We study the ground state of a Hamiltonian introduced by Kolb and Penson for modelling situations in which small electron pairs are formed. The Hamiltonian consists of a tight binding band term, and a term describing the nearest neighbour hopping of electron pairs. We give a Gutzwiller-type variational treatment, first with a single-parameter Ansatz treated in the single site Gutzwiller approximation, and then with more complicated trial wave functions, and an improved Gutzwiller approximation. The calculation yields a transition from a partially paired normal state, in which the spin susceptibility has a diminished value, into a fully paired state.
Phase transitions in the one-dimensional pair-hopping model: A renormalization-group study