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Experimentalists have recently been able to engineer non-trivial topological band structures using ultracold atoms in optical lattices. Motivated by ongoing experimental efforts to tune interactions, we explore the interplay between strong correlations and topology in these systems. Focusing on the Haldane-Hubbard honeycomb model as an example, we show that its strongly interacting Mott limit exhibits various chiral magnetic orders, including a wide regime of triple-Q tetrahedral order. Incorporating an additional third-neighbour hopping frustrates and ultimately melts the tetrahedral magnetic order. From analysing low energy spectra, many-body Chern numbers, entanglement spectra, and modular matrices, we identify the molten state as a chiral spin liquid with gapped semion excitations. Our numerical results suggest that this frustration induced melting may be realised as an exotic continuous quantum phase transition. Finally, we discuss recent results which point toward a common mechanism of realising chiral spin liquids in Mott insulators through the continuous melting of non-coplanar magnetic "parent" states.

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Ciaran Hickey, University of Toronto
Seminar Room 0.03, ETP
Contact: Simon Trebst