Perspectives of Polarons

Eduardo C. Marino

Yang Zhao, Paolo Zanardi A, Guanhua Chen

We revisit from a quantum-information perspective a classic problem of polaron theory in one dimension. In the context of the Holstein model we show that a simple analysis of quantum entanglement between excitonic and phononic degrees of freedom allows one to effectively characterize both the small and large polaron regimes as well as the crossover in between. The small (large) polaron regime corresponds to a high (low) degree of bipartite quantum entanglement between the exciton and the phonon cloud that clothes the exciton. Moreover, the self-trapping transition is clearly displayed by a sharp drop of exciton-phonon entanglement.

Nikolay N. Bogolubov, Nikolay N. Bogolubov

Dong-Chen Zheng, Wen, Lin, Renyuan Liao

We consider two heavy impurities immersed in a Bose-Einstein condensate, and calculate the self-energy using the Wilsonian renormalization. The polaron energy, quasiparticle residue and damping rate are extracted from the self-energy. We demonstrate that various effective potentials emerge from the polaron energy under the specific conditions. In the limit of large separation between the impurities, the polaron spectrum converges to the results for a single impurity, exhibiting an attractive-repulsive crossover across the Feshbach resonance. The boundary of this crossover is identified through the analysis of the damping rate. We highlight that repulsive-dominant polarons can exist as long as the impurities are sufficiently close, even when the impurity-boson interactions are attractive. Additionally, we observe that the two impurities become asymptotically free in the repulsive polaron regime. These results are verifiable and offer a fresh perspective on the interaction dynamics between two polarons.

W. Stephan

The single-polaron band structure of the Holstein model in one and two dimensions is studied using a new form of resummed strong-coupling perturbation theory. Well converged results are obtained for phonon frequencies of the order of the hopping integral and strong to intermediate electron-phonon coupling. The polaron band structure at intermediate coupling is shown to deviate markedly from that of a nearest-neighbor tight-binding model, and is in fact similar in shape to the prediction of weak-coupling self-consistent perturbation theory.

Zhenbang Dai, Jon Lafuente-Bartolome, Feliciano Giustino

This article reviews recent theoretical developments in the ab initio study of polarons in materials. The polaron is an emergent quasiparticle that arises from the interaction between electrons and phonons in solids, and consists of an electron or a hole accompanied by a distortion of the crystal lattice. Recent advances in experiments, theory, and computation have made it possible to investigate these quasiparticles with unprecedented detail, reigniting the interest in this classic problem of condensed matter physics. Recent theoretical and computational advances include ab initio calculations of polaron spectral functions, wavefunctions, lattice distortions, and transport and optical properties. These developments provide new insight into polaron physics, but they have evolved somewhat independently from the earlier effective Hamiltonian approaches that laid the foundation of the field. This article aims to bridge these complementary perspectives by placing them within a single unified conceptual framework. To this end, we start by reviewing effective Hamiltonians of historical significance in polaron theory, ab initio techniques based on density functional theory, and many-body first-principles approaches to polarons. After this survey, we outline a general field-theoretic framework that bridges between these diverse approaches to polaron physics. For completeness, we also review recent progress in the study of exciton polarons and self-trapped excitons and their relations to polarons. Beyond the methodology, we discuss recent applications to several classes of materials that attracted attention in the context of polaron physics.