Rotating Spin-1 Bose Clusters

We propose a simple scheme for generating rotating atomic clusters in an optical lattice which produces states with quantum Hall and spin liquid properties. As the rotation frequencies increase, the ground state of a rotating cluster of spin-1 Bose atoms undergoes a sequence of (spin and orbit) transitions, which terminates at an angular momentum L^* substantially lower than that of the boson Laughlin state. The spin-orbit correlations reflect “fermionization” of bosons facilitated by their spin degrees of freedom. We also show that the density of an expanding group of clusters has a scaling form which reveals the quantum Hall and spin structure of a single cluster.