We investigate the weak interaction integer quantum Hall (IQH) phase, the intermediate interaction phase identified as a chiral spin liquid (CSL) and the transition between them in the triangular lattice Hofstadter-Hubbard model at a density of one electron per site in an orbital magnetic field corresponding to one-quarter flux per plaquette. Our primary tool is the finite system density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method with both interaction-strength scan and fixed interaction techniques for cylinders of circumference 3, 5, and 7 and lengths up to 240. For the IQH phase, we use single particle exact diagonalization to clarify finite size effects, including an excess charge on the edges of our cylinders, and the limitations of entanglement spectra degeneracies on small circumference cylinders. For both phases, we use DMRG to study the entanglement spectra, the entanglement entropy, and the effect of flux insertion on charge and spin pumping, all of which show key differences between the two phases. To study the transition, we use interaction-strength scans extending between the two phases, and apply a scaling data collapse of a bond-dimerization order parameter to extract critical exponents. We also extract critical behavior from the divergence of correlation lengths on the IQH side, measuring decay away from edges of both the dimerization order parameter and transverse edge currents. The critical behavior and exponents are consistent with an Ising transition in 1+1 dimensions. Finally, we obtain excited states in various quantum number sectors finding that the gap to a charge neutral momentum
π excitation corresponding to fluctuations of the dimerization order parameter closes in the vicinity of the critical point but gaps to other excitations remain large.
A transition between an integer quantum Hall insulator and a chiral spin liquid can become critical without closing the single-electron gap, raising the question of which composite excitations govern the change in topological order. We investigate this question in the
SU(3) triangular-lattice Hofstadter--Hubbard model at one particle per site and magnetic flux
π/3 per triangle. Using infinite density matrix renormalization group calculations, we identify a weak-coupling integer quantum Hall phase and an interaction-driven
SU(3)1 chiral spin liquid. Near the transition, both the neutral and charge-
3e correlation lengths increase substantially, whereas the single-electron correlation length remains short, providing evidence for a Chern--Simons--Higgs critical theory, where a gauge-invariant monopole carries the quantum numbers of a fermionic
SU(3)-singlet trion. We discuss the implications for doping the system and recent experiments on doping
ν=−2/3 fractional quantum anomalous Hall in tMoTe
2.
Recent advances in moiré engineering motivate the study of lattice models of strongly-correlated electrons subjected to substantial orbital magnetic flux. We analyze the triangular lattice Hofstadter-Hubbard model at one-quarter flux quantum per plaquette and a density of one electron per site, where a chiral spin liquid phase may exist between weak-coupling integer quantum Hall and strong-coupling 120
∘ antiferromagnetic phases. We use matrix product state methods and analytical arguments to investigate this model compactified to cylinders of finite circumference. We uncover a glide particle-hole symmetry operation which, we argue, is spontaneously broken at the quantum Hall to spin liquid transition on odd-circumference cylinders. We numerically verify the spontaneous symmetry breaking and further demonstrate that this transition is associated with algebraic long-range correlations of various spin-singlet, charge-neutral operators. For even-circumference cylinders, the transition becomes a crossover associated with a large correlation length that grows substantially with circumference. Our findings suggest that in the two-dimensional limit, the transition to a chiral spin liquid phase is continuous and features critical fluctuations of the current.
Two-dimensional density-matrix renormalization group method is employed to examine the ground-state phase diagram of the Hubbard model on the triangular lattice at half-filling. The calculation reveals two discontinuities in the double occupancy with increasing the repulsive Hubbard interaction
U at ${U}_{\mathrm{c}1}\ensuremath{\sim}7.8t$ and ${U}_{\mathrm{c}2}\ensuremath{\sim}9.9t$ (
t being the hopping integral), indicating that there are three phases separated by first-order transitions. The absence of any singularity in physical quantities for $0\ensuremath{\le}U<{U}_{\mathrm{c}1}$ implies a metallic phase in this regime. For
U>Uc2, the local spin density induced by an applied pinning magnetic field exhibits a three sublattice feature, which is compatible with the ${120}^{\ensuremath{\circ}}$ N\'eel-ordered state realized in the limit of $U\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\ensuremath{\infty}$. For
Uc1<U<Uc2, a response to the applied pinning magnetic field is comparable to that in the metallic phase with a relatively large spin correlation length, but showing neither valence bond nor chiral magnetic order, which therefore resembles gapless spin liquid. However, the spin structure factor for the intermediate phase exhibits the maximum at the
K and ${\mathrm{K}}^{\ensuremath{'}}$ points in the momentum space, which is not compatible to spin liquid with a large spinon Fermi surface. The calculation also finds that the pairing correlation function monotonically decreases with increasing
U and thus the superconductivity is unlikely in the intermediate phase.
Recent experiments in moiré materials have enabled the realization of a variety of exotic quantum phases. In this context, the Hofstadter-Hubbard model has been proposed as a possible setting for hosting chiral spin liquid. Concurrently, significant progress has been recently made in the computational methods for two-dimensional many-body fermion systems, which makes numerically studying this challenging model a real possibility in genuine 2D geometry. Motivated by these advances, we investigate the putative chiral spin liquid phase in the triangular-lattice Hofstadter-Hubbard model using variational Monte Carlo with neural quantum states (NQS) and projected entangled pair states (PEPS). We observe spin-charge separation directly in real space through numerical spin-pumping simulation and real-time spin and charge motion. In addition, in the context of anyonic superconductivity conjectured in this model, we find a positive two-electron binding energy on small systems, but it decreases below our numerical resolution as the system size increases. Our work demonstrates NQS and PEPS as powerful tools, capable of cross-checking each other, for diagnosing topological order and fractionalized excitations in strongly correlated electronic systems.
The suppression of antiferromagnetic ordering in geometrically frustrated Hubbard models leads to a variety of exotic quantum phases including quantum spin liquids and chiral states. Here, we focus on the Hubbard model on one of the simplest frustrated lattice geometries, a triangular lattice. Motivated by the recent realization of ultracold fermionic atoms in triangular optical lattices, we study the properties of the triangular-lattice Hubbard model through a numerical linked-cluster expansion algorithm. We investigate the Mott insulator transition finding a critical interaction
Uc/t=7.0(2) and use spatial two- and three-point correlation functions to explore doped and imbalanced systems. Our results demonstrate that many interesting features occur at temperatures previously obtained for ultracold fermions in optical lattices and are accessible by upcoming experiments. Our calculations will be helpful for thermometry in ultracold atom quantum simulators and can guide experimental searches for exotic quantum phases in atomic triangular Hubbard quantum simulators.