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Title: Phase diagram of the bosonic Kondo-Hubbard model

Journal Article · · Physical Review. A
;  [1]
  1. JILA, National Institute of Standards and Technology, and University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado 80309 (United States)

We study a bosonic version of the Kondo lattice model with an onsite repulsion in the conduction band, implemented with alkali-metal atoms in two bands of an optical lattice. Using both weak- and strong-coupling perturbation theory, we find that at unit filling of the conduction bosons the superfluid-to-Mott-insulator transition should be accompanied by a magnetic transition from a ferromagnet (in the superfluid) to a paramagnet (in the Mott insulator). Furthermore, an analytic treatment of Gutzwiller mean-field theory reveals that quantum spin fluctuations induced by the Kondo exchange cause the otherwise continuous superfluid-to-Mott-insulator phase transition to be first order. We show that lattice separability imposes a serious constraint on proposals to exploit excited bands for quantum simulations, and discuss a way to overcome this constraint in the context of our model by using an experimentally realized nonseparable lattice. A method to probe the first-order nature of the transition based on collapses and revivals of the matter-wave field is also discussed.

OSTI ID:
22093600
Journal Information:
Physical Review. A, Vol. 84, Issue 5; Other Information: (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1050-2947
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English