Topologically bound states, non-Hermitian skin effect and flat bands, induced by two-particle interaction

Abstract: We study theoretically quantum states of two repelling spinless particles in a one-dimensional tight-binding model with simple periodic lattice and open boundary conditions. We demonstrate, that when the particles are not identical, their interaction drives nontrivial correlated two-particle states, such as bound states, edge states as well as interaction-induced flat bands. Specifically, the center-of-mass and relative motions of two particles become coupled in a topologically nontrivial way. By virtue of the non-Hermitian skin effect the localization of the center of mass enforces the localization of the relative motion and formation of the bound states.