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arXiv:2404.08745 · Physical Review Letters

Extended Metal-Insulator Crossover with Strong Antiferromagnetic Spin Correlation in Half-Filled 3D Hubbard Model

Yufeng Song, Youjin Deng, Yuan-Yao He

Published Jan 10, 2025• 17 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

The Hubbard model at temperatures above the Néel transition, despite being a paramagnet, can exhibit rich physics due to the interplay of Fermi surface, on-site interaction U and thermal fluctuations. Nevertheless, the understanding of the crossover physics remains only at a qualitative level, because of the intrinsically smooth behavior. Employing an improved variant of the numerically exact auxiliary-field quantum Monte Carlo algorithm equipped with numerical analytic continuation, we obtain a broad variety of thermodynamic and dynamical properties of the three-dimensional Hubbard model at half filling, quantitatively determine the crossover boundaries, and observe that the metal-insulator crossover regime, in which antiferromagnetic spin correlations appear strongest, exists over an extended regime in between the Fermi liquid for small U and the Mott insulator for large U. In particular, the location of the most rapid suppression of double occupancy as U increases, is found to fully reside in the metallic Fermi liquid regime, in contrast to the conventional intuition that it is a representative feature for entering the Mott insulator. Beside providing a reliable methodology for numerical study of crossover physics, our work can also serve as a timely and important guideline for the most recent optical lattice experiments.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.134.016503

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The Hubbard model at temperatures above the Néel transition, despite being a paramagnet, can exhibit rich physics due to the interplay of Fermi surface, on-site interaction U and thermal fluctuations. Nevertheless, the understanding of the crossover physics remains only at a qualitative level, because of the intrinsically smooth behavior. Employing an improved variant of the numerically exact auxiliary-field quantum Monte Carlo algorithm equipped with numerical analytic continuation, we obtain a broad variety of thermodynamic and dynamical properties of the three-dimensional Hubbard model at half filling, quantitatively determine the crossover boundaries, and observe that the metal-insulator crossover regime, in which antiferromagnetic spin correlations appear strongest, exists over an extended regime in between the Fermi liquid for small U and the Mott insulator for large U. In particular, the location of the most rapid suppression of double occupancy as U increases, is found to fully reside in the metallic Fermi liquid regime, in contrast to the conventional intuition that it is a representative feature for entering the Mott insulator. Beside providing a reliable methodology for numerical study of crossover physics, our work can also serve as a timely and important guideline for the most recent optical lattice experiments.
The interaction-driven evolution from a Fermi liquid to a Mott insulator is a hallmark of strongly correlated fermion systems. In this work, we present a {\it numerically unbiased} study of such metal-to-insulator crossover in the half-filled square-lattice Hubbard model at finite temperatures, employing auxiliary-field quantum Monte Carlo method. By jointly analyzing thermodynamic and dynamical observables, we establish the crossover diagram of the model in the temperature-interaction (TTT-UUU) plane. With increasing UUU, our numerical results reveal an extended crossover regime, which we refer to as the {\it Bad Metal}, that separates the Fermi liquid and Mott insulator. During the crossover, we also examine the antiferromagnetic spin correlations and observe pronounced nodal-antinodal dichotomy in the momentum-resolved single-particle spectral functions. Furthermore, we investigate the temperature dependence of several commonly used observables in the model. As representative results, we achieve an accurate map of the thermal entropy across the crossover diagram, and identify the parameter regions in which the model exhibits the Pomeranchuk cooling, characterized by an adiabatic cooling with increasing UUU. Beyond offering a more refined understanding of the crossover phenomenon, our work also provides valuable benchmark and guideline for future optical lattice experiments on the square-lattice Hubbard model.
Abstract The interaction-driven crossover from a Slater insulator to a Mott insulator in the Néel-ordered ground state of the Hubbard model is a fundamental paradigm of strongly correlated electrons, yet its quantitative characterization has remained elusive. Here we establish a clear and experimentally accessible thermal criterion for this crossover via the sign change of the temperature derivative of double occupancy, ( ∂D / ∂T ) U , near zero temperature. In the Slater regime, ( ∂D / ∂T ) U > 0 reflects the major role of charge fluctuations; in the Mott regime, the anomalous ( ∂D / ∂T ) U < 0, a manifestation of the Pomeranchuk effect, signals the dominance of low-energy spin superexchange physics. Using exact diagonalization and numerically exact quantum Monte Carlo simulations, we demonstrate that this criterion determines the crossover boundary at U cross / t = 4.0(2) for the half-filled two-dimensional Hubbard model. Furthermore, we obtain a consistent boundary independently from the maximum in the antiferromagnetic correlation length, which also arises from the superexchange physics. These two thermal signatures are theoretically unified through the local minimum of thermal entropy versus interaction U at low temperatures. Our results offer a direct, measurable, and physically intuitive framework to identify the SlaterMott crossover in optical lattice experiments.
The ground state of the Hubbard model with nearest-neighbor hopping on the square lattice at half filling is known to be that of an antiferromagnetic (AFM) band insulator for any on-site repulsion. At finite temperature, the absence of long-range order makes the question of how the interaction-driven insulator is realized nontrivial. We address this problem with controlled accuracy in the thermodynamic limit using self-energy diagrammatic determinant Monte Carlo and dynamical cluster approximation methods and show that development of long-range AFM correlations drives an extended crossover from Fermi liquid to insulating behavior in the parameter regime that precludes a metal-to-insulator transition. The intermediate crossover state is best described as a non-Fermi liquid with a partially gapped Fermi surface.
The 2D Hubbard model with nearest-neighbor hopping on the square lattice and an average of one electron per site is known to undergo an extended crossover from metallic to insulating behavior driven by proliferating antiferromagnetic correlations. We study signatures of this crossover in spin and charge correlation functions and present results obtained with controlled accuracy using the diagrammatic Monte Carlo approach in the range of parameters amenable to experimental verification with ultracold atoms in optical lattices. The qualitative changes in charge and spin correlations associated with the crossover are observed at well-separated temperature scales, which encase the intermediary regime of non-Fermi-liquid character, where local magnetic moments are formed and nonlocal fluctuations in both channels are essential.
We study the SU(3) symmetric Fermi-Hubbard model (FHM) in the square lattice at 1/31/31/3-filling using numerically exact determinant quantum Monte Carlo and numerical linked-cluster expansion techniques. We present the different regimes of the model in the $T\text{\ensuremath{-}}U$ plane, which are characterized by local and short-range correlations, and capture signatures of the metal-insulator transition and magnetic crossovers. These signatures are detected as the temperature scales characterizing the rise of the compressibility, and an interaction-dependent change in the sign of the diagonal spin-spin correlation function. The analysis of the compressibility estimates the location of the metal-insulator quantum critical point at ${U}_{c}/t\ensuremath{\sim}6$, and provides a temperature scale for observing Mott physics at finite TTT. Furthermore, from the analysis of the spin-spin correlation function we observe that for $U/t\ensuremath{\gtrsim}6$ and $T\ensuremath{\sim}J=4{t}^{2}/U$ there is a development of a short-range two-sublattice (2SL) antiferromagnetic structure, as well as an emerging three-sublattice (3SL) antiferromagnetic structure as the temperature is lowered below $T/J\ensuremath{\lesssim}0.57$. This crossover from 2SL to 3SL magnetic ordering agrees with Heisenberg limit predictions, and has observable effects on the density of on-site pairs. Finally, we describe how the features of the regimes in the $T\ensuremath{-}U$ plane can be explored with alkaline-earth-like atoms in optical lattices with currently achieved experimental techniques and temperatures. The results discussed in this paper provide a starting point for the exploration of the SU(3) FHM upon doping.
The Hubbard model represents the fundamental model for interacting quantum systems and electronic correlations.Using the two-dimensional half-filled Hubbard model at weak coupling as a testing ground, we perform a comparative study of a comprehensive set of state-of-the-art quantum many-body methods.Upon cooling into its insulating antiferromagnetic ground state, the model hosts a rich sequence of distinct physical regimes with crossovers between a high-temperature incoherent regime, an intermediate-temperature metallic regime, and a low-temperature insulating regime with a pseudogap created by antiferromagnetic fluctuations.We assess the ability of each method to properly address these physical regimes and crossovers through the computation of several observables probing both quasiparticle properties and magnetic correlations, with two numerically exact methods (diagrammatic and determinantal quantum Monte Carlo methods) serving as a benchmark.By combining computational results and analytical insights, we elucidate the nature and role of spin fluctuations in each of these regimes.Based on this analysis, we explain how quasiparticles can coexist with increasingly longrange antiferromagnetic correlations and why dynamical mean-field theory is found to provide a remarkably accurate approximation of local quantities in the metallic regime.We also critically