Wilson fermions and axion electrodynamics in optical lattices

We show that ultracold Fermi gases in optical superlattices can be used as quantum simulators of relativistic lattice fermions in 3 þ 1 dimensions. By exploiting laser-assisted tunneling, we find an analogue of the so-called naive Dirac fermions, and thus provide a realization of the fermion doublin...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Bermúdez Carballo, Alejandro, Mazza, L., Rizzi, M., Goldman, N., Lewenstein, M., Martín-Delgado Alcántara, Miguel Ángel
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2010
País:España
Institución:Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM)
Repositorio:Docta Complutense
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:docta.ucm.es:20.500.14352/42833
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/42833
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:53
Magnetic-fields
Ultracold gases
Surfaces-states
Neutral atoms
Condensate
Invariance
Physics.
Física-Modelos matemáticos
Descripción
Sumario:We show that ultracold Fermi gases in optical superlattices can be used as quantum simulators of relativistic lattice fermions in 3 þ 1 dimensions. By exploiting laser-assisted tunneling, we find an analogue of the so-called naive Dirac fermions, and thus provide a realization of the fermion doubling problem. Moreover, we show how to implement Wilson fermions, and discuss how their mass can be inverted by tuning the laser intensities. In this regime, our atomic gas corresponds to a phase of matter where Maxwell electrodynamics is replaced by axion electrodynamics: a 3D topological insulator.