Abstract
We show that the presence of a harmonic trap may in itself lead to many-body localization for cold atoms confined in that trap in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry. Specifically, the coexistence of delocalized phase in the center of the trap with localized region closer to the edges is predicted with the borderline dependent on the curvature of the trap. The phenomenon, similar in its origin to Stark localization, should be directly observed with cold atomic species. We discuss both the spinless and the spinful fermions, for the latter we address Stark localization at the same time as it has not been analyzed up till now.
Highlights
For a long time, it has been believed that many-body systems tend to thermalize as expressed by eigenstate thermalization hypothesis [1,2]
We show that the presence of a harmonic trap may in itself lead to many-body localization for cold atoms confined in that trap in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry
The results presented here are limited to moderate timescales where we observe no traces of the very slow thermalizing dynamics expected in the harmonic trap [11]
Summary
Coexistence of localized and extended phases: Many-body localization in a harmonic trap. We show that the presence of a harmonic trap may in itself lead to many-body localization for cold atoms confined in that trap in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry. The coexistence of delocalized phase in the center of the trap with localized region closer to the edges is predicted with the borderline dependent on the curvature of the trap. The phenomenon, similar in its origin to Stark localization, should be directly observed with cold atomic species. We discuss both the spinless and the spinful fermions; for the latter we address Stark localization at the same time as it has not been analyzed up until now
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