Correlation-driven Lifshitz transition and orbital order in a two-band Hubbard model

TL;DR

This paper investigates how electron interactions in a two-band Hubbard model lead to a Lifshitz transition and orbital order changes, revealing complex phase behavior including orbital depletion, topological transitions, and Mott insulating states.

Contribution

It uncovers the interaction-driven Lifshitz transition and orbital order phenomena in a two-band Hubbard model at quarter-filling, extending understanding beyond the half-filling case.

Findings

Interaction induces an effective crystal field splitting.

Narrower band can become completely depleted, causing a Lifshitz transition.

Mott transition can occur before the Lifshitz transition when bandwidths are similar.

Abstract

We study by dynamical mean field theory the ground state of a quarter-filled Hubbard model of two bands with different bandwidths. At half-filling, this model is known to display an orbital selective Mott transition, with the narrower band undergoing Mott localisation while the wider one being still itinerant. At quarter-filling, the physical behaviour is different and to some extent reversed. The interaction generates an effective crystal field splitting, absent in the Hamiltonian, that tends to empty the narrower band in favour of the wider one, which also become more correlated than the former at odds with the orbital selective paradigm. Upon increasing the interaction, the depletion of the narrower band can continue till it empties completely and the system undergoes a topological Lifshitz transition into a half-filled single-band metal that eventually turns insulating. Alternatively, when the two bandwidths are not too different, a first order Mott transition intervenes before the Lifshitz's one. The properties of the Mott insulator are significantly affected by the interplay between spin and orbital degrees of freedom.