Abstract
We study the miscible-immiscible quantum phase transition in a linearly coupled binary Bose-Hubbard model in one dimension that can describe the low-energy properties of a two-component Bose-Einstein condensate in optical lattices. With the quantum many-body ground state obtained from the density matrix renormalization group algorithm, we calculate the characteristic physical quantities of the phase transition controlled by the linear coupling between the two components. Furthermore we calculate the Binder cumulant to determine the critical point and construct the phase diagram. The strong-coupling expansion shows that in the Mott insulator regime the model Hamiltonian can be mapped to a spin-1/2 XXZ model with a transverse magnetic field.