Optical weight transfer in excitation spectra of ultra-cold bosons in two- and three-dimensional optical lattices

We investigate the excitations of strongly interacting bosons confined in an optical lattice. Using the combined Bogoliubov method and the quantum rotor approach, we map the Hamiltonian of strongly interacting bosons onto U(1) phase action. This allows us to calculate the density of states for various geometries of optical lattices and its dependence on the presence of the superfluid phase. We observe that the superfluidity is manifested by a sharp coherence peak resulting from long-range order, while the excitation spectrum of the Mott insulator contains a gap.