We consider a lattice version of the ``negative-
U′′ Hubbard model in three dimensions, to study the crossover from a superconducting phase transition (dominated by phase fluctuation) to a regime where the amplitude of the superconducting order parameter controls the critical temperature. Starting from a fermionic Hamiltonian, we give a microscopic derivation of the effective action in terms of the relevant physical fields: the modulus and phase of the superconducting order parameter. Furthermore, by employing to the resulting coarse--grained quantum
XY model the phase fluctuation algebra between number and phase operators (given by the Euclidean group
E2), we map the ``phase-only'' action onto a solvable quantum spherical model. We establish the self--consistent theory (involving both fermionic and bosonic degrees of freedom), and calculate the superconducting phase coherence transition temperature
Tc as a function of the coupling strength
∣U∣, exhibiting a maximum where the behavior crosses over from BCS to Bose-Einstein (BE) condensation. We examine a pseudogap in the normal state which emerges naturally as a precursor of superconductivity at the second characteristic temperature
Tg due to a state with bound pairs but without long--range phase coherence. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the reduced gaps of the model $2{\ensuremath{\Delta}}_{0}{/k}_{B}{T}_{g}\ensuremath{\sim}4$ is almost independent on the pairing strength
∣U∣/t, whereas $2{\ensuremath{\Delta}}_{0}{/k}_{B}{T}_{c}$ increases with increasing
∣U∣---in striking analogy with the phenomenology of the high--temperature cuprate superconductors when interpreted in terms of the BCS-BC crossover scenario.
The superfluid characteristics of the attractive Hubbard model are analyzed for any coupling |U| and arbitrary electron concentration (0n2) by means of the slave-boson mean-field method and also by the perturbative treatment of the strong-coupling limit. The slave boson method takes into account correlations of electrons and yields a reliable description of the crossover from BCS-type superconductivity to local pair (composite bosons) superconductivity with increasing |U|. The results for the ground state (the free energy, the gap in the excitation spectrum) and the electromagnetic characteristics (the critical magnetic field, the London penetration depth, the coherence length) are compared with those obtained by the Hartree-Fock approximation and by the self-consistent second-order perturbation theory in the weak-coupling limit as well as with those obtained using perturbational approaches in the strong-coupling limit. We show that the slave-boson method, in contrast to the Hartree-Fock approximation, gives credible results for all investigated quantities in the whole interaction range, interpolating smoothly between the BCS and local pair regimes. A comparison of theoretical predictions for our simple model with experimental data for various families of short-coherence-length superconductors suggests that the best agreement can be obtained for intermediate values of the local attraction. \textcopyright{} 1996 The American Physical Society.
We study the superconducting transition in the attractive Hubbard model in two dimensions using the self-consistent T -matrix approximation. We demonstrate that for large systems, this approximate method produces XY critical scaling in the correlation length and pair susceptibility. Our data also exhibits XY finite-size scaling. For the parameters considered, the critical regime is quite large, extending beyond 5 times T KTB . We discuss the role of vortex-pair unbinding in the normal state in the context of pseudogap behaviour and the relevance to the physics of underdoped cuprates.
In this paper we address the behavior of the superfluid transition temperature
Tc in the attractive Hubbard model. The attractive Hubbard model can be regarded as the generalization of the BCS to Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) crossover to a lattice and, as such, may have implications for future optical lattice studies. Nevertheless, the BEC limit of the Hubbard model is very different from that of the better-studied Fermi gases, owing to the strong intersite repulsion between pairs. Here we address systematically the effects of pairing fluctuations for all filling fractions over the entire range of attractive interaction strength. A central conclusion of our work is that in a lattice, around half filling, the smooth evolution from the BCS to the BEC limits is interrupted:
Tc vanishes when the system approaches the bosonic regime with increasing interaction strength. We suggest that this interruption of crossover may signal a quantum critical transition to another form of superfluid not continuously connected to a BCS-like phase. A simple variational ansatz for an alternate ground state in this more strongly coupled superfluid is presented. A generalization of the (
s-wave) Hubbard model to
d-wave pairing allows us to address issues of relevance to high-
Tc superconductivity. The phase diagram (representing the pairing or pseudogap onset temperature
T∗ and
Tc) shows that here too one observes a vanishing of
Tc when
T∗ becomes sufficiently large. Given this predicted breakdown of the crossover, and given the striking similarity to features of the cuprate phase diagram, we suggest that future experiments on ultracold fermions in optical lattices should not be exclusively limited to the repulsive Hubbard model, but should address the attractive model in order to elucidate features of high-temperature superconductivity.
The two-dimensional attractive Hubbard model is studied in the weak-to-intermediate-coupling regime by employing a nonperturbative approach. It is shown that this approach is in quantitative agreement with Monte Carlo calculations for both single-particle and two-particle quantities. Both the density of states and the single-particle spectral weight show a pseudogap at the Fermi energy below some characteristic temperature
T∗, also in good agreement with quantum Monte Carlo calculations. The pseudogap is caused by critical pairing fluctuations in the low-temperature renormalized classical regime $(\ensuremath{\Elzxh}\ensuremath{\omega}<{k}_{B}T)$ of the two-dimensional system. With increasing temperature the spectral weight fills in the pseudogap instead of closing it, and the pseudogap appears earlier in the density of states than in the spectral function. Small temperature changes around
T∗ can modify the spectral weight over frequency scales much larger than temperature. Several qualitative results for the s-wave case should remain true for d-wave superconductors.
By means of the functional-integral formulation we discuss the occurrence of superconductivity resulting from Bose-Einstein condensation within a model describing preformed pairs which coexist in thermal equilibrium with unpaired fermions. At saddle-point level we study the thermodynamic properties of the model as functions of the boson excitation energy $\ensuremath{\nu},$ discussing the results in connection with the phenomenology of the pseudogap state of the superconducting cuprates. For temperatures above the Bose-Einstein condensation temperature
Tc we also analyze the effects of Gaussian fluctuations on the critical temperature and on the boson spectrum. Finally, we compare the bosonic effective action which controls thermal fluctuations of the mixture to the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau functional of an interacting fermionic system at intermediate coupling.