@article {1467, title = {Phase diagram of the Bose Kondo-Hubbard model}, journal = {Physical Review A}, volume = {84}, year = {2011}, month = {2011/11/16}, abstract = { We study a bosonic version of the Kondo lattice model with an on-site repulsion in the conduction band, implemented with alkali atoms in two bands of an optical lattice. Using both weak and strong-coupling perturbation theory, we find that at unit filling of the conduction bosons the superfluid to Mott insulator transition should be accompanied by a magnetic transition from a ferromagnet (in the superfluid) to a paramagnet (in the Mott insulator). Furthermore, an analytic treatment of Gutzwiller mean-field theory reveals that quantum spin fluctuations induced by the Kondo exchange cause the otherwise continuous superfluid to Mott-insulator phase transition to be first order. We show that lattice separability imposes a serious constraint on proposals to exploit excited bands for quantum simulations, and discuss a way to overcome this constraint in the context of our model by using an experimentally realized non-separable lattice. A method to probe the first-order nature of the transition based on collapses and revivals of the matter-wave field is also discussed. }, doi = {10.1103/PhysRevA.84.053619}, url = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1103.0245v2}, author = {Michael Foss-Feig and Ana Maria Rey} }