Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

Lectures in quantum gravity

Ivano Basile, Luca Buoninfante, Francesco Di Filippo, Benjamin Knorr, Alessia Platania, Anna Tokareva

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 98 (2025) · published 7 August 2025 | · pdf

Formulating a quantum theory of gravity lies at the heart of fundamental theoretical physics. This collection of lecture notes encompasses a selection of topics that were covered in six mini-courses at the Nordita PhD school "Towards Quantum Gravity". The scope was to provide a coherent picture, from its foundation to forefront research, emphasizing connections between different areas. The lectures begin with perturbative quantum gravity and effective field theory. Subsequently, two ultraviolet-complete approaches are presented: Asymptotically safe gravity and string theory. Finally, elements of quantum effects in black hole spacetimes are discussed.

2 citations
Parametric couplings in engineered quantum systems

Anja Metelmann

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 66 (2023) · published 13 March 2023 | · pdf

Parametric couplings in engineered quantum systems are a powerful tool to control, manipulate and enhance interactions in a variety of platforms. It allows us to bring systems of different energy scales into communication with each other. This short chapter introduces the basic principles and discusses a few examples of how one can engineer parametric amplifiers with improved characteristics over conventional setups. Clearly, the selected examples are author-biased, and other interesting proposals and implementations can be found in the literature. The focus of this chapter is on parametric effects between linearly coupled harmonic oscillators, however, parametric modulation is also applicable with nonlinear couplings and anharmonic systems.

2 citations
Scattering from an external field in quantum chromodynamics at high energies: From foundations to interdisciplinary connections

Athanasia-Konstantina Angelopoulou, Anh Dung Le, Stéphane Munier

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 92 (2025) · published 12 March 2025 | · pdf

We review the factorization of the $S$-matrix elements in the context of particle scattering off an external field, which can serve as a model for the field of a large nucleus. The factorization takes the form of a convolution of light cone wave functions describing the physical incoming and outgoing states in terms of bare partons, and products of Wilson lines. The latter represent the interaction between the bare partons and the external field. Specializing to elastic scattering amplitudes of onia at very high energies, we introduce the color dipole model, which formulates the calculation of the modulus-squared of the wave functions in quantum chromodynamics with the help of a branching random walk, and the scattering amplitudes as observables on this classical stochastic process. Methods developed for general branching processes produce analytical formulas for the asymptotics of such observables, and thus enable one to derive exact large-rapidity expressions for onium-nucleus cross sections, from which electron-nucleus cross sections may be inferred.

2 citations
Quantum to classical mapping of the two-dimensional toric code in an external field

Sydney R. Timmerman, Zvonimir Z. Bandic, Roger G. Melko

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 57 (2022) · published 20 July 2022 | · pdf

Kitaev's toric code Hamiltonian in dimension D=2 has been extensively studied for its topological properties, including its quantum error correction capabilities. While the Hamiltonian is quantum, it lies within the class of models that admits a D+1 dimensional classical representation. In these notes, we provide details of a Suzuki-Trotter expansion of the partition function of the toric code Hamiltonian in the presence of an external magnetic field. By coupling additional degrees of freedom in the form of a matter field that can subsequently be gauged away, we explicitly derive a classical Hamiltonian on a cubic lattice which takes the form of a non-isotropic 3D Ising gauge theory.

2 citations
Two lectures on Yang-Lee edge singularity and analytic structure of QCD equation of state

Vladimir V. Skokov

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 91 (2025) · published 7 March 2025 | · pdf

These lecture notes, prepared for the 2024 XQCD PhD, provide an introduction to the analytic structure of an equation of state near a second-order phase transition and its most prominent landmark: the Yang-Lee edge singularity. In addition to discussing general properties, the notes review recent theoretical progress in locating the QCD critical point by tracking the trajectory of the Yang-Lee edge singularity.

1 citation
A brief introduction to extended gravity and connections to dark energy: Illustrated with scalar field examples

Clare Burrage

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 41 (2022) · published 15 March 2022 | · pdf

These lecture notes provide a brief introduction to extensions of gravity and their connections to dark energy. Due to time and space limitations this is not a comprehensive review of the field. Instead, I aim to introduce key concepts and ideas in this area through a series of examples based on scalar field extensions of gravity and models of dark energy.

1 citation
Field theory of collinear and noncollinear magnetic order

Oleg Tchernyshyov

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 85 (2024) · published 5 September 2024 | · pdf

These lecture notes from the 2023 Summer School "Principles and applications of symmetry in magnetism" introduce the reader to the classical field theory of ferromagnets and antiferromagnets.

1 citation
A somewhat random walk through nuclear and particle physics

Thomas D. Cohen, Nicholas R. Poniatowski

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 34 (2021) · published 20 September 2021 | · pdf

These notes are an outgrowth of an advanced undergraduate course taught at the University of Maryland, College Park. They are intended as an introduction to various aspects of particle and nuclear physics with an emphasis on the role of symmetry. The basic philosophy is to introduce many of the fundamental ideas in nuclear and particle physics using relatively sophisticated mathematical tools -- but to do so in as a simplified a context to explain the underlying ideas. Thus, for example, the Higgs mechanism is discussed in terms of an Abelian Higgs model. The emphasis is largely, but not entirely theoretical in orientation. The goal is for readers to develop an understanding of many of the underlying issues in a relatively sophisticated way.

1 citation
Seven Études on dynamical Keldysh model

Dmitri V. Efremov, Mikhail N. Kiselev

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 65 (2022) · published 6 December 2022 | · pdf

We present a comprehensive pedagogical discussion of a family of models describing the propagation of a single particle in a multicomponent non-Markovian Gaussian random field. We report some exact results for single-particle Green's functions, self-energy, vertex part and T-matrix. These results are based on a closed form solution of the Dyson equation combined with the Ward identity. Analytical properties of the solution are discussed. Further we describe the combinatorics of the Feynman diagrams for the Green's function and the skeleton diagrams for the self-energy and vertex, using recurrence relations between the Taylor expansion coefficients of the self-energy. Asymptotically exact equations for the number of skeleton diagrams in the limit of large $N$ are derived. Finally, we consider possible realizations of a multicomponent Gaussian random potential in quantum transport via complex quantum dot experiments.

1 citation
A brief tutorial on information theory

Tarek Tohme, William Bialek

SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 87 (2024) · published 23 September 2024 | · pdf

At the 2023 Les Houches Summer School on Theoretical Biological Physics, several students asked for some background on information theory, and so we added a tutorial to the scheduled lectures. This is largely a transcript of that tutorial, lightly edited. It covers basic definitions and context rather than detailed calculations. We hope to have maintained the informality of the presentation, including exchanges with the students, while still being useful.

1 citation

Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Next

Publications

2 citations

2 citations

2 citations

2 citations

1 citation

1 citation

1 citation

1 citation

1 citation

1 citation