Abstract This paper is a first step toward rigorously establishing the validity of mean-field approximations for the dynamics of quantum systems in a large dimensional limit. Our result is a derivation of the large d mean-field limit of the Bose–Hubbard model on a square lattice. The Bose–Hubbard model effectively describes bosons on a lattice with on-site interactions and nearest-neighbour hopping, serving as a foundational framework for understanding strong particle interactions and the superfluid to Mott insulator phase transition. We prove a trace norm estimate between the one-lattice-site reduced density of the Schrödinger dynamics and the mean-field dynamics in the limit of large dimension. Here, the mean-field approximation is in the hopping amplitude and not in the interaction, leading to a very rich and non-trivial mean-field equation. This mean-field equation does not only describe the condensate, as is the case when the mean-field description comes from a large particle number limit averaging out the interaction, but it allows for a phase transition since it contains the full non-trivial interaction. Our work is a rigorous justification of a simple case of the highly successful dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT) for bosons, which somewhat surprisingly yields many qualitatively correct results in three dimensions.
Abstract This paper is a first step toward rigorously establishing the validity of mean-field approximations for the dynamics of quantum systems in a large dimensional limit. Our result is a derivation of the large d mean-field limit of the Bose–Hubbard model on a square lattice. The Bose–Hubbard model effectively describes bosons on a lattice with on-site interactions and nearest-neighbour hopping, serving as a foundational framework for understanding strong particle interactions and the superfluid to Mott insulator phase transition. We prove a trace norm estimate between the one-lattice-site reduced density of the Schrödinger dynamics and the mean-field dynamics in the limit of large dimension. Here, the mean-field approximation is in the hopping amplitude and not in the interaction, leading to a very rich and non-trivial mean-field equation. This mean-field equation does not only describe the condensate, as is the case when the mean-field description comes from a large particle number limit averaging out the interaction, but it allows for a phase transition since it contains the full non-trivial interaction. Our work is a rigorous justification of a simple case of the highly successful dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT) for bosons, which somewhat surprisingly yields many qualitatively correct results in three dimensions.
In the context of out of equilibrium dynamics of isolated interacting quantum many-body systems, we study the mean-field discretized and nonlinear Gross-Pitaevskii equation (GPE) of motion for a fully connected (or all-to-all coupled) Bose-Hubbard model describing a large population of bosons on a lattice of generic dimension V, with potential experimental applications ranging from ultra-cold atomic gases in optical traps to systems of Josephson junctions. Considering a quench on the system Hamiltonian, we describe the time evolution of a system initialized to the Mott insulating phase and taken in the strong superfluid regime, finding a sharp change in the dynamical behaviour when varying the quench intensity across a critical value, that is a dynamical phase transition. Our results generalize the study presented in some previous papers focusing on the particular cases of V = 2, V = 3 and 1D lattice, and place particular emphasis on the relaxation of some dynamical order parameters in the large V limit. On the side of the dynamical phase transition corresponding to the strong superfluid regime, we find such relaxation to consist of a π-synchronization of the mean field bosonic phases, that we find to compete against the eventual site-dependent disorder of the Hamiltonian in what, in analogy with the notorious Kuramoto model for nonlinear coupled oscillators, can be referred to as a synchronization transition. Additionally, in support of the validity of the mean field approximation far from the transition, we report a study beyond mean field based on the Bogolioubov-de Gennes method.
The Mott metal-insulator transition in the Hubbard model is studied by constructing a dynamical slave-boson mean-field theory in the limit of large lattice coordination number z that incorporates the binding between doubly occupied (doublon) and empty (holon) sites. On the Mott insulating side where all doublons and holons bond in real space into excitonic pairs leading to the charge gap, the theory simplifies considerably to leading order in 1/z and becomes exact on the infinite-z Bethe lattice. An asymptotic solution is obtained for a continuous Mott transition associated with the closing of the charge gap at a critical value of the Hubbard Uc and the corresponding doublon density ndc, hopping ${\ensuremath{\chi}}_{d}^{c}$ and doublon-holon pairing ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}}_{d}^{c}$ amplitudes. We find ${U}_{c}={U}_{\mathrm{BR}}[1\ensuremath{-}2{n}_{d}^{c}\ensuremath{-}\sqrt{z}({\ensuremath{\chi}}_{d}^{c}+{\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}}_{d}^{c})]\ensuremath{\simeq}0.8{U}_{\mathrm{BR}}$, where UBR is the critical value for the Brinkman-Rice transition in the Gutzwiller approximation captured in the static mean-field solution of the slave-boson formulation of Kotliar and Ruckenstein. Thus, the Mott transition can be viewed as the quantum correction to the Brinkman-Rice transition due to doublon-holon binding. Quantitative comparisons are made to the results of the dynamical mean-field theory, showing good agreement. In the absence of magnetic order, the Mott insulator is a U(1) quantum spin liquid with nonzero intersite spinon hopping that survives the large-z limit and lifts the 2N-fold degeneracy of the local moments. We show that the spinons are coupled to the doublons/holons by a dissipative compact U(1) gauge field in the deconfined phase, realizing the spin-charge separated gapless spin liquid Mott insulator.
This thesis is about the derivation of effective mean field equations and their next-order corrections starting from nonrelativistic many-body quantum theory. Mean field equations provide an approximate ansatz for the description of interacting many-particle systems. In this ansatz the interaction between the particles is replaced by a self-consistent external potential leading to an effective one-body description of the many-particle system. Next-order corrections provide an approximation which goes one step further and tries to capture also subleading effects that are not resolved by the mean field ansatz. We present mathematical proofs for the validity of such effective theories for different models that are motivated, e.g., from the theory of ultracold atoms (the bosonic Hartree equation and the corresponding Bogoliubov theory) and from plasma physics (the motion of a tracer particle through a degenerate and dense electron gas). Starting from a many-body Schrödinger equation, our goal is to show that the solutions converge in a particular limit to the solutions to an effective mean field equation and its next-order corrections. After a short introduction and a summary in Chapter one, we present the main part of this work in three self-contained chapters. In Chapter two we analyze the dynamics of a large number N of nonrelativistic bosons in the weak coupling limit, i.e., for a coupling constant g_N=1/N. It is well known that in the limit of infinite particle number, the Hartree equation emerges as an effective one-particle theory of the Bose gas. This is closely related to the remarkable physical phenomenon of Bose-Einstein condensation at low temperature, namely that the majority of particles in a Bose gas occupies the same copy of a single one-particle quantum state. Our emphasis lies in the description of the few particles that fluctuate around the Bose-Einstein condensate. We show convergence of the fully interacting dynamics to an auxiliary time evolution in the norm of the N-particle space. This result allows us to prove several other assertions. Among other things, it is used to derive the Hartree equation with optimal speed of convergence 1/N for initial states that are close to ground states of interacting systems and also to prove convergence of the N-particle solution towards a time evolution obtained from the Bogoliubov Hamiltonian on Fock space. Chapter three is about the low energy properties of the weakly interacting homogeneous Bose gas. Here, we derive a novel estimate for low energy eigenfunctions stating that the probability for finding l particles out of their total number N not in the condensate is exponentially small in the number l. Using this bound, we then prove that the ground state wave function of the microscopic model satisfies certain quasifree type properties. The exponential decay is moreover used to provide an alternative proof for the validity of Bogoliubov's approximation for the low-lying energy eigenvalues. Bogoliubov theory states that the excitation energies of the Bose gas are given by excitations of free quasiparticles obeying an effective energy-momentum dispersion relation which is linear for small momentum. The linearity of the effective dispersion relation is an essential ingredient for the explanation of the superfluid character of the Bose gas. In Chapter four we study the time evolution of a single particle coupled through a pair potential to a dense and homogeneous ideal Fermi gas in two spatial dimensions. This type of model is well known in plasma physics where it is used to describe the energy loss of ions moving through a dense and degenerate electron gas. We analyze the model for a coupling parameter g=1 and prove closeness of the time evolution to an effective dynamics for large densities of the gas and for long time scales of the order of some power of the density. The effective dynamics is generated by the free Hamiltonian with a large but constant energy shift. To leading order, this energy shift is given by the spatially homogeneous mean field potential produced by the gas particles, whereas at next-to-leading order, one has to consider an additional correction to the mean field energy which is due to so-called recollision processes.
We present a strong-coupling expansion of the Bose-Hubbard model based on a mean-field treatment of the hopping term, while onsite fluctuations are taken into account exactly. This random phase approximation describes the universal features of the generic Mott-insulator--superfluid transition (induced by a density change) and the superfluid state near the phase transition. The critical quasiparticles at the quantum critical point have a quadratic dispersion with an effective mass m∗ and their mutual interaction is described by an effective s-wave scattering length a∗. The singular part of the pressure takes the same form as in a dilute Bose gas, provided we replace the boson mass m and the scattering length in vacuum a by m∗ and a∗, and the density n by the excess density $|n\ensuremath{-}{n}_{\mathrm{MI}}|$ of particles (or holes) with respect to the Mott insulator. We define a universal two-body contact Cuniv that controls the high-momentum tail $\ensuremath{\sim}1/{|\mathbf{k}|}^{4}$ of the singular part nksing of the momentum distribution. We also apply the strong-coupling RPA to a lattice model of hard-core bosons and find that the high-momentum distribution is controlled by a universal contact, in complete agreement with the Bose-Hubbard model. Finally, we discuss a continuum model of bosons in an optical lattice and define two additional two-body contacts: a short-distance universal contact Cunivsd which controls the high-momentum tail of nksing at scales larger than the inverse lattice spacing, and a full contact C, which controls the high-momentum tail of the full-momentum distribution nk.
The objective of this paper is the theoretical description of the Mott insulator to superfluid quantum phase transition of a Bose gas in an optical lattice. In former works the Rayleigh-Schr\"odinger perturbation theory was used within a mean-field approach, which yields partially nonphysical results since the degeneracy between two adjacent Mott lobes is not taken into account. In order to correct such nonphysical results we apply the Brillouin-Wigner perturbation theory to the mean-field approximation of the Bose-Hubbard model. Detailed explanations of how to use the Brillouin-Wigner theory are presented, including a graphical approach that allows one to efficiently keep track of the respective analytic terms. To prove the validity of this computation, the results are compared with other works. Besides the analytic calculation of the phase boundary from Mott insulator to superfluid phase, the condensate density is also determined by simultaneously solving two algebraic equations. The analytical and numerical results turn out to be physically meaningful and can cover a region of system parameters inaccessible until now. Our results are of particular interest provided a harmonic trap is added to the former calculations in a homogeneous system, in view of describing an experiment within the local-density approximation. Thus, the paper represents an essential preparatory work for determining the experimentally observed wedding cake structure of particle-density profile at both finite temperature and finite hopping.
Quantum mechanical lattice models, such as the famous Hubbard model, were originally intended as simplified descriptions of the behavior of electrons in real solids. Today it is clear that even such simple models can present remarkably rich physics. At the same time, obtaining reliable solutions for correlated quantum systems is difficult and requires the development of both computing resources and new algorithms and approximations. Parallel with the theoretical developments, applications of lattice models have also expanded to the study of ultracold atoms in optical lattices. The hallmark of these experiments is the possibility to design different kinds of lattices and to tune the interactions between the atoms, making it possible to do real experiments on theoretical "toy models". \n \nIn this thesis we have used dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT) and its cluster extensions to study superfluidity and topological phenomena in lattice models. The DMFT combines the exact solution of a small reference system with a self-consistent mean-field treatment of the rest of the lattice. After a short introduction to the physical background of the lattice models, we review the formal definition and practical aspects of the DMFT method. We discuss the Baym-Kadanoff-Luttinger-Ward functional formalism that can be used to derive the DMFT equations, and review the numerical exact diagonalization and continuous-time quantum Monte-Carlo algorithms that were used in the implementation of the method. \n \nPublications I and VI discuss superfluid states induced by correlation effects that cannot easily be treated within a static mean-field theory. In Publication I we study a bilayer system where two different types of superfluids can be found depending on the densities of particles in the layers. Publication VI has a focus in the d-wave superconductivity and non-uniform, striped magnetism of the two-dimensional Hubbard model, which are thought to be connected with the high-Tc superconductivity in cuprate materials. The stripe state along with non-Fermi-liquid properties visible only in a beyond-mean-field treatment were observed also in the study of the Hubbard model on the Lieb lattice in Publication V. \n \nTopological and geometric properties of lattice systems, such as the Berry curvature and Chern numbers, play a central role in Publications II, III and IV. In Publication II we used exact diagonalization, DMFT and mean-field theory to study the topological phase diagram of an interacting Haldane model. The methods consistently predict a phase diagram with an interme-diate topological phase not found in the well-known non-interacting case. In Publications III and IV mean-field theory is used to study the connection between Berry curvature and the superfluid weight in lattice models, and DMFT calculations were used to support the mean-field results. Topological lattice systems have recently been realized in ultracold gas experiments and it is hoped that the calculations presented here inspire this line of research.