Superfluidity of Bosonic Atoms in Multi-Band Optical Lattices

L.-M. Duan

We show that ultracold atoms can be controlled in multi-band optical lattices through spatially periodic Raman pulses for investigation of a class of strongly correlated physics related to the Kondo problem. The underlying dynamics of this system is described by a spin-dependent fermionic or bosonic Kondo-Hubbard lattice model even if we have only spin-independent atomic collision interaction. We solve the bosonic Kondo-Hubbard lattice model through a mean-field approximation, and the result shows a clear phase transition from the ferromagnetic superfluid to the Kondo-singlet insulator at the integer filling.

Andreas Hemmerich

Daniel E. Sheehy, Qin-Qin Lü

Matthias Ölschläger, T. Kock, Georg Wirth +3 more

The study of superconductivity with unconventional order is complicated in condensed matter systems by their extensive complexity. Optical lattices with their exceptional precision and control allow one to emulate superfluidity avoiding many of the complications of condensed matter. A promising approach to realize unconventional superfluid order is to employ orbital degrees of freedom in higher Bloch bands. In recent work, indications were found that bosons condensed in the second band of an optical chequerboard lattice might exhibit p x ± i p y order. Here we present experiments, which provide strong evidence for the emergence of p x ± i p y order driven by the interaction in the local p-orbitals. We compare our observations with a multi-band Hubbard model and find excellent quantitative agreement.

Dirk-Sören Lühmann, Ole Jürgensen, K. Sengstock

We show that multi-orbital and density-induced tunneling have a significant impact on the phase diagram of bosonic atoms in optical lattices. Off-site interactions lead to density-induced hopping, the so-called bond-charge interactions, which can be identified with an effective tunneling potential and can reach the same order of magnitude as conventional tunneling. In addition, interaction-induced higher-band processes also give rise to strongly modified tunneling, on-site and bond-charge interactions. We derive an extended occupation-dependent Hubbard model with multi-orbitally renormalized processes and compute the corresponding phase diagram. It substantially deviates from the single-band Bose–Hubbard model and predicts strong changes of the superfluid-to-Mott-insulator transition. In general, the presented beyond-Hubbard physics plays an essential role in bosonic lattice systems and has an observable influence on experiments with tunable interactions.

Eugene Demler