Interaction-induced chiral-transport inversion

Li Pan; Qian Liang; Chang-An Yang; Yu Huang; Pengjie Liu; Fanying Xi; Wei Yi; Xiaofan Zhou; Jian-Song Pan

doi:10.1103/w8dc-n153

Letter

Interaction-induced chiral-transport inversion

Li Pan^1,*, Qian Liang^2,3,4,*, Chang-An Yang ¹, Yu Huang ¹, Pengjie Liu¹, Fanying Xi ¹, Wei Yi^5,6,7,8,†, Xiaofan Zhou^9,10,‡, and Jian-Song Pan ^1,11,§

¹College of Physics, Sichuan University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610065, China
²Zhejiang Province Key Laboratory of Quantum Technology and Device, School of Physics, and State Key Laboratory for Extreme Photonics and Instrumentation, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310027, China
³College of Optical Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310027, China
⁴Department of Physics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
⁵Laboratory of Quantum Information, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China
⁶Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Quantum Network, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China
⁷CAS Center For Excellence in Quantum Information and Quantum Physics, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China
⁸Hefei National Laboratory, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230088, China
⁹State Key Laboratory of Quantum Optics and Quantum Optics Devices, Institute of Laser Spectroscopy, Shanxi University, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030006, China
¹⁰Collaborative Innovation Center of Extreme Optics, Shanxi University, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030006, China
¹¹Key Laboratory of High Energy Density Physics and Technology of Ministry of Education, Sichuan University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610065, China

^*These authors contributed equally to this work.
^†Contact author: wyiz@ustc.edu.cn
^‡Contact author: zhouxiaofan@sxu.edu.cn
^§Contact author: panjsong@scu.edu.cn

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Phys. Rev. A 112, L061303 – Published 22 December, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/w8dc-n153

Abstract

We investigate the chiral dynamics of locally interacting bosons in a two-leg flux ladder, where on-site interactions, despite being fully isotropic, counterintuitively reverse the flux-induced chiral transport of density distribution. For a Bose-Einstein condensate (in the mean-field regime), this reversal arises from an interaction-driven dynamical band-occupation inversion, which selectively populates single-particle states of the opposing chirality. Strikingly, the chiral-transport inversion has a few-body, hence beyond-mean-field, origin, as the formation of two-body bound states with reversed chirality dominates the few-body dynamics. This dual pathway, that is, occupation inversion and bound-state formation, underlies the chiral-transport inversion, which challenges the conventional wisdom that isotropic interactions cannot bias density transport. Our work reveals the interplay between interactions and chirality and highlights how correlations engineer exotic quantum transport.

Physical Review A

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