We demonstrate a first order metal-insulator phase transition in the repulsive, fully frustrated, single-band Hubbard model as a function of the coupling to a fermion bath. Time dependent manipulation of the bath coupling allows switching between metallic and insulating states both across the phase transition and within the coexistence region. We propose a simple nanoelectronic device for experimentally realizing dynamic control of the bath coupling. Analysis of the device characteristics shows that it can act as a two-terminal memristor.
We employ an exact solution of the simplest model for pump-probe time-resolved photoemission spectroscopy in charge-density-wave systems to show how, in nonequilibrium the gap in the density of states disappears while the charge density remains modulated, and then the gap reforms after the pulse has passed. This nonequilibrium scenario qualitatively describes the common short-time experimental features in TaS2 and TbTe3 indicating a quasiuniversality for nonequilibrium "melting" with qualitative features that can be easily understood within a simple picture.
We establish the nonequilibrium thermal phases of a voltage driven antiferromagnetic Mott insulator in three dimensions, realised at steady state under a voltage bias. Starting from the Keldysh action for the half filled Hubbard model we derive an effective Langevin equation for the `slow' magnetic variables. The coupling of electrons to these degrees of freedom determine the transport properties. At low temperature we find a voltage-driven discontinuous insulator-metal transition, along with hysteresis. We map the suppression of the Néel temperature $T_N$ and pseudogap temperature $T_{pg}$ wi…
We define, compute and analyze the nonequilibrium differential optical conductivity of the one-dimensional extended Hubbard model at half-filling after applying a pump pulse, using the time-dependent density matrix renormalization group method. The melting of the Mott insulator is accompanied by a suppression of the local magnetic moment and ensuing photogeneration of doublon-holon pairs. The differential optical conductivity reveals $(i)$ mid-gap states related to parity-forbidden optical states, and $(ii)$ strong renormalization and hybridization of the excitonic resonance and the absorption…
We present a formalism based on nonequilibrium dynamical mean field theory (DMFT) which allows to compute the time-resolved X-ray absorption spectrum (XAS) of photo-excited solids. By applying this formalism to the photo-doped half-filled and quarter-filled two-orbital Hubbard models in the Mott insulating regime we clarify how the time-resolved XAS signal reflects the nonequilibrium population of different local states. Apart from the missing broadening associated with continuum excitations, the atomic XAS spectrum computed with the nonthermal state populations provides a good approximation t…
We use time-evolution techniques for (infinite) matrix-product-states to calculate, directly in the thermodynamic limit, the time-dependent photoemission spectra and dynamic structure factors of the half-filled Hubbard chain after pulse irradiation. These quantities exhibit clear signatures of the photoinduced phase transition from insulator to metal that occurs because of the formation of so-called $η$ pairs. In addition, the spin dynamic structure factor loses spectral weight in the whole momentum space, reflecting the suppression of antiferromagnetic correlations due to the buildup of $η$-p…
We study real-time dynamics of a charge carrier introduced into undoped Mott insulator propagating under a constant electric field F on the t-J ladder and square lattice. We calculate quasistationary current. In both systems adiabatic regime is observed followed by the positive differential resistivity (PDR) at moderate fields where carrier mobility is determined. Quantitative differences between ladder and 2-dimensional (2D) system emerge when at large fields both systems enter negative differential resistivity (NDR) regime. In the ladder system Bloch-like oscillations prevail, while in 2D th…
We study equilibrium and nonequilibrium properties of electron-phonon systems described by the Hubbard-Holstein model using the dynamical mean-field theory. In equilibrium, we benchmark the results for impurity solvers based on the one-crossing approximation and slave-rotor approximation against non-perturbative numerical renormalization group reference data. We also examine how well the low energy properties of the electron-boson coupled systems can be reproduced by an effective static electron-electron interaction. The one-crossing and slave-rotor approximations are then used to simulate ins…
We study the nonequilibrium dynamics in the pump-probe spectroscopy of excitonic insulators using the spinless two-orbital model with phonon degrees of freedom in the time-dependent mean-field approximation. We introduce the pulse light as a time-dependent vector potential via the Peierls phase in the Hamiltonian. We find that, in the Bose-Einstein condensation regime where the normal state is semiconducting, the excitonic order is suppressed when the frequency of the pulse light is slightly larger than the band gap, while the order is enhanced when the frequency of the pulse is much larger th…
Charge-density-wave systems have a static modulation of the electronic charge at low temperatures when they enter an ordered state. While they have been studied for decades in equilibrium, it is only recently that they have been examined in nonequilibrium with time-resolved studies. Here, we present the exact solution for the nonequilibrium response of electrons (in the simplest model for a charge density wave) when the system is placed under a strong DC electric field. This allows us to examine the formation of driven Bloch oscillations and how the presence of a current modifies the nonequili…
We develop a method for extracting the steady nonequilibrium current from studies of driven isolated systems, applying it to the model of one-dimensional Mott insulator at high temperatures. While in the nonintegrable model the nonequilibrium conditions can be accounted by internal heating, the integrability leads to a strongly nonlinear dc response with vanishingly small dc conductivity in the linear--response regime. The finding is consistent with equilibrium results for dc limit of the optical conductivity determined in the presence of a weak and decreasing perturbation.
We investigate the quantum mechanical origin of resistive phase transitions in solids driven by a constant electric field in the vicinity of a metal-insulator transition. We perform a nonequilibrium mean-field analysis of a driven-dissipative anti-ferromagnet, which we solve analytically for the most part. We find that the insulator-to-metal transition (IMT) and the metal-to-insulator transition (MIT) proceed by two distinct electronic mechanisms: Landau-Zener processes, and the destabilization of metallic state by Joule heating, respectively. However, we show that both regimes can be unified …
Photo-excited strongly correlated systems can exhibit intriguing non-thermal phases, but the theoretical investigation of them poses significant challenges. In this work, we introduce a generalized Gibbs ensemble type description for long-lived photo-doped states in Mott insulators. This framework enables systematic studies of photo-induced phases based on equilibrium methods, as demonstrated here for the one-dimensional extended Hubbard model. We determine the nonequilibrium phase diagram, which features $η$-pairing and charge density wave phases in a wide doping range, and reveal physical pr…
Photodoped states are widely observed in laser-excited Mott insulators, in which charge excitations are quickly created and can exist beyond the duration of the external driving. Despite the fruitful experimental explorations, theoretical studies on the microscopic models face the challenge to simultaneously deal with exponentially separated time scales, especially in multi-band systems, where the long-time behaviors are often well beyond the reach of state-of-the-art numerical tools. Here, we address this difficulty by introducing a steady-state description of photodoped Mott insulators using…
In order to investigate photoinduced insulator-metal transitions observed in correlated electron systems, we propose a new theoretical method, where we combine a Floquet-matrix method for AC-driven systems with the dynamical mean-field theory. The method can treat nonequilibrium steady states exactly beyond the linear-response regime. We have applied the method to the Falicov-Kimball model coupled to AC electric fields, and numerically obtained the spectral function, the nonequilibrium distribution function and the current-voltage characteristic. The results show that intense AC fields indeed …
We study the nonequilibrium dynamics of photoexcited electrons in the narrow-gap Mott insulator VO$_2$. The initial stages of relaxation are treated using a quantum Boltzmann equation methodology, which reveals a rapid ($\sim$ femtosecond time scale) relaxation to a pseudothermal state characterized by a few parameters that vary slowly in time. The long-time limit is then studied by a Hartree-Fock methodology, which reveals the possibility of nonequilibrium excitation to a new metastable $M_1$ metal phase that is qualitatively consistent with a recent experiment. The general physical picture o…
We study the dynamics of charge-transfer insulators after photo-excitation using the three-band Emery model and a nonequilibrium extension of Hartree-Fock+EDMFT and GW+EDMFT. While the equilibrium properties are accurately reproduced by the Hartree-Fock treatment of the full $p$ bands, dynamical correlations are essential for a proper description of the photo-doped state. The insertion of doublons and holons leads to a renormalization of the charge transfer gap %and $p$ bands and to a substantial broadening of the bands. We calculate the time-resolved photoemission spectrum and optical conduct…
Employing a combination of a sign-free Monte Carlo approach and nonequilibrium Green's function techniques, we study nonequilibrium charge transport in a model heterostructure, where a two-dimensional spin-less Falicov-Kimball system is coupled to two noninteracting leads. We show that the transport characteristic depends sensitively on the electrostatic potential in the system and exhibits different properties for different phases of the Falicov-Kimball model. In particular, pronounced step-like changes of the current and transmission are observed at the phase boundaries, evident even on a lo…
We use a self-consistent strong-coupling expansion for the self-energy (perturbation theory in the hopping) to describe the nonequilibrium dynamics of strongly correlated lattice fermions. We study the three-dimensional homogeneous Fermi-Hubbard model driven by an external electric field showing that the damping of the ensuing Bloch oscillations depends on the direction of the field, and that for a broad range of field strengths, a long-lived transient prethermalized state emerges. This long-lived transient regime implies that thermal equilibrium may be out of reach of the time scales accessib…
We present a systematic study of the nonequilibrium steady states (NESS) in Mott insulators driven by DC or AC electric fields, based on the Floquet dynamical mean-field theory. The results are analyzed using a generalized tunneling formula for the current, which is reminiscent of the Meir-Wingreen formula and provides insights into the relevant physical processes. In the DC case, the spectrum of the NESSs exhibits Wannier-Stark (WS) states associated with the lower and upper Hubbard bands. In addition, there emerge WS sidebands from many-body states. Using the tunneling formula, we demonstrat…
Understanding strongly correlated systems driven out of equilibrium is a challenging task necessitating the simultaneous treatment of quantum mechanics,dynamical constraints and strong interactions. A Mott insulator subjected to a uniform and static electric field is prototypical, raising key questions such as the fate of Bloch oscillations with increasing correlation strength, the approach to a steady state DC transport regime and the role of dissipation in it, and electric field driven phase transitions. We develop here an effective large-N Keldysh field theory for studying nonequilibrium tr…
Nonequilibrium dynamics in correlated materials has attracted attention due to the possibility of characterizing, tuning, and creating complex ordered states. To understand the photoinduced microscopic dynamics, especially the linkage under realistic pump conditions between transient states and remnant elementary excitations, we performed nonperturbative simulations of various time-resolved spectroscopies. We used the Mott antiferromagnetic insulator as a model platform. The transient dynamics of multi-particle excitations can be attributed to the interplay between Floquet virtual states and a…
Metal-insulator transition features as a transformation, from a highly charge conductive state to another state where charge conductivity is greatly suppressed when decreasing the temperature. Here we demonstrate two consecutive transitions in NdNiO3 films with CoFe2O4 capping, in which the metal-insulator transition occurs at 85 K, followed by an unprecedented insulator-metal transition below 40 K. The emerging insulator-metal transition associated with a weak antiferromagnetic behavior is observed in 20 unit cell-thick NdNiO3 with more than 5 unit cell CoFe2O4 capping. Differently, the NdNiO…
The carrier generation in insulators subjected to strong electric fields is characterized by the Landau-Zener formula for the tunneling probability with a nonperturbative exponent. Despite its long history with diverse applications and extensions, study of nonequilibrium steady states and associated current response in the presence of the generated carriers has been mainly limited to numerical simulations so far. Here, we develop a framework to calculate the nonequilibrium Green's function of generic insulating systems under a DC electric field, in the presence of a fermionic reservoir. Using …
In this work, we explore the possibility of emergent nonequilibrium steady states arising from the electric-field-driven Mott insulator via the Keldysh-Floquet dynamical mean field theory (DMFT), which can determine the fully-interacting, nonequilibrium steady-state Green's functions with the noninteracting counterparts as an input to the DMFT self-consistency loop. Unlike the retarded component, obtaining the lesser Green's function for the noninteracting system presents an important obstacle since the thermalization of the noninteracting system still requires a precise understanding of the d…
The elucidation of nonequilibrium states in strongly correlated systems holds the key to emergence of novel quantum phases. The nonequilibrium-induced insulator-to-metal transition is particularly interesting since it reflects the fundamental nature of competition between itinerancy and localization of the charge degrees of freedom. We investigate pulse-excited insulator-to-metal transition of the half-filled one-dimensional extended Hubbard model. Calculating the time-dependent optical conductivity with the time-dependent density-matrix renormalization group, we find that strong mono- and hal…
We study the Hall conductance of a Chern insulator after a global quench of the Hamiltonian. The Hall conductance in the long time limit is obtained by applying the linear response theory to the diagonal ensemble. It is expressed as the integral of the Berry curvature weighted by the occupation number over the Brillouin zone. We identify a topologically driven nonequilibrium phase transition, which is indicated by the nonanalyticity of the Hall conductance as a function of the energy gap m_f in the post-quench Hamiltonian H_f. The topological invariant for the quenched state is the winding num…
The periodic Anderson lattice model for the crystalline electric field (CEF)split 4f quartet states is used to describe the Yb-based Kondo insulators/semiconductors. In the slave-boson mean-field approximation, we derive the hybridized quasiparticle bands, and find that decreasing the hybridization difference of the two CEF quartets may induce an insulator-to-metal phase transition. The resulting metallic phase has a hole and an electron Fermi pockets. Such a phase transition may be realized experimentally by applying pressure, reducing the difference in hybridization of the two CEF quartets.
We derived a simple metal-insulator criterion in analytical form for the doped Mott-Hubbard materials. Its readings closely related to the orbital and spin nature of the ground states of the unit cell. The available criterion readings (metal or insulator) in the paramagnetic phase points to the possibility of the insulator state of doped materials with the forbidden first removal electron states. According to its physical meaning the result is similar to Wilsons criterion in the itinerant electron systems. An application of the criterion to the high-Tc cuprates discussed.
It is well established that for non-interacting electrons, increasing disorder drives a metal into a gapless localized Anderson insulator. While in three dimensions a threshold in disorder must be crossed for the transition, in two dimensions and lower, the smallest amount of disorder destabilizes the metal. The nature of the metal-insulator transition in an interacting system remains unresolved. Here we explore the effect of disorder on a strongly correlated Mott insulator without changing the carrier concentration. Angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) measurements on copper inte…
We use a nonequilibrium implementation of extended dynamical mean field theory to study the effect of dynamical screening in photo-excited Mott insulators. The insertion of doublons and holes adds low-energy screening modes and leads to a reduction of the Mott gap. The coupling to low-energy bosonic modes further- more opens new relaxation channels and significantly speeds up the thermalization process. We also consider the effect of the energy distribution of the doped carriers on the screening.
The metal-insulator transition of the quarter-filled Hubbard model on triangular lattice is studied at the mean field level. We find a quasi-one dimensional metallic state with a collinear magnetic order competes closely with an insulating state with a non-coplanar magnetic order for both signs of the hopping integral $t$. In the strong correlation regime($U/|t|\gg1$), it is found that the metal-insulator transition of the system occurs in a two-step manner. The quasi-one dimensional metallic state with collinear magnetic order is found to be stable in an intermediate temperature region betwee…
We consider a heterostructure of a metal and a barrier with onsite correlation at half filling using unrestricted Hartree Fock. We find that above a certain value of correlation strength in the barrier planes, the system is a Mott insulator, while below this value the system still behaves like a gapless insulator. The energy spectrum is found to be very novel with the presence of multiple gaps. Thus the system remains non metallic for any finite value of correlation.
