Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Exact multi-instantons in topological string theory

  Jie Gu, Marcos Mariño

  SciPost Phys. 15, 179 (2023) · published 26 October 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Topological string theory has multi-instanton sectors which lead to non-perturbative effects in the string coupling constant and control the large order behavior of the perturbative genus expansion. As proposed by Couso, Edelstein, Schiappa and Vonk, these sectors can be described by a trans-series extension of the BCOV holomorphic anomaly equations. In this paper we find exact, closed form solutions for these multi-instanton trans-series in the case of local Calabi-Yau manifolds. The resulting multi-instanton amplitudes turn out to be very similar to the eigenvalue tunneling amplitudes of matrix models. Their form suggests that the flat coordinates of the Calabi-Yau manifold are naturally quantized in units of the string coupling constant, as postulated in large $N$ dualities. Based on our results we obtain a general picture for the resurgent structure of the topological string in the local case, which we illustrate with explicit calculations for local $\mathbb{P}^2$.

  5 citations

• Revealing the finite-frequency response of a bosonic quantum impurity

  Sébastien Léger, Théo Sépulcre, Dorian Fraudet, Olivier Buisson, Cécile Naud, Wiebke Hasch-Guichard, Serge Florens, Izak Snyman, Denis M. Basko, Nicolas Roch

  SciPost Phys. 14, 130 (2023) · published 25 May 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Quantum impurities are ubiquitous in condensed matter physics and constitute the most stripped-down realization of many-body problems. While measuring their finite-frequency response could give access to key characteristics such as excitations spectra or dynamical properties, this goal has remained elusive despite over two decades of studies in nanoelectronic quantum dots. Conflicting experimental constraints of very strong coupling and large measurement bandwidths must be met simultaneously. We get around this problem using cQED tools, and build a precisely characterized quantum simulator of the boundary sine-Gordon model, a non-trivial bosonic impurity problem. We succeeded to fully map out the finite frequency linear response of this system. Its reactive part evidences a strong renormalisation of the nonlinearity at the boundary in agreement with non-perturbative calculations. Its dissipative part reveals a striking many-body broadening caused by multi-photon conversion. The experimental results are matched quantitatively to a perturbative calculation based on a microscopically calibrated model. Furthermore, we push the device into a regime where perturbative calculations break down, which calls for more advanced theoretical tools to model many-body quantum circuits. We also critically examine the technological limitations of cQED platforms to reach universal scaling laws. This work opens exciting perspectives for the future such as quantifying quantum entanglement in the vicinity of a quantum critical point or accessing the dynamical properties of non-trivial many-body problems.

  5 citations

• Theoretical investigations on Kerr and Faraday rotations in topological multi-Weyl Semimetals

  Supriyo Ghosh, Ambaresh Sahoo, Snehasish Nandy

  SciPost Phys. 15, 133 (2023) · published 4 October 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Motivated by the recent proposal of giant Kerr rotation in WSMs, we investigate the Kerr and Faraday rotations in time-reversal broken multi-Weyl semimetals (mWSMs) in the absence of an external magnetic field. Using the framework of Kubo response theory, we find that both the longitudinal and transverse components of the optical conductivity in mWSMs are modified by the topological charge ($n$). Engendered by the optical Hall conductivity, we show in the thin film limit that, while the giant Kerr rotation and corresponding ellipticity are independent of $n$, the Faraday rotation and its ellipticity angle scale as $n$ and $n^2$, respectively. In contrast, the polarization rotation in semi-infinite mWSMs is dominated by the axion field showing $n$ dependence. In particular, the magnitude of Kerr (Faraday) angle decreases (increases) with increasing $n$ in Faraday geometry, whereas in Voigt geometry, it depicts different $n$-dependencies in different frequency regimes. The obtained results on the behavior of polarization rotations in mWSMs could be used in experiments as a probe to distinguish single, double, and triple WSMs, as well as discriminate the surfaces of mWSMs with and without hosting Fermi arcs.

  5 citations

• Quasi-particle functional Renormalisation Group calculations in the two-dimensional half-filled Hubbard model at finite temperatures

  Daniel Rohe, Carsten Honerkamp

  SciPost Phys. 9, 084 (2020) · published 7 December 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We present a highly parallelisable scheme for treating functional Renormalisation Group equations which incorporates a quasi-particle-based feedback on the flow and provides direct access to real-frequency self-energy data. This allows to map out the boundaries of Fermi-liquid regimes and to study the effect of quasi-particle degradation near Fermi liquid instabilities. As a first application, selected results for the two-dimensional half-filled perfectly nested Hubbard model are shown.

  5 citations

• Semi-local Bounds on Null Energy in QFT

  Jackson R. Fliss, Ben Freivogel

  SciPost Phys. 12, 084 (2022) · published 7 March 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We investigate whether the null energy, averaged over some region of space- time, is bounded below in QFT. First, we use light-sheet quantization to prove a version of the “Smeared Null Energy Condition” (SNEC) proposed in [1], applicable for free and super-renormalizable QFT’s equipped with a UV cut- off. Through an explicit construction of squeezed states, we show that the SNEC bound cannot be improved by smearing on a light-sheet alone. We propose that smearing the null energy over two null directions defines an op- erator that is bounded below and independent of the UV cutoff, in what we call the “Double-Smeared Null Energy Condition,” or DSNEC. We indicate schematically how this bound behaves with respect to the smearing lengths and argue that the DSNEC displays a transition when the smearing lengths are comparable to the correlation length.

  5 citations

• Emulating twisted double bilayer graphene with a multiorbital optical lattice

  Junhyun Lee, J. H. Pixley

  SciPost Phys. 13, 033 (2022) · published 25 August 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  This work theoretically explores how to emulate twisted double bilayer graphene with ultracold atoms in multiorbital optical lattices. In particular, the quadratic band touching of Bernal stacked bilayer graphene is emulated using a square optical lattice with $p_x$, $p_y$, and $d_{x^2−y^2}$ orbitals on each site, while the effects of a twist are captured through the application of an incommensurate potential. The quadratic band touching is stable until the system undergoes an Anderson like delocalization transition in momentum space, which occurs concomitantly with a strongly renormalized single particle spectrum inducing flat bands, which is a generalization of the magic-angle condition realized in Dirac semimetals. The band structure is described perturbatively in the quasiperiodic potential strength, which captures miniband formation and the existence of magic-angles that qualitatively agrees with the exact numerical results in the appropriate regime. We identify several magic-angle conditions that can either have part or all of the quadratic band touching point become flat. In each case, these are accompanied by a diverging density of states and the delocalization of plane wave eigenstates. It is discussed how these transitions and phases can be observed in ultracold atom experiments.

  5 citations

• Topological and quantum critical properties of the interacting Majorana chain model

  Natalia Chepiga, Nicolas Laflorencie

  SciPost Phys. 14, 152 (2023) · published 13 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study Majorana chain with the shortest possible interaction term and in the presence of hopping alternation. When formulated in terms of spins the model corresponds to the transverse field Ising model with nearest-neighbor transverse and next-nearest-neighbor longitudinal repulsion. The phase diagram obtained with extensive DMRG simulations is very rich and contains six phases. Four gapped phases include paramagnetic, period-2 with broken translation symmetry, $\mathbb{Z}_2$ with broken parity symmetry and the period-2-$\mathbb{Z}_2$ phase with both symmetries broken. In addition there are two floating phases: gapless and critical Luttinger liquid with incommensurate correlations, and with an additional spontaneously broken $\mathbb{Z}_2$ symmetry in one of them. By analyzing an extended phase diagram we demonstrate that, in contrast with a common belief, the Luttinger liquid phase along the self-dual critical line terminates at a weaker interaction strength than the end point of the Ising critical line that we find to be in the tri-critical Ising universality class. We also show that none of these two points is a Lifshitz point terminating the incommensurability. In addition, we analyzed topological properties through Majorana zero modes emergent in the two topological phases, with and without incommensurability. In the weak interaction regime, a self-consistent mean-field treatment provides a remarkable accuracy for the description of the spectral pairing and the parity switches induced by the interaction.

  5 citations

• Separability and entanglement of resonating valence-bond states

  Gilles Parez, Clément Berthiere, William Witczak-Krempa

  SciPost Phys. 15, 066 (2023) · published 21 August 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We investigate separability and entanglement of Rokhsar-Kivelson (RK) states and resonating valence-bond (RVB) states. These states play a prominent role in condensed matter physics, as they can describe quantum spin liquids and quantum critical states of matter, depending on their underlying lattices. For dimer RK states on arbitrary tileable graphs, we prove the exact separability of the reduced density matrix of $k$ disconnected subsystems, implying the absence of bipartite and multipartite entanglement between the subsystems. For more general RK states with local constraints, we argue separability in the thermodynamic limit, and show that any local RK state has zero logarithmic negativity, even if the density matrix is not exactly separable. In the case of adjacent subsystems, we find an exact expression for the logarithmic negativity in terms of partition functions of the underlying statistical model. For RVB states, we show separability for disconnected subsystems up to exponentially small terms in the distance $d$ between the subsystems, and that the logarithmic negativity is exponentially suppressed with $d$. We argue that separability does hold in the scaling limit, even for arbitrarily small ratio $d/L$, where $L$ is the characteristic size of the subsystems. Our results hold for arbitrary lattices, and encompass a large class of RK and RVB states, which include certain gapped quantum spin liquids and gapless quantum critical systems.

  5 citations

• Quantum order-by-disorder induced phase transition in Rydberg ladders with staggered detuning

  Madhumita Sarkar, Mainak Pal, Arnab Sen, Krishnendu Sengupta

  SciPost Phys. 14, 004 (2023) · published 16 January 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  $^{87}{\rm Rb}$ atoms are known to have long-lived Rydberg excited states with controllable excitation amplitude (detuning) and strong repulsive van der Waals interaction $V_{{\bf r} {\bf r'}}$ between excited atoms at sites ${\bf r}$ and ${\bf r'}$. Here we study such atoms in a two-leg ladder geometry in the presence of both staggered and uniform detuning with amplitudes $\Delta$ and $\lambda$ respectively. We show that when $V_{{\bf r r'}} \gg(\ll) \Delta, \lambda$ for $|{\bf r}-{\bf r'}|=1(>1)$, these ladders host a plateau for a wide range of $\lambda/\Delta$ where the ground states are selected by a quantum order-by-disorder mechanism from a macroscopically degenerate manifold of Fock states with fixed Rydberg excitation density $1/4$. Our study further unravels the presence of an emergent Ising transition stabilized via the order-by-disorder mechanism inside the plateau. We identify the competing terms responsible for the transition and estimate a critical detuning $\lambda_c/\Delta=1/3$ which agrees well with exact-diagonalization based numerical studies. We also study the fate of this transition for a realistic interaction potential $V_{{\bf r} {\bf r'}} = V_0 /|{\bf r}-{\bf r'}|^6$, demonstrate that it survives for a wide range of $V_0$, and provide analytic estimate of $\lambda_c$ as a function of $V_0$. This allows for the possibility of a direct verification of this transition in standard experiments which we discuss.

  5 citations

• Carroll fermions

  Eric A. Bergshoeff, Andrea Campoleoni, Andrea Fontanella, Lea Mele, Jan Rosseel

  SciPost Phys. 16, 153 (2024) · published 14 June 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Using carefully chosen projections, we consider different Carroll limits of relativistic Dirac fermions in any spacetime dimensions. These limits define Carroll fermions of two types: electric and magnetic. The latter type transforms as a reducible but indecomposable representation of the Carroll group. We also build action principles for all Carroll fermions we introduce; in particular, in even dimensions we provide an action principle for a minimal magnetic Carroll fermion, having the same number of components as a Dirac spinor. We then explore the coupling of these fermions to magnetic Carroll gravity in both its first-order and second-order formulations.

  5 citations