Few-boson dynamics in double wells: From single-atom to correlated-pair tunneling

Abstract

We investigate few-boson tunneling in a one-dimensional double well, covering the full crossover from weak interactions to the fermionization limit of strong correlations. Based on exact quantum-dynamical calculations, it is found that the tunneling dynamics of two atoms evolves from Rabi oscillations to correlated pair tunneling as we increase the interaction strength. Near the fermionization limit, fragmented-pair tunneling is observed and analyzed in terms of the population imbalance and two-body correlations. For more atoms, the tunneling dynamics near fermionization is shown to be sensitive to both atom number and initial configuration.