Publications

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• Quantifying the effect of interactions in quantum many-body systems

  Jiannis K. Pachos, Zlatko Papic

  SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 4 (2018) · published 27 September 2018 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Free fermion systems enjoy a privileged place in physics. With their simple structure they can explain a variety of effects, ranging from insulating and metallic behaviours to superconductivity and the integer quantum Hall effect. Interactions, e.g. in the form of Coulomb repulsion, can dramatically alter this picture by giving rise to emerging physics that may not resemble free fermions. Examples of such phenomena include high-temperature superconductivity, fractional quantum Hall effect, Kondo effect and quantum spin liquids. The non-perturbative behaviour of such systems remains a major obstacle to their theoretical understanding that could unlock further technological applications. Here, we present a pedagogical review of "interaction distance" [Nat. Commun. 8, 14926 (2017)] -- a systematic method that quantifies the effect interactions can have on the energy spectrum and on the quantum correlations of generic many-body systems. In particular, the interaction distance is a diagnostic tool that identifies the emergent physics of interacting systems. We illustrate this method on the simple example of a one-dimensional Fermi-Hubbard dimer.

  11 citations

• Exact effective interactions and 1/4-BPS dyons in heterotic CHL orbifolds

  Guillaume Bossard, Charles Cosnier-Horeau, Boris Pioline

  SciPost Phys. 7, 028 (2019) · published 5 September 2019 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Motivated by precision counting of BPS black holes, we analyze six-derivative couplings in the low energy effective action of three-dimensional string vacua with 16 supercharges. Based on perturbative computations up to two-loop, supersymmetry and duality arguments, we conjecture that the exact coefficient of the $\nabla^2(\nabla\phi)^4$ effective interaction is given by a genus-two modular integral of a Siegel theta series for the non-perturbative Narain lattice times a specific meromorphic Siegel modular form. The latter is familiar from the Dijkgraaf-Verlinde-Verlinde (DVV) conjecture on exact degeneracies of 1/4-BPS dyons. We show that this Ansatz reproduces the known perturbative corrections at weak heterotic coupling, including tree-level, one- and two-loop corrections, plus non-perturbative effects of order $e^{-1/g_3^2}$. We also examine the weak coupling expansions in type I and type II string duals and find agreement with known perturbative results, as well as new predictions for higher genus perturbative contributions. In the limit where a circle in the internal torus decompactifies, our Ansatz predicts the exact $\nabla^2 F^4$ effective interaction in four-dimensional CHL string vacua, along with infinite series of exponentially suppressed corrections of order $e^{-R}$ from Euclideanized BPS black holes winding around the circle, and further suppressed corrections of order $e^{-R^2}$ from Taub-NUT instantons. We show that instanton corrections from 1/4-BPS black holes are precisely weighted by the BPS index predicted from the DVV formula, including the detailed moduli dependence. We also extract two-instanton corrections from pairs of 1/2-BPS black holes, demonstrating consistency with supersymmetry and wall-crossing, and estimate the size of instanton-anti-instanton contributions.

  11 citations

• Engineered Josephson diode effect in kinked Rashba nanochannels

  Alfonso Maiellaro, Mattia Trama, Jacopo Settino, Claudio Guarcello, Francesco Romeo, Roberta Citro

  SciPost Phys. 17, 101 (2024) · published 2 October 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The superconducting diode effect, reminiscent of the unidirectional charge transport in semiconductor diodes, is characterized by a nonreciprocal, dissipationless flow of Cooper pairs. This remarkable phenomenon arises from the interplay between symmetry constraints and the inherent quantum behavior of superconductors. Here, we explore the geometric control of the diode effect in a kinked nanostrip Josephson junction based on a two-dimensional electron gas (2DEGs) with Rashba spin-orbit interaction. We provide a comprehensive analysis of the diode effect as a function of the kink angle and the out-of-plane magnetic field. Our analysis reveals a rich phase diagram, showcasing a geometry and field-controlled diode effect. The phase diagram also reveals the presence of an anomalous Josephson effect related to the emergence of trivial zero-energy Andreev bound states, which can evolve into Majorana bound states. Our findings indicate that the exceptional synergy between geometric control of the diode effect and topological phases can be effectively leveraged to design and optimize superconducting devices with tailored transport properties.

  11 citations

• Polynomial filter diagonalization of large Floquet unitary operators

  David J. Luitz

  SciPost Phys. 11, 021 (2021) · published 3 August 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Periodically driven quantum many-body systems play a central role for our understanding of nonequilibrium phenomena. For studies of quantum chaos, thermalization, many-body localization and time crystals, the properties of eigenvectors and eigenvalues of the unitary evolution operator, and their scaling with physical system size $L$ are of interest. While for static systems, powerful methods for the partial diagonalization of the Hamiltonian were developed, the unitary eigenproblem remains daunting. In this paper, we introduce a Krylov space diagonalization method to obtain exact eigenpairs of the unitary Floquet operator with eigenvalue closest to a target on the unit circle. Our method is based on a complex polynomial spectral transformation given by the geometric sum, leading to rapid convergence of the Arnoldi algorithm. We demonstrate that our method is much more efficient than the shift invert method in terms of both runtime and memory requirements, pushing the accessible system sizes to the realm of 20 qubits, with Hilbert space dimensions $\geq 10^6$.

  11 citations

• 't Hooft lines of ADE-type and topological quivers

  Youssra Boujakhrout, El Hassan Saidi, Rachid Ahl Laamara, Lalla Btissam Drissi

  SciPost Phys. 15, 078 (2023) · published 5 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We investigate 4D Chern-Simons theory with ADE gauge symmetries in the presence of interacting Wilson and 't Hooft line defects. We analyse the intrinsic properties of these lines' coupling and explicate the building of oscillator-type Lax matrices verifying the RLL integrability equation. We propose gauge quiver diagrams Q$_{G}^{\mu}$ encoding the topological data carried by the Lax operators and give several examples where Darboux coordinates are interpreted in terms of topological bi-fundamental matter. We exploit this graphical description (i) to give new results regarding solutions in representations beyond the fundamentals of $sl_{N}$, $ so_{2N}$ and $e_{6,7}$, and (ii) to classify the Lax operators for simply laced symmetries in a unified E$_{7}$ CS theory. For quick access, a summary list of the leading topological quivers Q$ _{ADE}^{\mu}$ is given in the conclusion section [Figures 29.(a-e), 30.(a-d) and 31.(a-d)].

  11 citations

• Parent Hamiltonian reconstruction of Jastrow-Gutzwiller wavefunctions

  Xhek Turkeshi, Marcello Dalmonte

  SciPost Phys. 8, 042 (2020) · published 16 March 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Variational wave functions have been a successful tool to investigate the properties of quantum spin liquids. Finding their parent Hamiltonians is of primary interest for the experimental simulation of these strongly correlated phases, and for gathering additional insights on their stability. In this work, we systematically reconstruct approximate spin-chain parent Hamiltonians for Jastrow-Gutzwiller wave functions, which share several features with quantum spin liquid wave-functions in two dimensions. Firstly, we determine the different phases encoded in the parameter space through their correlation functions and entanglement content. Secondly, we apply a recently proposed entanglement-guided method to reconstruct parent Hamiltonians to these states, which constrains the search to operators describing relativistic low-energy field theories - as expected for deconfined phases of gauge theories relevant to quantum spin liquids. The quality of the results is discussed using different quantities and comparing to exactly known parent Hamiltonians at specific points in parameter space. Our findings provide guiding principles for experimental Hamiltonian engineering of this class of states.

  11 citations

• Flux vacua and modularity for $\mathbb{Z}_2$ symmetric Calabi-Yau manifolds

  Philip Candelas, Xenia de la Ossa, Pyry Kuusela, Joseph McGovern

  SciPost Phys. 15, 146 (2023) · published 9 October 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We find continuous families of supersymmetric flux vacua in IIB Calabi-Yau compactifications for multiparameter manifolds with an appropriate $\mathbb{Z}_{2}$ symmetry. We argue, supported by extensive computational evidence, that the numerators of the local zeta functions of these compactification manifolds have quadratic factors. These factors are associated with weight-two modular forms, these manifolds being said to be weight-two modular. Our evidence supports the flux modularity conjecture of Kachru, Nally, and Yang. The modular forms are related to a continuous family of elliptic curves. The flux vacua can be lifted to F-theory on elliptically fibred Calabi-Yau fourfolds. If conjectural expressions for Deligne's periods are true, then these imply that the F-theory fibre is complex-isomorphic to the modular curve. In three examples, we compute the local zeta function of the internal geometry using an extension of known methods, which we discuss here and in more detail in a companion paper. With these techniques, we are able to compare the zeta function coefficients to modular form Fourier coefficients for hundreds of manifolds in three distinct families, finding agreement in all cases. Our techniques enable us to study not only parameters valued in $\mathbb{Q}$ but also in algebraic extensions of $\mathbb{Q}$, so exhibiting relations to Hilbert and Bianchi modular forms. We present in appendices the zeta function numerators of these manifolds, together with the corresponding modular forms.

  11 citations

• From dynamical localization to bunching in interacting Floquet systems

  Yuval Baum, Evert P. L. van Nieuwenburg, Gil Refael

  SciPost Phys. 5, 017 (2018) · published 16 August 2018 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We show that a quantum many-body system may be controlled by means of Floquet engineering, i.e., their properties may be controlled and manipulated by employing periodic driving. We present a concrete driving scheme that allows control over the nature of mobile units and the amount of diffusion in generic many-body systems. We demonstrate these ideas for the Fermi-Hubbard model, where the drive renders doubly occupied sites (doublons) the mobile excitations in the system. In particular, we show that the amount of diffusion in the system and the level of fermion-pairing may be controlled and understood solely in terms of the doublon dynamics. We find that under certain circumstances the diffusion in the system may be eliminated completely. We conclude our work by generalizing these ideas to generic many-body systems.

  11 citations

• Efficient and scalable path integral Monte Carlo simulations with worm-type updates for Bose-Hubbard and XXZ models

  Nicolas Sadoune, Lode Pollet

  SciPost Phys. Codebases 9 (2022) · published 29 November 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We present a novel and open-source implementation of the worm algorithm, which is an algorithm to simulate Bose-Hubbard and sign-positive spin models using a path-integral representation of the partition function. The code can deal with arbitrary lattice structures and assumes spin-exchange terms, or bosonic hopping amplitudes, between nearest-neighbor sites, and local or nearest-neighbor interactions of the density-density type. We explicitly demonstrate the near-linear scaling of the algorithm with respect to the system volume and the inverse temperature and analyze the autocorrelation times in the vicinity of a $U(1)$ second order phase transition. The code is written in such a way that extensions to other lattice models as well as closely-related sign-positive models can be done straightforwardly on top of the provided framework.

  11 citations

• Mobility control as state-making in civil war: Forcing exit, selective return and strategic laissez-faire

  Christiane Fröhlich, Lea Müller-Funk

  Mig. Pol. 2, 001 (2023) · published 27 March 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  This paper addresses the question of how different actors attempt to control mobility during civil war, and how mobility control and processes of state-making interact in such settings. Mobility in civil wars is often considered a political act by the various actors involved: Leaving the country can be perceived as an act of opposition, as can moving between territories which are controlled by different, opposing factions. Drawing on literature on strategic displacement and migration politics and combining this with empirical insights from the ongoing wars in Libya and Syria, the paper identifies three mechanisms of mobility control in civil war settings: forcing exit, selective return as a form of expulsion, and strategic laissez-faire as the intentional absence of regulation regarding displacement and return. The analysis reveals that all three mechanisms are employed by state actor(s), rebels, and militias, and can be understood as elements of a new (post)war order that includes some citizens while excluding others depending on perceptions of political threats. We interpret the three mechanisms as ways in which actors in civil war settings attempt to manipulate a country’s demography in their own favour in a process of state-making. The paper is based on fieldwork conducted between 2018 and 2021 in Syria, Lebanon, Libya, and Tunisia.

  10 citations