Quantum phases in an optical lattice with a staggered magnetic field

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It is proposed to experimentally study ultracold atoms subjected to a time-modulated optical potential, which simulates the action of a staggered magnetic field upon charged particles confined in a rectangular quasi two-dimensional stationary lattice. At low densities this scenario allows to explore a new chiral quantum phase characterized by a vortex-antivortex lattice, which breaks time-reversal symmetry. In order to prevent deleterious heating from interband transitions and to reach the strongly correlated regime, the motion along one axis of the lattices is frozen out and a Feshbach resonance is used to independently tune the interaction while maintaining a suitable size of the hopping parameters. This will permit us to map out the phase boundaries between various superfluid quantum phases and a Mott insulator.