The boson-fermion model with on-site Coulomb repulsion between fermions

Abstract

The boson-fermion model, describing a mixture of itinerant electrons hybridizing with tightly bound electron pairs represented as hard-core bosons, is here generalized with the inclusion of a term describing on-site Coulomb repulsion between fermions with opposite spins. Within the general framework of the Dynamical Mean-Field Theory, it is shown that around the symmetric limit of the model this interaction strongly competes with the local boson-fermion exchange mechanism, smoothly driving the system from a pseudogap phase with poor conducting properties to a metallic regime characterized by a substantial reduction of the fermionic density. On the other hand, if one starts from correlated fermions described in terms of the one-band Hubbard model, the introduction in the half-filled insulating phase of a coupling with hard-core bosons leads to the disappearance of the correlation gap, with a consequent smooth crossover to a metallic state.