Quantum engineering of Majorana quasiparticles in one-dimensional optical lattices

We propose a feasible way of engineering Majorana-type quasiparticles in ultracold fermionic gases on a one-dimensional (1D) optical lattice. For this purpose, imbalanced ultracold atoms interacting by the spin-orbit coupling should be hybridized with a three-dimensional Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) molecular cloud. By constraining the profile of an internal defect potential we show that the Majorana-type excitations can be created or annihilated. This process is modelled within the Bogoliubov-de Gennes approach. This study is relevant also to nanoscopic 1D superconductors where modification of the internal defect potential can be obtained by electrostatic means.

Transport of Strongly Correlated Bosons in an Optical Lattice

Phase separations induced by a trapping potential in one-dimensional fermionic systems as a source of core-shell structures

Ultracold fermionic gases in optical lattices give a great opportunity for creating different types of novel states. One of them is phase separation induced by a trapping potential between different types of superfluid phases. The core-shell structures, occurring in systems with a trapping potential, are a good example of such separations. The types and the sequences of phases which emerge in such structures can depend on spin-imbalance, shape of the trap and on-site interaction strength. In this work, we investigate the properties of such structures within an attractive Fermi gas loaded in the optical lattice, in the presence of the trapping potential and their relations to the phase diagr…

Critical behaviour in one dimension: unconventional pairing, phase separation, BEC-BCS crossover and magnetic Lifshitz transition

We study the superconducting properties of population-imbalanced ultracold Fermi mixtures in one-dimensional (1D) optical lattices that can be effectively described by the spin-imbalanced attractive Hubbard model (AHM) in the presence of a Zeeman magnetic field. We use the mean-field theory approach to obtain the ground state phase diagrams including some unconventional superconducting phases such as the Fulde--Ferrell--Larkin--Ovchinnikov (FFLO) phase, and the $\eta$ phase (an extremal case of the FFLO phase), both for the case of a fixed chemical potential and for a fixed number of particles. It allows to determine optimal regimes for the FFLO phase as well as $\eta$-pairing stability. We…

Magnetic Lifshitz transition and its consequences in multi-band iron-based superconductors

In this paper we address Lifshitz transition induced by applied external magnetic field in a case of iron-based superconductors, in which a difference between the Fermi level and the edges of the bands is relatively small. We introduce and investigate a two-band model with intra-band pairing in the relevant parameters regime to address a generic behaviour of a system with hole-like and electron-like bands in external magnetic field. Our results show that two Lifshitz transitions can develop in analysed systems and the first one occurs in the superconducting phase and takes place at approximately constant magnetic field. The chosen sets of the model parameters can describe characteristic ban…

Reentrant Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov superfluidity in the honeycomb lattice

We study superconducting properties of population-imbalanced ultracold Fermi mixtures in the honeycomb lattice that can be effectively described by the spin-imbalanced attractive Hubbard model in the presence of a Zeeman magnetic field. We use the mean-field theory approach to obtain ground state phase diagrams including some unconventional superconducting phases such as the Fulde--Ferrell--Larkin--Ovchinnikov (FFLO) phase. We show that this phase is characterized by atypical behaviour of the Cooper pairs total momentum in the external magnetic field. We show that the momentum changes its value as well as direction with change of the system parameters. We discuss the influence of van Hove s…

Low-Temperature Phases in Two-Orbital Hubbard Model Realized with Ultracold Atoms in Optical Lattices

Breaking of SU(4) symmetry and interplay between strongly correlated phases in the Hubbard model

We study the thermodynamic properties of four-component fermionic mixtures described by the Hubbard model using the dynamical mean-field-theory approach. Special attention is given to the system with SU(4)-symmetric interactions at half filling, where we analyze equilibrium many-body phases and their coexistence regions at nonzero temperature for the case of simple cubic lattice geometry. We also determine the evolution of observables in low-temperature phases while lowering the symmetry of the Hamiltonian towards the two-band Hubbard model. This is achieved by varying interflavor interactions or by introducing the spin-flip term (Hund's coupling). By calculating the entropy for different s…

Superfluidity of fermionic pairs in a harmonic trap. Comparative studies: Local Density Approximation and Bogoliubov-de Gennes solutions

Abstract Experiments with ultracold gases on the lattice give the opportunity to realize superfluid fermionic mixtures in a trapping potential. The external trap modifies the chemical potential locally. Moreover, this trap also introduces non-homogeneity in the superconducting order parameter. There are, among other approaches, two methods which can be used to describe the system of two-component mixtures loaded into an optical lattice: the Local Density Approximation (LDA) and the self-consistent Bogoliubov–de Gennes equations. Here, we compare results obtained within these two methods. We conclude that the results can be distinguishable only in the case of a small value of the pairing int…