Electron-like and photon-like excitations in an ultracold Bose-Fermi atom mixture

Abstract

We show that the electron-like and photon-like excitations may exist in a three-dimensional Bose-Fermi Hubbard model describing ultracold Bose-Fermi atom mixtures in optical lattices. In a Mott insulating phase of the Bose atoms, these excitations are stabilized by an induced repulsive interaction between 'electrons' if the Fermi atoms are nearly half filling. We suggest to create 'external electric field' so that the electron-like excitation can be observed by measuring the linear density-density response of the 'electron' gas to the 'external field' in a time-of-flight experiment of the mixture. The Fermi surface of the 'electron' gas may also be expected to be observed in the time-of-flight.