arXiv subjects

Friedemann Queisser

Publications and source records attributed to Friedemann Queisser.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Evolution of terahertz third harmonic response across rare-earth nickelate phase-diagram

High harmonic generation (HHG) is a sensitive probe for investigating electronic structures and dynamics of materials and a source for attosecond pulses. In particular, HHG with terahertz (THz) light can enable probing of nonlinear responses in correlated materials arising from low-energy many-body interactions. However, THz HHG studies have so far largely focused on topological materials and superconductors, leaving out other potential material systems which could also become efficient THz HHG sources. Here, we report THz third harmonic generation (THG) in rare-earth nickelates -- a prototype material for exploring the Mott insulator-metal transition and related technological applications. We find that the THG amplitude is highly sensitive to the strengths of electronic and magnetic phases of nickelates. In films with sharp phase-transitions, the local maximum and minimum in the temperature-dependent THG amplitude coincide with insulator-metal and magnetic transition temperatures, respectively. While in films with weaker transitions, these features shift toward lower temperatures or even monotonous THG enhancement is observed down to low temperatures. We developed a generalized theory for THz harmonic generation in negative charge-transfer insulators and outlined strategies to enhance the THz nonlinearities further. Our study broadens the scope of THz HHG studies and related applications to strongly correlated materials.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2026

Disorder-induced localisation in the Mott-Hubbard model

For the Fermi-Hubbard model in the Mott insulator phase, we employ the hierarchy of correlations to study how doublon and holon quasi-particle excitations are affected by adding disorder to the system. We study two types of disorder: charge disorder, in the form of on-site potential randomness; and spin disorder, in the form of a fixed, randomly generated background spin arrangement. By analysing the quasi-particle eigen-spectra and quantifying the degree to which the corresponding eigen-states localise, we find both an energetic and spatial separation between localised and delocalised states in the charge disorder. In contrast, the spin disorder results in localised states throughout the quasi-particle bands. Finally, we repeat our calculations using strong-coupling perturbation theory, and compare the results obtained from both methods.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2026

Higher harmonics in Mott-Hubbard insulators as sensors

Using strong-coupling time-dependent perturbation theory, we study the response of Mott and charge-transfer insulators to an oscillating electric field. We derive analytical expressions for the resulting higher-harmonic currents and show that they encode information about spin order and microscopic hopping pathways. The results demonstrate that higher harmonics can serve as probes of correlated materials and as sensors of the applied driving field.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2025

Magneto-photoelectric effect in graphene via tailored potential landscapes

We consider the propagation of charge carriers in planar graphene under the combined influence of a constant transversal magnetic field $B$ and an in-plane varying electric potential $ϕ(x)$. By suitably designing the potential landscape $ϕ(x)$, we may effectively steer charge carriers generated by photo-excitation, for example, in order to achieve an efficient charge separation. These finding may pave the way for transport schemes or photoelectric/photovoltaic applications.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2025

Kibble-Zurek dynamics in the anisotropic Ising model of the Si(001) surface

As a simplified description of the non-equilibrium dynamics of buckled dimers on the Si(001) surface, we consider the anisotropic 2D Ising model and study the freezing of spatial correlations during a cooling quench across the critical point. Depending on the cooling rate, we observe a crossover from 1D to 2D behavior. For rapid cooling, we find effectively 1D behavior in the strongly coupled direction, for which we provide an exact analytic solution of the non-equilibrium dynamics. For slower cooling rates, we start to see 2D behavior where our numerical simulations show an approach to the usual Kibble-Zurek scaling in 2D.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2024

Quasi-particle propagation across semiconductor-Mott insulator interfaces

As a prototypical example for a heterostructure combining a weakly and a strongly interacting quantum many-body system, we study the interface between a semiconductor and a Mott insulator. Via the hierarchy of correlations, we derive and match the propagating or evanescent (quasi) particle solutions on both sides and assume that the interactions among the electrons in the semiconducting regions can be absorbed by an effective potential. While the propagation is described by a band-like dispersion in both the weakly and the strongly interacting case, the inverse decay length across the interface follows a different dependence on the band gap in the Mott insulator and the semiconductor. As one consequence, tunnelling through a Mott insulating layer behaves quite differently from a semiconducting (or band insulating) layer. For example, we find a strong suppression of tunnelling for energies in the middle between the upper and lower Hubbard band of the Mott insulator.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2024

Continuous Dimer Angles on the Silicon Surface: Critical Properties and the Kibble-Zurek Mechanism

Langevin dynamics simulations are used to analyze the static and dynamic properties of an {XY} model adapted to dimers forming on Si(001) surfaces. The numerics utilise high-performance parallel computation methods on GPUs. The static exponent $ν$ of the symmetry-broken XY model is determined to $ν= 1.04$. The dynamic critical exponent $z$ is determined to $z = 2.13$ and, together with $ν$, shows the behavior of the Ising universality class. For time-dependent temperatures, we observe frozen domains and compare their size distribution with predictions from Kibble-Zurek theory. We determine a significantly larger quench exponent that shows little dependence on the damping or the symmetry-breaking field.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2024

Floquet analysis of a superradiant many-qutrit refrigerator

We investigate superradiant enhancements in the refrigeration performance of a set of $N$ three-level systems that are collectively coupled to a hot and a cold thermal reservoir and are additionally subject to collective periodic (circular) driving. Assuming the system-reservoir coupling to be weak, we explore the regime of stronger periodic driving strengths by comparing collective weak driving, Floquet-Lindblad, and Floquet-Redfield master equations. We identify regimes where the power injected by the periodic driving is used to pump heat from the cold to the hot reservoir and derive analytic sufficient conditions for them based on a cycle analysis of the Floquet-Lindblad master equation. In those regimes, we also argue for which parameters collective enhancements like a quadratic scaling of the cooling current with $N$ can be expected and support our arguments by numerical simulations.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2023

Back-reaction and correlation effects on pre-thermalization in Mott-Hubbard systems

For the Fermi-Hubbard model in the strongly interacting Mott insulator state, we study the pre-thermalization dynamics after a quench. To this end, we employ the method of the hierarchy of correlations and compare different levels of accuracy. To leading order, the usual free quasi-particle dynamics (as encoded in the two-point correlation functions) yields the standard picture of pre-thermalization. Taking into account the back-reaction of these quasi-particle fluctuations onto the mean-field background as the first next-to-leading order effect, we observe a strong degradation of pre-thermalization, especially in low dimensions. In contrast, the inclusion of three-point correlations enhances pre-thermalization.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Attraction versus repulsion between doublons or holons in Mott-Hubbard systems

For the Mott insulator state of the Fermi-Hubbard model in the strong-coupling limit, we study the interaction between quasi-particles in the form of doublons and holons. Comparing different methods -- the hierarchy of correlations, strong-coupling perturbation theory, and exact analytic solutions for the Hubbard tetramer -- we find an effective interaction between doublons and/or holons to linear order in the hopping strength $T$ which can display attractive as well as repulsive contributions, depending on the involved momenta. Finally, we speculate about the implications of our findings for high-temperature superconductivity.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Dynamically Assisted Tunneling in the Floquet Picture

We study how tunneling through a potential barrier $V(x)$ can be enhanced by an additional harmonically oscillating electric field ${\mathfrak E}(t)={\mathfrak E}_0\cos(ωt)$. To this end, we transform into the Kramers-Henneberger frame and calculate the coupled Floquet channels numerically. We find distinct signatures of resonances when the incident energy $E$ equals the driving frequency $ω=E$ which clearly shows the breakdown of the time-averaged potential approximation. As a simple model for experimental applications (e.g., in solid state physics), we study the rectangular potential, which can also be benchmarked with respect to analytical results. Finally, we consider the truncated Coulomb potential relevant for nuclear fusion.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2023

Higher-harmonic generation in the driven Mott-Hubbard model

Using Floquet theory and the hierarchy of correlations, we study the non-equilibrium dynamics of the Mott insulator state in the Fermi-Hubbard model under the influence of a harmonically oscillating electric field representing the pump laser. After deriving the associated Floquet exponents, we consider higher-harmonic generation where the strongest signal is obtained if the driving frequency equals one third of the Mott gap.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Doublon-holon pair creation in Mott-Hubbard systems in analogy to QED

Via the hierarchy of correlations, we study doublon-holon pair creation in the Mott state of the Fermi-Hubbard model induced by a time-dependent electric field. Special emphasis is placed on the analogy to electron-positron pair creation from the vacuum in quantum electrodynamics (QED). We find that the accuracy of this analogy depends on the spin structure of the Mott background. For Ising type anti-ferromagnetic order, we derive an effective Dirac equation. A Mott state without any spin order, on the other hand, does not explicitly display such a quasi-relativistic behavior.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2022

Environment-induced decay dynamics of anti-ferromagnetic order in Mott-Hubbard systems

We study the dissipative Fermi-Hubbard model in the limit of weak tunneling and strong repulsive interactions, where each lattice site is tunnel-coupled to a Markovian fermionic bath. For cold baths at intermediate chemical potentials, the Mott insulator property remains stable and we find a fast relaxation of the particle number towards half filling. On longer time scales, we find that the anti-ferromagnetic order of the Mott-Néel ground state on bi-partite lattices decays, even at zero temperature. For zero and non-zero temperatures, we quantify the different relaxation time scales by means of waiting time distributions which can be derived from an effective (non-Hermitian) Hamiltonian and obtain fully analytic expressions for the Fermi-Hubbard model on a tetramer ring.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2021

Optical absorption and carrier multiplication at graphene edges in a magnetic field

We study optical absorption at graphene edges in a transversal magnetic field. The magnetic field bends the trajectories of particle- and hole excitations into antipodal direction which generates a directed current. We find a rather strong amplification of the edge current by impact ionization processes. More concretely, the primary absorption and the subsequent carrier multiplication is analyzed for a graphene fold and a zigzag edge. We identify exact and approximate selection rules and discuss the dependence of the decay rates on the initial state.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2021

Dynamically assisted tunneling in the impulse regime

We study the enhancement of tunneling through a potential barrier $V(x)$ by a time-dependent electric field with special emphasis on pulse-shaped vector potentials such as $A_x(t)=A_0/\cosh^2(ωt)$. In addition to the known effects of pre-acceleration and potential deformation already present in the adiabatic regime, as well as energy mixing in analogy to the Franz-Keldysh effect in the non-adiabatic (impulse) regime, the pulse $A_x(t)$ can enhance tunneling by ``pushing'' part of the wave-function out of the rear end of the barrier. Besides the natural applications in condensed matter and atomic physics, these findings could be relevant for nuclear fusion, where pulses $A_x(t)$ with $ω=1~\rm keV$ and peak field strengths of $10^{16}~\rm V/m$ might enhance tunneling rates significantly.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2020

Comment on "Enhanced deuterium-tritium fusion cross sections in the presence of strong electromagnetic fields"

In their article [Phys.\ Rev.\ C {\bf 100}, 064610 (2019)], Lv, Duan, and Liu study the enhancement of deuterium-tritium fusion reactions by the electromagnetic field of an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL). While we support the general idea (which was put forward earlier in our rapid communication [Phys.\ Rev.\ C {\bf 100}, 041601(R) (2019)]), we find that the time-averaged potential approximation used by Lv, Duan, and Liu is not justified in this regime and does not take into account important effects. Due to those effects, the enhancement mechanism may actually be more efficient than predicted by Lv, Duan, and Liu.

nucl-th↗

arXiv2019

Boltzmann relaxation dynamics of strongly interacting spinless fermions on a lattice

Motivated by the recent interest in non-equilibrium phenomena in quantum many-body systems, we study strongly interacting fermions on a lattice by deriving and numerically solving quantum Boltzmann equations that describe their relaxation to thermodynamic equilibrium.The derivation is carried out by inspecting the hierarchy of correlations within the framework of the 1/Z-expansion. Applying the Markov approximation, we obtain the dynamic equations for the distribution functions. Interestingly, we find that in the strong-coupling limit, collisions between particles and holes dominate over particle-particle and hole-hole collisions -- in stark contrast to weakly interacting systems. As a consequence, our numerical simulations show that the relaxation time scales strongly depend on the type of excitations (particles or holes or both) that are initially present.

quant-ph↗