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Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice

The control of transport properties is a key tool at the basis of many technologically relevant effects in condensed matter. The clean and precisely controlled environment of ultracold atoms in optical lattices allows one to prepare simplified but instructive models, which can help to better underst...

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Autores principales: Di Liberto, M., Comparin, T., Kock, T., Ölschläger, M., Hemmerich, A., Smith, C. Morais
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Pub. Group 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4284656/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25501387
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ncomms6735
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author Di Liberto, M.
Comparin, T.
Kock, T.
Ölschläger, M.
Hemmerich, A.
Smith, C. Morais
author_facet Di Liberto, M.
Comparin, T.
Kock, T.
Ölschläger, M.
Hemmerich, A.
Smith, C. Morais
author_sort Di Liberto, M.
collection PubMed
description The control of transport properties is a key tool at the basis of many technologically relevant effects in condensed matter. The clean and precisely controlled environment of ultracold atoms in optical lattices allows one to prepare simplified but instructive models, which can help to better understand the underlying physical mechanisms. Here we show that by tuning a structural deformation of the unit cell in a bipartite optical lattice, one can induce a phase transition from a superfluid into various Mott insulating phases forming a shell structure in the superimposed harmonic trap. The Mott shells are identified via characteristic features in the visibility of Bragg maxima in momentum spectra. The experimental findings are explained by Gutzwiller mean-field and quantum Monte Carlo calculations. Our system bears similarities with the loss of coherence in cuprate superconductors, known to be associated with the doping-induced buckling of the oxygen octahedra surrounding the copper sites.
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spelling pubmed-42846562015-01-13 Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice Di Liberto, M. Comparin, T. Kock, T. Ölschläger, M. Hemmerich, A. Smith, C. Morais Nat Commun Article The control of transport properties is a key tool at the basis of many technologically relevant effects in condensed matter. The clean and precisely controlled environment of ultracold atoms in optical lattices allows one to prepare simplified but instructive models, which can help to better understand the underlying physical mechanisms. Here we show that by tuning a structural deformation of the unit cell in a bipartite optical lattice, one can induce a phase transition from a superfluid into various Mott insulating phases forming a shell structure in the superimposed harmonic trap. The Mott shells are identified via characteristic features in the visibility of Bragg maxima in momentum spectra. The experimental findings are explained by Gutzwiller mean-field and quantum Monte Carlo calculations. Our system bears similarities with the loss of coherence in cuprate superconductors, known to be associated with the doping-induced buckling of the oxygen octahedra surrounding the copper sites. Nature Pub. Group 2014-12-11 /pmc/articles/PMC4284656/ /pubmed/25501387 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ncomms6735 Text en Copyright © 2014, Nature Publishing Group, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited. All Rights Reserved. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
spellingShingle Article
Di Liberto, M.
Comparin, T.
Kock, T.
Ölschläger, M.
Hemmerich, A.
Smith, C. Morais
Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
title Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
title_full Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
title_fullStr Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
title_full_unstemmed Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
title_short Controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
title_sort controlling coherence via tuning of the population imbalance in a bipartite optical lattice
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4284656/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25501387
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ncomms6735
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