 2. Our results raise a general question whether quantum particles with long-range tunnelling can undergo quantum localization in 3D lattices with substitutional disorder.
We study the one-dimensional nearest-neighbor tight-binding model of electrons with independently distributed random hopping and no on-site potential (i.e., off-diagonal disorder with particle-hole symmetry, leading to sublattice symmetry, for each realization). For nonsingular distributions of the hopping, it is known that the model exhibits a universal, singular behavior of the density of states $\ensuremath{\rho}(E)\ensuremath{\sim}1/|E{ln}^{3}|E||$ and of the localization length $\ensuremath{\xi}(E)\ensuremath{\sim}|ln|E||$, near the band center
E=0. (This singular behavior is also applicable to random XY and Heisenberg spin chains; it was first obtained by Dyson for a specific random harmonic oscillator chain.) Simultaneously, the state at
E=0 shows a universal, subexponential decay at large distances $\ensuremath{\sim}exp[\ensuremath{-}\sqrt{r/{r}_{0}}]$. In this study, we consider singular, but normalizable, distributions of hopping, whose behavior at small
t is of the form $\ensuremath{\sim}1/[t{ln}^{\ensuremath{\lambda}+1}(1/t)]$, characterized by a single, continuously tunable parameter $\ensuremath{\lambda}>0$. We find, using a combination of analytic and numerical methods, that while the universal result applies for $\ensuremath{\lambda}>2$, it no longer holds in the interval $0<\ensuremath{\lambda}<2$. In particular, we find that the form of the density of states singularity is enhanced (relative to the Dyson result) in a continuous manner depending on the nonuniversal parameter $\ensuremath{\lambda}$; simultaneously, the localization length shows a less divergent form at low energies and ceases to diverge below $\ensuremath{\lambda}=1$. For $\ensuremath{\lambda}<2$, the fall-off of the
E=0 state at large distances also deviates from the universal result and is of the form $\ensuremath{\sim}exp[\ensuremath{-}{(r/{r}_{0})}^{1/\ensuremath{\lambda}}]$, which decays faster than an exponential for $\ensuremath{\lambda}<1$.
Abstract We consider Anderson localization in the half-filled Anderson–Hubbard model in the presence of either random on-site interactions or spatially alternating interactions in the lattice. By using dynamical mean field theory with the equation of motion method as an impurity solver, we calculate the arithmetically and geometrically averaged local density of states and derive the equations determining the critical value for the phase transition between metallic, Anderson and Mott insulating phases. The nonmagnetic ground state phase diagrams are constructed numerically. We figure out that the presence of Coulomb disorder drives the system toward the Anderson localized phase that can occur even in the absence of Anderson structural disorder. For the spatially alternating interactions, we find that the metallic region is reduced and the Anderson insulator one is enlarged with increasing interaction modulation. Our obtained results are relevant to current research in ultracold atoms in disordered optical lattices where metal–insulator transition can be observed experimentally by using ultracold atom techniques.
In this work we study Anderson localization of quantum states in different kind of disordered media. First we apply the recently-developed theory of \textit{landscape localization} pioneered by Filoche and Mayboroda, giving rise to an effective potential which yields further insight into localization. We analyze this problem numerically in one, two and three dimensions with uniform and point-like potentials, aiming at inferring the properties of the localized states from the knowledge of the localization landscape. We also consider quasiperiodic potentials which induce a metal-insulator transition (extended to localized states), testing the prediction of the wave functions using the effective potential as a reference. Finally, we study how the localized states are distributed in the energy spectrum energy in one-dimension and how we can modify their localization varying the properties of the random potential. We find that for a uniform disordered potential, the density of states is symmetric around the mean energy. And for a point-like potential, the spectrum energy has a continuous part at low energies and a discrete part at high energies.