title: First-order phase transitions in optical lattices with tunable three-body onsite interaction.
abstract: We study the two-dimensional Bose-Hubbard model in the presence of a three-body interaction term, both at a mean-field level and via quantum Monte Carlo simulations. The three-body term is tuned by coupling the triply occupied states to a trapped universal trimer. We find that, for a sufficiently attractive three-body interaction, the n=2 Mott lobe disappears and the system displays first-order phase transitions separating the n=1 from the n=3 lobes and the n=1 and n=3 Mott insulator from the superfluid. We also analyze the effect of finite temperature and find that transitions are still of first order at temperatures T~J, where J is the hopping matrix element.
authors.affiliation: ITAMP, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Safavi-Naini
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: von Stecher
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Capogrosso-Sansone
authors.forename: Seth T
authors.initials: ST
authors.lastname: Rittenhouse