We study the attractive SU($N$) Hubbard model with particle-hole symmetry. The model is defined on a bipartite lattice with the number of sites $N_A$ $(N_B)$ in the $A$ $(B)$ sublattice. We prove three theorems that allow us to identify the basic ground-state properties: the degeneracy, the fermion number, and the SU($N$) quantum number. We also show that the ground state exhibits charge density wave order when $|N_A-N_B|$ is macroscopically large. The theorems hold for a bipartite lattice in any dimension, even without translation invariance.
Extending the U(1) slave-rotor representation\cite{FG_SRR} of the repulsive Hubbard model, we propose an SU(2) slave-rotor decomposition for the attractive Hubbard model, where the SU(2) slave-rotor variables represent order parameter fluctuations associated with superconductivity and charge density wave. This decomposition method allows us to modify the standard Hartree-Fock mean field theory by incorporating order parameter fluctuations on an equal footing. Deriving an effective SU(2) slave-rotor action from the attractive Hubbard model, and analyzing it at the mean field level, we demonstra…
We use microscopic Bogoliubov-de Gennes formalism to explore the ground-state phase diagram of the single-band attractive Hofstadter-Hubbard model on a square lattice. We show that the interplay between the Hofstadter butterfly and superfluidity breaks spatial symmetry, and gives rise to stripe-ordered superfluid and supersolid phases in large parameter spaces. We also discuss the effects of a trapping potential and comment on the viability of observing stripe-ordered phases with cold Fermi gases.
We study the percolative superconducting transition as the density of randomly placed attractive centers grows in a host metal. Employing the Hubbard-Stratanovich transformation for the interaction and allowing for spatial, thermal fluctuations of the pairing field, we obtain real-space features of the transition from weak to strong coupling. Spectral and transport properties are studied in detail. BCS-BEC crossover is discussed in the context of site dilution of attractive centers.
We study the conditions under which, using a canonical transformation, the phases sought after for the repulsive Hubbard model, namely a Mott insulator in the paramagnetic and anti-ferromagnetic phases, and a putative d-wave superfluid can be deduced from observations in an optical lattice loaded with a spin-imbalanced ultra-cold Fermi gas with attractive interactions, thus realizing the attractive Hubbard model. We show that the Mott insulator and antiferromagnetic phase of the repulsive Hubbard model are in fact more easy to observe as a paired, and superfluid phase respectively, in the attr…
We investigate the competition between superconductivity (SC) and charge density wave (CDW) under a time-dependent periodic field in the attractive Hubbard model. By employing the time-dependent exact diagonalization method, we show that the driving frequency and amplitude of the external field can control the enhancement of either the superconducting pair or the CDW correlations, which are degenerate in the ground state of the half-filled attractive Hubbard model in the absence of the field. In the strong-coupling limit of the attractive Hubbard interaction, the controllability is characteriz…
We study the superconducting Kosterlitz-Thouless transition of the attractive Hubbard model on a two-dimensional triangular lattice using auxiliary field quantum Monte Carlo method for system sizes up to $12\times 12$ sites. Combining three methods to analyze the numerical data, we find, for the attractive interaction of $U=-4t$, that the transition temperature stays almost constant within the band filling range of $1.0 < n < 1.4$, while it is found to be much lower in the $n<1$ region.
We solve the attractive Hubbard model for arbitrary interaction strengths within dynamical mean-field theory. We compute the transition temperature for superconductivity and analyze electron pairing in the normal phase. The normal state is a Fermi liquid at weak coupling and a non-Fermi liquid state with a spin gap at strong coupling. Away from half-filling, the quasi-particle weight vanishes discontinuously at the transition between the two normal states.
We study fermionic superfluidity in strongly anisotropic optical lattices with attractive interactions utilizing the cluster DMFT method, and focusing in particular on the role of non-local quantum fluctuations. We show that non-local quantum fluctuations impact the BCS superfluid transition dramatically. Moreover, we show that exotic superfluid states with delicate order parameter structure, such as the Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov phase driven by spin population imbalance, can emerge even in the presence of such strong fluctuations.
The influence of the Zeeman magnetic field ($h$) on the ground state evolution of superfluid properties from the weak coupling (BCS like) to the strong coupling limit of tightly bound local pairs (LP) with increasing attraction has been studied. The analysis was carried out within the spin-polarized attractive Hubbard model, for a fixed number of particles and a $d=3$ simple cubic lattice. The broken symmetry Hartree approximation was used. For strong attraction and in the dilute limit, the homogeneous magnetized superconducting phase (SC$_M$) was found in the $(h-|U|)$ and ($P-|U|$) diagrams.
We consider the extended Hubbard model in the atomic limit on a Bethe lattice with coordination number z. By using the equations of motion formalism, the model is exactly solved for both attractive and repulsive intersite potential V. By focusing on the case of negative V, i.e., attractive intersite interaction, we study the phase diagram at finite temperature and find, for various values of the filling and of the on-site coupling U, a phase transition towards a state with phase separation. We determine the critical temperature as a function of the relevant parameters, U/|V|, n and z and we fi…
Using the negative U Hubbard model we analyze normal state properties of a superconductor. In this model there exists a characteristic pairing temperature T_P above a superconducting critical temperature. Below T_P electrons start to form incoherent pairs. The fluctuations in charge and phase are precursors of charge density wave and superconductivity phases depending on band filling. They lead naturally to pseudogap opening in the density of states.
Angle-resolved photoemission spectra are calculated microscopically for the two-dimensional attractive Hubbard model. A system of self-consistent T-matrix equations are solved numerically in the real-time domain. The single-particle spectral function has a two-peak structure resulting from the presense of bound states. The spectral function is suppressed at the chemical potential, leading to a pseudogap-like behavior. At high temperatures and densities the pseudogap diminishes and finally disappears; these findings are similar to experimental observations for the cuprates.
Experiments on polarized fermion gases performed by trapping ultracold atoms in optical lattices, allow the study of an attractive Hubbard model for which the strength of the on site interaction is tuned by means of a Feshbach resonance. Using a well-known particle-hole transformation we discuss how results obtained for this system can be reinterpreted in the context of a doped repulsive Hubbard model. In particular we show that the Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO) state corresponds to the striped state of the two-dimensional doped positive U Hubbard model. We then use the results of nu…
We investigate spontaneously symmetry breaking states in the attractive SU($N$) Hubbard model at half filling. Combining dynamical mean-field theory with the continuous-time quantum Monte Carlo method, we obtain the finite temperature phase diagrams for the superfluid state. When $N>2$, the second-order phase transition occurs in the weak coupling region, while the first-order phase transition with the hysteresis appears in the strong coupling region. We also discuss the stability of the density wave state and clarify the component dependence of the maximum critical temperature.
We present the first rigorous example of the Hubbard model in any dimensions which exhibits metallic ferromagnetism. The model is a genuine Hubbard model with short-range hopping and on-site Coulomb repulsion, and has multi single-electron bands. In the limit where the band gap and the Coulomb repulsion become infinite, we prove that the ground states are completely ferromagnetic and at the same time conducting.
We investigate the possibility of unconventional spin density wave (SDW) in the attractive Hubbard model with finite spin polarization. We show that pairing and density fluctuations induce the transverse d-wave SDW near the half-filling. This novel SDW is related to the d-wave superfluidity induced by antiferromagnetic spin fluctuations, in the sense that they are connected with each other through Shiba's attraction-repulsion transformation. Our results predict the d-wave SDW in real systems, such as cold Fermi atom gases with population imbalance and compounds involving valence skipper elemen…
The coexistence of superconducting and charge-density-wave order in the half-filled attractive Hubbard model is interpreted as a consequence of the pseudospin SU(2) symmetry spontaneously broken to a `hidden' subgroup U(1). By topological arguments we show that there must exist new skyrmion textures associated with this symmetry breakdown. This fact is illustrated via a non-linear $σ$-model. Unlike the spin textures previously known in an antiferromagnetic background, doping the model away from half-filling leads the new skyrmions to unwrap.
We contrast the transport properties (dc resistivity, Seebeck coefficient), optical conductivity, spectral functions, dynamical magnetic susceptibility, and the NMR $1/T_1$ spin-lattice relaxation rate of the repulsive and attractive infinite-dimensional Hubbard models in the paramagnetic phase for a generic band filling. The calculations are performed in a wide temperature interval using the dynamical mean-field theory with the numerical renormalization group as the impurity solver. The attractive case exhibits significantly more complex temperature dependences which can be explained by the b…
We study the attractive fermionic Hubbard model on a honeycomb lattice using determinantal quantum Monte Carlo simulations. By increasing the interaction strength U (relative to the hopping parameter t) at half-filling and zero temperature, the system undergoes a quantum phase transition at 5.0 < U_c/t < 5.1 from a semi-metal to a phase displaying simultaneously superfluid behavior and density order. Doping away from half-filling, and increasing the interaction strength at finite but low temperature T, the system always appears to be a superfluid exhibiting a crossover between a BCS and a mole…
The superfluid properties of the attractive Hubbard model in a Zeeman magnetic field, and in the weak coupling regime have been investigated. The temperature and magnetic field dependencies of the order parameter have been analyzed. Furthermore, the temperature vs. magnetic field and temperature vs. spin polarization phase diagrams for the 2D and 3D lattices have been obtained. For some parameters a reentrant transition has been found.
We investigate the electronic and superconducting properties of a negative-U Hubbard model. For this purpose we evaluate a recently introduced variational theory based on Gutzwiller-correlated BCS wave functions. We find significant differences between our approach and standard BCS theory, especially for the superconducting gap. For small values of $|U|$, we derive analytical expressions for the order parameter and the superconducting gap which we compare to exact results from perturbation theory.
We discuss the phase diagram of the extended Hubbard model with both attractive and repulsive local and nonlocal interactions. The extended dynamical mean-field theory (EDMFT) and the dual boson method (DB) are compared. The latter contains additional nonlocal correlation effects that are not incorporated in EDMFT. We find that EDMFT and DB give almost identical results in the attractive $V$ regime, where phase separation occurs. This is quite a difference with the previously studied repulsive $V$ regime, where EDMFT and DB give very different phase boundaries for the checkerboard order phase,…
We have applied the Fast Fourier transform (FFT), which allows to compute efficiently convolution sums, to solve the set of self-consistent T-matrix equations to get the Green function of the two dimensional attractive-U Hubbard modelbelow $T_c$, extending previous calculations of the same authors. Using a constant order parameter $Δ(T)$, we calculated $T_c$ as a function of electron density and interaction strength $U$. These global results deviate from the BCS behavior remarkably.
We analyze the normal phase of the attractive Hubbard model within dynamical mean-field-theory. We present results for the pair-density, the spin-susceptibility, the specific heat, the momentum distribution, and for the quasiparticle weight. At weak coupling the low-temperature behavior of all quantities is consistent with Fermi liquid theory. At strong coupling all electrons are bound pairs, which leads to a spin gap and removes fermionic quasi-particle excitations. The transition between the Fermi liquid phase and the pair phase takes place at a critical coupling of the order of the band-wid…
Fermi gases and liquids display an excitation spectrum that is simply connected, ensuring closed Fermi surfaces. In strongly correlated systems like the cuprate superconductors, the existence of open sheets of Fermi surface known as Fermi arcs indicates a distinctly different topology of the spectrum with no equivalent in Fermi liquid theory. Here, we demonstrate a generic mechanism by which correlation effects in fermionic systems can change the topology of the spectrum. Using diagrammatic Monte Carlo simulations, we demonstrate the existence of disconnected and multiply connected excitation …
Ultracold atoms in optical lattice provides a platform to realize the superfluid (SF) state, a quantum order with paired charge-neutral fermions. In this paper, we studied SF state in the twodimensional attractive Hubbard model with pi-flux on each plaquette. The SF state in the pi-flux lattice model suffers very strong quantum fluctuations and the ground state becomes a possible quantum phase liquid state. In this phase, there exists the Cooper pairing together with a finite energy gap for the atoms, but no long range SF phase coherence exists at zero temperature. In addition, we discussed th…
The phase diagram of the attractive Hubbard model with spatially inhomogeneous interactions is obtained using a single site dynamical mean field theory like approach. The model is characterized by three parameters: the interaction strength, the active fraction (fraction of sites with the attractive interaction), and electron filling. The calculations indicate that in a parameter regime with intermediate values of interaction strength (compared to the bare bandwidth of the electrons), and intermediate values of the active fraction, "non-BCS" superconductivity is obtained. The results of this wo…
We propose a fully microscopic theory of the anomalous normal state of the attractive Hubbard model in the low-density limit that accounts for propagator renormalization. Our analytical conclusions, which focus on the thermodynamic instabilities contained in the self-consistent equations associated with our formulation, have been verified by our comprehensive numerical study of the same equations. The resulting theory is found to contain no transitions at non-zero temperatures for all finite lattices, and we have confirmed, using our numerical studies, that this behaviour persists in the therm…
The extended Hubbard model with an attractive density-density interaction, positive pair hopping, or both, is shown to host topological phases, with a doubly degenerate entanglement spectrum and interacting edge spins. This constitutes a novel instance of topological order which emerges from interactions. When the interaction terms combine in a charge-SU(2) symmetric fashion, a novel partially polarized pseudospin phase appears, in which the topological features of the spin degrees of freedom coexist with long-range $η$-wave superconductivity. Thus, our system provides an example of an interpl…
The influence of a Zeeman magnetic field on the superconducting characteristics of the attractive Hubbard model was investigated. The ground state and temperature phase diagrams were obtained for a fixed number of particles. Two critical magnetic fields were found for the first order phase transition from the superconducting to the normal state for $n\neq 1$. For some range of parameters a reentrant transition was found and gapless superconductivity was obtained. The significance of the Hartree term was also analyzed.
Attractive interaction between fermions can lead to pairing and superfluidity in an optical lattice. In contrast to the `continuum', on a lattice the trap induced density variation can generate a non monotonic profile of the pairing amplitude, and completely modify the spectral signatures of any possible pseudogap phase. Using a tool that fully captures the inhomogeneity and strong thermal fluctuations, we demonstrate how the crucial radio frequency signatures of pairing are `inverted' in a trapped attractive fermion lattice compared to the traditional continuum case. These features would be c…
We calculate the one-electron spectral function of the attractive-U Hubbard model in two dimensions. We work in the intermediate coupling and low density regime and evaluate analytically the self-energy. The results are obtained in a framework based on the self-consistent T-matrix approximation. We also calculate the chemical potential of the bound pairs as a function of temperature. On the basis of this calculation we analyze the low-temperature resistivity and specific heat in the normal state of this system. We compare our results with recent beautiful tunneling experiments in the underdope…
The scaling limit of the higher level Bethe Ansatz (HLBA) equations for a macroscopically half-filled Hubbard chain is considered. These equations practically decouple into three disjoint sets which are again of the BA type, and correspond to the secular equations of three different kinds of dressed particles (one massive and two massless). The finite size corrections and the fine structure of the spectrum show that the massless sector corresponds to a conformal field with central charge c=1 and Gaussian anomalous dimensions. The zero temperature free energy is also calculated and is found to …
We consider the extended Hubbard model with attractive on-site interaction U and nearest-neighbor repulsions V. We construct an effective Hamiltonian H_{eff} for hopping t<<V and arbitrary U<0. Retaining the most important terms, H_{eff} can be mapped onto two XXZ models, solved by the Bethe ansatz. The quantum phase diagram shows two Luttinger liquid phases and a region of phase separation between them. For density n<0.422 and U<-4, singlet superconducting correlations dominate at large distances. For some parameters, the results are in qualitative agreement with experiments in BaKBiO.
The ground-state properties of the Hubbard model with attractive local pairing interactions are investigated in the framework of lattice density-functional theory. A remarkable correlation is revealed between the interaction-energy functional $W[\boldsymbolη]$ corresponding to the Bloch-state occupation-number distribution $η_{\boldsymbol{k}σ}$ and the entropy $S[\boldsymbolη]$ of a system of non-interacting fermions having the same $η_{\boldsymbol{k}σ}$. The relation between $W[\boldsymbolη]$ and $S[\boldsymbolη]$ is shown to be approximately linear for a wide range of ground-state representa…
We provide a new perspective on the pseudogap physics for attractive fermions as described by the three-dimensional Hubbard model. The pseudogap in the single-particle spectral function, which occurs for temperatures above the critical temperature $T_c$ of the superfluid transition, is often interpreted in terms of preformed, uncondensed pairs. Here we show that the occurrence of pseudogap physics can be consistently understood in terms of local excitations which lead to a splitting of the quasiparticle peak for sufficiently large interaction. This effect becomes prominent at intermediate and …
We study the interplay between the Hofstadter butterfly, strong interactions and Zeeman field within the mean-field Bogoliubov-de Gennes theory in real space, and explore the ground states of the attractive single-band Hofstadter-Hubbard Hamiltonian on a square lattice, including the exotic possibility of imbalanced vector potentials. We find that the cooperation between the vector potential and superfluid order breaks the spatial symmetry of the system, and flourish stripe-ordered Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO)-like superfluid and supersolid phases that can be distinguished and chara…
The ground state phase diagram of the two-dimensional attractive Hubbard model with population imbalance is explored using a mean field ansatz. A linear programming algorithm is used to identify the blocked states, such that the population imbalance can be imposed exactly. This allows to explore regions of the number-projected phase diagram that can not be obtained with the conventional Bogoliubov-de Gennes ansatz. The Fulde-Ferrel-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO) phase of pairs with non-zero momentum is found to be the ground state over a wide range of parameters, while phase separation occurs only …
We have made a variational analysis on an evolution of superconductivity from weak to strong coupling regime. In contrast to a crossover without thermodynamic anomaly found in a dilute system, we show the existence of a quantum phase transition near half filling. The transition is driven by charge density waves instabilities. We have found that superconductivity and charge density waves coexist in the presence of a weak intersite repulsion. The ground state phase diagram is determined and the quantum phase transition is an attractive version of the Mott transition.
This short paper summarizes a calculational method for obtaining the dynamical properties of many-body theories formulated in terms of (unrenormalized) bare propagators (and more generally, in terms of meromorphic functions, or convolutions over meromorphic functions) to a very high accuracy. We demonstrate the method by applying it to a T-matrix theory of the attractive Hubbard model in two dimensions. We expand the pair propagator using a partial fraction decomposition, and then solve for the residues and pole locations of such a decomposition using a computer algebra system to an arbitraril…
The critical temperature for the attractive Hubbard model on a square lattice is determined from the analysis of two independent quantities, the helicity modulus, $ρ_s$, and the pairing correlation function, $P_s$. These quantities have been calculated through Quantum Monte Carlo simulations for lattices up to $18\times 18$, and for several densities, in the intermediate-coupling regime. Imposing the universal-jump condition for an accurately calculated $ρ_s$, together with thorough finite-size scaling analyses (in the spirit of the phenomenological renormalization group) of $P_s$, suggests th…
We investigate low-energy excitations of the one-dimensional half-filled SU(4) Hubbard model with an attractive on-site interaction U < 0 using the density matrix renormalization group method as well as a perturbation theory. We find that the ground state is a charge density wave state with a long range order. The ground state is completely incompressible since all the excitations are gapful. The charge gap which is the same as the four-particle excitation gap is a non-monotonic function of U, while the spin gap and others increase with increasing |U| and have linear asymptotic behaviors.
In this work, we adapt the formalism of the dynamical vertex approximation (D$Γ$A), a diagrammatic approach including many-body correlations beyond the dynamical mean-field theory, to the case of attractive onsite interactions. We start by exploiting the ladder approximation of the D$Γ$A scheme, in order to derive the corresponding equations for the non-local self-energy and vertex functions of the attractive Hubbard model. Second, we prove the validity of our derivation by showing that the results obtained in the particle-hole symmetric case fully preserve the exact mapping between the attrac…
The attractive Hubbard model on a 2-D square lattice is studied at low electronic densities using the ladder approximation for the pair susceptibility. This model includes (i) the short coherence lengths known to exist experimentally in the cuprate superconductors, and (ii) two-particle bound states that correspond to electron pairs. We study the quasiparticle lifetimes in both non self-consistent and self-consistent theories, the latter including interactions between the pairs. We find that if we include the interactions between pairs the quasiparticle lifetimes vary approximately linearly wi…
In this work, a two-dimensional one-band Hubbard model is investigated within a two-pole approximation. The model presents a non-local attractive potential $U (U<0)$ that allows the study of d-wave superconductivity and also includes hopping up to second-nearest-neighbors. The two-pole scheme has been proposed to improve the Hubbard-I approximation. The analytical results show a more complex form for the gap $Δ(T)$, when compared to the one obtained in the latter approximation. Indeed, new anomalous correlation functions associated with the superconductivity are involved in the calculation of …
The energy gap between the ground state and the first excited state of the one-dimensional attractive Bose-Hubbard Hamiltonian is investigated in connection with directed polymers in random media. The excitation gap Δis obtained by exact diagonalization of the Hamiltonian in the two- and three-particle sectors and also by an exact Bethe Ansatz solution in the two-particle sector. The dynamic exponent z is found to be 2. However, in the intermediate range of the size L where UL~O(1), U being the attractive interaction, the effective dynamic exponent shows an anomalous peak reaching high values …
We scrutinize the real-frequency structure of the self-energy in the superconducting state of the attractive Hubbard model within the dynamical mean-field theory. Within the strong-coupling superconducting phase which has been understood in terms of the Bose-Einstein condensation in the literature, we find two qualitatively different regions crossing over each other. In one region close to zero temperature, the self-energy depends on the frequency only weakly at low energy. On the other hand, in the region close to the critical temperature, the self-energy shows a pole structure. The latter re…
We study the crossover between the sudden quench limit and the adiabatic dynamics of superconducting states in the attractive Hubbard model. We focus on the dynamics induced by the change of the attractive interaction during a finite ramp time which is varied in order to track the evolution of the dynamical phase diagram from the sudden quench to the equilibrium limit. Two different dynamical regimes are realized for quenches towards weak and strong coupling interactions. At weak coupling the dynamics depends only on the energy injected into the system, whereas a dynamics retaining memory of t…
We apply a wilsonian renormalization group approach to the continuum limit of the attractive $t-t'$ Hubbard model, taken when the Fermi level is at the Van Hove singularity of the density of states. The model has well-defined scaling properties and the effective couplings display an unbounded flow in the infrared. We determine the leading instabilities by computing the different response functions up to $t' = 0.5 t$. The phase diagram shows a large boundary between superconducting and charge-density-wave phases, that merge in a triple point with a phase separation instability. The latter is re…
We consider a Fermi gas that is loaded onto a square optical lattice and subjected to a perpendicular artificial magnetic field, and determine its superfluid transition boundary by adopting a BCS-like mean-field approach in momentum space. The multi-band structure of the single-particle Hofstadter spectrum is taken explicitly into account while deriving a generalized pairing equation. We present the numerical solutions as functions of the artificial magnetic flux, interaction strength, Zeeman field, chemical potential, and temperature, with a special emphasis on the roles played by the density…
We derive an efficient method for treating renormalization contributions at two-loop level within the functional renormalization group in the one-particle irreducible formalism for fermions. It is based on a decomposition of the two-particle vertex in charge, magnetic and pairing channels. The method treats single-particle and collective excitations in all channels on equal footing, allows for the description of symmetry-breaking and captures collective mode fluctuation physics in the infrared. As a first application, we study the superfluid ground state of the two-dimensional attractive Hubba…
A Dynamical Mean Field Theory analysis of the attractive Hubbard model is carried out. We focus on the normal state upon restricting to solutions where superconducting order is not allowed. Nevertheless a clear first-order pairing transition as a function of the coupling takes place at all the electron densities out of half-filling. The transition occurs between a Fermi liquid, stable for $U < U_c$, and an insulating bound pairs phase for $U > U_c$. The spectral function in the Fermi liquid phase is constituted by a low energy structure around the Fermi level (similar to the Kondo resonance of…
It is shown that in the two-dimensional attractive Hubbard model, the mean-field phase transition is replaced by a renormalized classical regime of fluctuations where a pseudogap opens up in the single-particle spectral weight. It is argued that this pseudogap and precursors of the ordered state quasiparticles can occur only in strongly anisotropic quasi two-dimensional materials. This precursor phenomenon differs from preformed local pairs. Furthermore, while critical antiferromagnetic fluctuations would also lead to a pseudogap in the repulsive model, there are some important differences bet…
