Electron-phonon vertex in the two-dimensional one-band Hubbard model

Using quantum Monte Carlo techniques, we study the effects of electronic correlations on the effective electron-phonon (el-ph) coupling in a two-dimensional one-band Hubbard model. We consider a momentum-independent bare ionic el-ph coupling. In the weak- and intermediate-correlation regimes, we find that the on-site Coulomb interaction U acts to effectively suppress the ionic el-ph coupling at all electron and phonon momenta. In this regime, our numerical simulations are in good agreement with the results of perturbation theory to order U². However, entering the strong-correlation regime, we find that the forward-scattering process stops decreasing and begins to substantially increase as a function of U, leading to an effective el-ph coupling which is peaked in the forward direction. Whereas at weak and intermediate Coulomb interactions, screening is the dominant correlation effect suppressing the el-ph coupling, at larger U values irreducible vertex corrections become more important and give rise to this increase. These vertex corrections depend crucially on the renormalized electronic structure of the strongly correlated system.