Strong coupling theory for the Jaynes-Cummings-Hubbard model

We present an analytic strong-coupling approach to the phase diagram and elementary excitations of the Jaynes-Cummings-Hubbard model describing a superfluid-insulator transition of polaritons in an array of coupled QED cavities. In the Mott phase, we find four modes corresponding to particle/hole excitations with lower and upper polaritons, respectively. Simple formulas are derived for the dispersion relation and spectral weights within a strong-coupling random-phase approximation (RPA). The phase boundary is calculated beyond RPA by including the leading correction due to quantum fluctuations.