Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Bridging nano-optics and condensed matter formalisms in a unified description of inelastic scattering of relativistic electron beams

  Hugo Lourenço-Martins, Axel Lubk, Mathieu Kociak

  SciPost Phys. 10, 031 (2021) · published 10 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  In the last decades, the blossoming of experimental breakthroughs in the domain of electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS) has triggered a variety of theoretical developments. Those have to deal with completely different situations, from atomically resolved phonon mapping to electron circular dichroism passing by surface plasmon mapping. All of them rely on very different physical approximations and have not yet been reconciled, despite early attempts to do so. As an effort in that direction, we report on the development of a scalar relativistic quantum electrodynamic (QED) approach of the inelastic scattering of fast electrons. This theory can be adapted to describe all modern EELS experiments, and under the relevant approximations, can be reduced to any of the last EELS theories. In that aim, we present in this paper the state of the art and the basics of scalar relativistic QED relevant to the electron inelastic scattering. We then give a clear relation between the two once antagonist descriptions of the EELS, the retarded green Dyadic, usually applied to describe photonic excitations and the quasi-static mixed dynamic form factor (MDFF), more adapted to describe core electronic excitations of material. We then use this theory to establish two important EELS-related equations. The first one relates the spatially resolved EELS to the imaginary part of the photon propagator and the incoming and outgoing electron beam wavefunction, synthesizing the most common theories developed for analyzing spatially resolved EELS experiments. The second one shows that the evolution of the electron beam density matrix is proportional to the mutual coherence tensor, proving that quite universally, the electromagnetic correlations in the target are imprinted in the coherence properties of the probing electron beam.

  7 citations

• On quantum separation of variables beyond fundamental representations

  Jean Michel Maillet, Giuliano Niccoli

  SciPost Phys. 10, 026 (2021) · published 4 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We describe the extension, beyond fundamental representations of the Yang-Baxter algebra, of our new construction of separation of variables bases for quantum integrable lattice models. The key idea underlying our approach is to use the commuting conserved charges of the quantum integrable models to generate bases in which their spectral problem is separated, i.e. in which the wave functions are factorized in terms of specific solutions of a functional equation. For the so-called "non-fundamental" models we construct two different types of SoV bases. The first is given from the fundamental quantum Lax operator having isomorphic auxiliary and quantum spaces and that can be obtained by fusion of the original quantum Lax operator. The construction essentially follows the one we used previously for fundamental models and allows us to derive the simplicity and diagonalizability of the transfer matrix spectrum. Then, starting from the original quantum Lax operator and using the full tower of the fused transfer matrices, we introduce a second type of SoV bases for which the proof of the separation of the transfer matrix spectrum is naturally derived. We show that, under some special choice, this second type of SoV bases coincides with the one associated to Sklyanin's approach. Moreover, we derive the finite difference type (quantum spectral curve) functional equation and the set of its solutions defining the complete transfer matrix spectrum. This is explicitly implemented for the integrable quantum models associated to the higher spin representations of the general quasi-periodic Y(gl2) Yang-Baxter algebra. Our SoV approach also leads to the construction of a Q-operator in terms of the fused transfer matrices. Finally, we show that the Q-operator family can be equivalently used as the family of commuting conserved charges enabling to construct our SoV bases.

  6 citations

• OASIS: Optimal Analysis-Specific Importance Sampling for event generation

  Konstantin T. Matchev, Prasanth Shyamsundar

  SciPost Phys. 10, 034 (2021) · published 15 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We propose a technique called Optimal Analysis-Specific Importance Sampling (OASIS) to reduce the number of simulated events required for a high-energy experimental analysis to reach a target sensitivity. We provide recipes to obtain the optimal sampling distributions which preferentially focus the event generation on the regions of phase space with high utility to the experimental analyses. OASIS leads to a conservation of resources at all stages of the Monte Carlo pipeline, including full-detector simulation, and is complementary to approaches which seek to speed-up the simulation pipeline.

  6 citations

• Double soft theorem for generalised biadjoint scalar amplitudes

  Md. Abhishek, Subramanya Hegde, Dileep P. Jatkar, Arnab Priya Saha

  SciPost Phys. 10, 036 (2021) · published 16 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study double soft theorem for the generalised biadjoint scalar field theory whose amplitudes are computed in terms of punctures on $\mathbb{CP}^{k-1}$. We find that whenever the double soft limit does not decouple into a product of single soft factors, the leading contributions to the double soft theorems come from the degenerate solutions, otherwise the non degenerate solutions dominate. Our analysis uses the regular solutions to the scattering equations. Most of the results are presented for $k=3$ but we show how they generalise to arbitrary $k$. We have explicit analytic results, for any $k$, in the case when soft external states are adjacent.

  5 citations

• Dark Matter EFT, the Third -- Neutrino WIMPs

  Ingolf Bischer, Tilman Plehn, Werner Rodejohann

  SciPost Phys. 10, 039 (2021) · published 17 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Sterile neutrinos coupling only to third-generation fermions are attractive dark matter candidates. In an EFT approach we demonstrate that they can generate the observed relic density without violating constraints from direct and indirect detection. Such an EFT represents a gauged third-generation $B-L$ model, as well as third-generation scalar or vector leptoquarks. LHC measurements naturally distinguish the different underlying models.

  4 citations

• Mapping current and activity fluctuations in exclusion processes: consequences and open questions

  Matthieu Vanicat, Eric Bertin, Vivien Lecomte, Eric Ragoucy

  SciPost Phys. 10, 028 (2021) · published 5 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Considering the large deviations of activity and current in the Asymmetric Simple Exclusion Process (ASEP), we show that there exists a non-trivial correspondence between the joint scaled cumulant generating functions of activity and current of two ASEPs with different parameters. This mapping is obtained by applying a similarity transform on the deformed Markov matrix of the source model in order to obtain the deformed Markov matrix of the target model. We first derive this correspondence for periodic boundary conditions, and show in the diffusive scaling limit (corresponding to the Weakly Asymmetric Simple Exclusion Processes, or WASEP) how the mapping is expressed in the language of Macroscopic Fluctuation Theory (MFT). As an interesting specific case, we map the large deviations of current in the ASEP to the large deviations of activity in the SSEP, thereby uncovering a regime of Kardar–Parisi–Zhang in the distribution of activity in the SSEP. At large activity, particle configurations exhibit hyperuniformity [Jack et al., PRL 114 060601 (2015)]. Using results from quantum spin chain theory, we characterize the hyperuniform regime by evaluating the small wavenumber asymptotic behavior of the structure factor at half-filling. Conversely, we formulate from the MFT results a conjecture for a correlation function in spin chains at any fixed total magnetization (in the thermodynamic limit). In addition, we generalize the mapping to the case of two open ASEPs with boundary reservoirs, and we apply it in the WASEP limit in the MFT formalism. This mapping also allows us to find a symmetry-breaking dynamical phase transition (DPT) in the WASEP conditioned by activity, from the prior knowledge of a DPT in the WASEP conditioned by the current.

  3 citations

• Shape of a sound wave in a weakly-perturbed Bose gas

  Oleksandr V. Marchukov, Artem G. Volosniev

  SciPost Phys. 10, 025 (2021) · published 3 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We employ the Gross-Pitaevskii equation to study acoustic emission generated in a uniform Bose gas by a static impurity. The impurity excites a sound-wave packet, which propagates through the gas. We calculate the shape of this wave packet in the limit of long wave lengths, and argue that it is possible to extract properties of the impurity by observing this shape. We illustrate here this possibility for a Bose gas with a trapped impurity atom -- an example of a relevant experimental setup. Presented results are general for all one-dimensional systems described by the nonlinear Schr\"odinger equation and can also be used in nonatomic systems, e.g., to analyze light propagation in nonlinear optical media. Finally, we calculate the shape of the sound-wave packet for a three-dimensional Bose gas assuming a spherically symmetric perturbation.

  3 citations

• Topological interpretation of color exchange invariants: hexagonal lattice on a torus

  Olivier Cépas, Peter M. Akhmetiev

  SciPost Phys. 10, 042 (2021) · published 18 February 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We explain a correspondence between some invariants in the dynamics of color exchange in a 2d coloring problem, which are polynomials of winding numbers, and linking numbers in 3d. One invariant is visualized as linking of lines on a special surface with Arf-Kervaire invariant one, and is interpreted as resulting from an obstruction to transform the surface into its chiral image with special continuous deformations. We also consider additional constraints on the dynamics and see how the surface is modified.

  1 citation