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Main Author: Zhang, Chao
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.11058
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author Zhang, Chao
author_facet Zhang, Chao
contents We map out the global phase diagram of a single mobile impurity in the two-dimensional Bose-Hubbard model, spanning the bath evolution from a compressible superfluid (SF) to an incompressible Mott insulator (MI) and the full range of impurity-bath coupling. Using sign-problem-free worm-algorithm quantum Monte Carlo, we identify two distinct self-trapping mechanisms that organize the entire diagram. In the compressible SF, increasing impurity-bath coupling $|U_{\mathrm{ib}}|$ drives an interaction-driven self-trapping crossover signaled by a collapse of the \emph{impurity} winding number: a light, extended polaron evolves continuously into a heavy polaron and ultimately into a self-trapped state -- a repulsive \emph{saturated bubble} or an attractive \emph{bound cluster} -- even while the bath remains globally superfluid, demonstrating self-trapping without any bath phase transition. By contrast, when the bath is tuned across the SF-MI transition at fixed $U_{\mathrm{ib}}$, localization is compressibility controlled. The vanishing bath compressibility quenches long-wavelength density redistribution and suppresses polaronic dressing, converting the SF polaron into a weakly dressed, nearly free defect upon entering the MI when $|U_{\mathrm{ib}}| \le 8.0$. Then increasing $|U_{\mathrm{ib}}|$ triggers a distinct Mott-specific route: the impurity binds a quantized vacancy or particle excitation, manifested by discrete changes $ΔN_b=\pm1$ in the total bath occupation. Together, our results provide a unified microscopic picture of impurity self-trapping in correlated lattice bosons, governed by winding collapse in the SF and by compressibility loss and defect quantization across the SF-MI boundary.
format Preprint
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publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Impurity Self-Trapping in Lattice Bose systems
Zhang, Chao
Quantum Gases
We map out the global phase diagram of a single mobile impurity in the two-dimensional Bose-Hubbard model, spanning the bath evolution from a compressible superfluid (SF) to an incompressible Mott insulator (MI) and the full range of impurity-bath coupling. Using sign-problem-free worm-algorithm quantum Monte Carlo, we identify two distinct self-trapping mechanisms that organize the entire diagram. In the compressible SF, increasing impurity-bath coupling $|U_{\mathrm{ib}}|$ drives an interaction-driven self-trapping crossover signaled by a collapse of the \emph{impurity} winding number: a light, extended polaron evolves continuously into a heavy polaron and ultimately into a self-trapped state -- a repulsive \emph{saturated bubble} or an attractive \emph{bound cluster} -- even while the bath remains globally superfluid, demonstrating self-trapping without any bath phase transition. By contrast, when the bath is tuned across the SF-MI transition at fixed $U_{\mathrm{ib}}$, localization is compressibility controlled. The vanishing bath compressibility quenches long-wavelength density redistribution and suppresses polaronic dressing, converting the SF polaron into a weakly dressed, nearly free defect upon entering the MI when $|U_{\mathrm{ib}}| \le 8.0$. Then increasing $|U_{\mathrm{ib}}|$ triggers a distinct Mott-specific route: the impurity binds a quantized vacancy or particle excitation, manifested by discrete changes $ΔN_b=\pm1$ in the total bath occupation. Together, our results provide a unified microscopic picture of impurity self-trapping in correlated lattice bosons, governed by winding collapse in the SF and by compressibility loss and defect quantization across the SF-MI boundary.
title Impurity Self-Trapping in Lattice Bose systems
topic Quantum Gases
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.11058