We discuss a system of dilute Bose gas confined in a layered structure of stacked square lattices (slab geometry). A derived phase diagram reveals a nonmonotonic dependence of the ratio of tunneling to on-site repulsion on the artificial magnetic field applied to the system. The effect is reduced when more layers are added, which mimics a two- to quasi-three-dimensional geometry crossover. Furthermore, we establish a correspondence between anisotropic infinite (quasi-three-dimensional) and isotropic finite (slab geometry) systems that share exactly the same critical values, which can be an important clue for choosing experimental setups that are less demanding, but still leading to the identical results. Finally, we show that the properties of the ideal Bose gas in a three-dimensional optical lattice can be closely mimicked by finite (slab) systems when the number of two-dimensional layers is larger than 10 for isotropic interactions, or even less when the layers are weakly coupled.

• Received 13 October 2010

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.83.023607