arXiv:1212.6779 · Physical Review B
Restoring phase coherence in a one-dimensional superconductor using power-law electron hopping
Alejandro M. Lobos, Masaki Tezuka, Antonio M. Garcı́a-Garcı́a
Abstract
In a one-dimensional (1D) superconductor, zero-temperature quantum fluctuations destroy phase coherence. Here we put forward a mechanism which can restore phase coherence: power-law hopping. We study a 1D attractive-$U$ Hubbard model with power-law hopping using Abelian bosonization and density-matrix renormalization group (DMRG) techniques. The parameter that controls the hopping decay acts as the effective, noninteger spatial dimensionality ${d}_{\mathrm{eff}}$. For real-valued hopping amplitudes we identify analytically a range of parameters for which power-law hopping suppresses fluctuations and restores superconducting long-range order for any ${d}_{\mathrm{eff}}>1$, at zero temperature. A detailed DMRG analysis fully supports these findings. These results are also of direct relevance to quantum magnetism as our model can be mapped onto an $S=1/2$ XXZ spin chain with power-law decaying couplings, which can be studied experimentally with cold-ion-trap techniques.