Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Approach to the separatrix with eccentric orbits

  Guillaume Lhost, Geoffrey Compère

  SciPost Phys. Core 8, 059 (2025) · published 29 August 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Eccentric binary compact mergers are prime targets of current and future gravitational wave observatories. In the small mass ratio expansion, post-adiabatic inspirals have been modeled up to the separatrix, where first-principle modeling currently ends. In this paper, we derive the analytic late time solution to the adiabatic inspiral in terms of self-force coefficients at the separatrix. We identify the role of the Lambert $W_{-1}$ function as a key mathematical ingredient in the approach to the separatrix.

  2 citations

• Kinetics of quantum reaction-diffusion systems

  Federico Gerbino, Igor Lesanovsky, Gabriele Perfetto

  SciPost Phys. Core 8, 014 (2025) · published 4 February 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We discuss many-body fermionic and bosonic systems subject to dissipative particle losses in arbitrary spatial dimensions $d$, within the Keldysh path-integral formulation of the quantum master equation. This open quantum dynamics represents a generalisation of classical reaction-diffusion dynamics to the quantum realm. We first show how initial conditions can be introduced in the Keldysh path integral via boundary terms. We then study binary annihilation reactions $A+A\to \emptyset$, for which we derive a Boltzmann-like kinetic equation. The ensuing algebraic decay in time for the particle density depends on the particle statistics. In order to model possible experimental implementations with cold atoms, for fermions in $d=1$ we further discuss inhomogeneous cases involving the presence of a trapping potential. In this context, we quantify the irreversibility of the dynamics studying the time evolution of the system entropy for different quenches of the trapping potential. We find that the system entropy features algebraic decay for confining quenches, while it saturates in deconfined scenarios.

  2 citations

• Python-JAX-based fast Stokesian dynamics

  Kim William Torre, Raoul D. Schram, Joost de Graaf

  SciPost Phys. Codebases 56 (2025) · published 30 June 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Stokesian Dynamics (SD) is a powerful computational framework for simulating the motion of particles in a viscous Newtonian fluid under Stokes-flow conditions. Traditional SD implementations can be computationally expensive as they rely on the inversion of large mobility matrices to determine hydrodynamic interactions. Recently, however, the simulation of thermalized systems with large numbers of particles has become feasible [Fiore and Swan, J. Fluid Mech. 878, 544 (2019)]. Their "fast Stokesian dynamics" (FSD) method leverages a saddle-point formulation to ensure overall scaling of the algorithm that is linear in the number of particles $\mathcal{O}(N)$; performance relies on dedicated graphics-processing-unit computing. Here, we present a different route toward implementing FSD, which instead leverages the Just-in-Time (JIT) compilation capabilities of Google JAX. We refer to this implementation as JFSD and perform benchmarks on it to verify that it has the right scaling and is sufficiently fast by the standards of modern computational physics. In addition, we provide a series of physical test cases that help ensure accuracy and robustness, as the code undergoes further development. Thus, JFSD is ready to facilitate the study of hydrodynamic effects in particle suspensions across the domains of soft, active, and granular matter.

  2 citations

• Highlights from the Telescope Array Experiment

  Hiroyuki Sagawa for the Telescope Array Collaboration

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 13, 041 (2023) · published 29 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The Telescope Array (TA) is the largest hybrid cosmic ray detector in the Northern Hemisphere, which observes primary particles in the energy range from 2 PeV to 100 EeV. The main TA detector consists of 507 plastic scintillation counters on a 1.2-km spacing square grid and fluorescence detectors at three stations overlooking the sky above the surface detector array. The TA Low energy Extension (TALE) detector, which consists of ten fluorescence telescopes, and 80 infill surface detectors with 400m and 600 m spacing, has continued to provide stable observations since its construction completion in 2018. The TAx4, a plan to quadruple the detection area of TA is also ongoing. About half of the planned surface detectors have been deployed, and the current TAx4 continues to operate stably as a hybrid detector. I review the present status of the TA experiment and the recent results on the cosmic-ray anisotropy, mass composition and energy spectrum.

  2 citations

• Tensor network study of the Shastry-Sutherland model with weak interlayer coupling

  Patrick C. G. Vlaar, Philippe Corboz

  SciPost Phys. 15, 126 (2023) · published 2 October 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The layered material SrCu$_2$(BO$_3$)$_2$ has long been studied because of its fascinating physics in a magnetic field and under pressure. Many of its properties are remarkably well described by the Shastry-Sutherland model (SSM) - a two-dimensional frustrated spin system. However, the extent of the intermediate plaquette phase discovered in SrCu$_2$(BO$_3$)$_2$ under pressure is significantly smaller than predicted in theory, which is likely due to the weak interlayer coupling that is present in the material but neglected in the model. Using state-of-the-art tensor network methods we study the SSM with a weak interlayer coupling and show that the intermediate plaquette phase is destabilized already at a smaller value around $J''/J\sim0.04-0.05$ than previously predicted from series expansion. Based on our phase diagram we estimate the effective interlayer coupling in SrCu$_2$(BO$_3$)$_2$ to be around $J''/J\sim 0.027$ at ambient pressure.

  2 citations

• Electron addition spectral functions of low-density polaron liquids

  Alberto Nocera, Mona Berciu

  SciPost Phys. 15, 110 (2023) · published 22 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Spectral functions are important quantities that contain a wealth of information about the quasiparticles of a system, and that can also be measured experimentally. For systems with electron-phonon coupling, good approximations for the spectral function are available only in the Migdal limit (at Fermi energies much larger than the typical phonon frequency, $E_F\gg \Omega$, requiring a large carrier concentration $x$) and in the single polaron limit (at $x=0$). Here we show that the region with $x\ll 1$ ($E_F <\Omega$) can also be reliably investigated with the Momentum Average (MA) variational approximation, which essentially describes the formation of a polaron above an inert Fermi sea. Specifically, we show that for the one-dimensional spinless Holstein model, the MA spectral functions compare favorably with those calculated using variationally exact density matrix renormalization group simulations (DMRG) evaluated directly in frequency-space, so long as $x<0.1$ and the adiabaticity ratio $\Omega/t>0.5$. Unlike in the Migdal limit, here 'polaronic physics' emerges already at moderate couplings. The relevance of these results for a spinful low-$x$ metal is also discussed.

  2 citations

• Hydrodynamic fluctuations and topological susceptibility in chiral magnetohydrodynamics

  Arpit Das, Nabil Iqbal, Napat Poovuttikul

  SciPost Phys. 17, 042 (2024) · published 9 August 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Chiral magnetohydrodynamics is devoted to understanding the late-time and long-distance behavior of a system with an Adler-Bell-Jackiw anomaly at finite temperatures. The non-conservation of the axial charge is determined by the topological density $\vec{E} \cdot \vec{B}$; in a classical hydrodynamic description this decay rate can be suppressed by tuning the background magnetic field to zero. However it is in principle possible for thermal fluctuations of $\vec{E} \cdot \vec{B}$ to result in a non-conservation of the charge even at vanishing $B$-field; this would invalidate the classical hydrodynamic effective theory. We investigate this by computing the real-time susceptibility of the topological density at one-loop level in magnetohydrodynamic fluctuations, relating its low-frequency limit to the decay rate of the axial charge. We find that the frequency-dependence of this susceptibility is sufficiently soft as to leave the axial decay rate unaffected, validating the classical hydrodynamic description. We show that the susceptibility contains non-analytic frequency-dependence which is universally determined by hydrodynamic data. We comment briefly on possible connections to the recent formulation of the ABJ anomaly in terms of non-invertible symmetry.

  2 citations

• The chiral SYK model in three-dimensional holography

  Alexander Altland, Dmitry Bagrets, Nele Callebaut, Konstantin Weisenberger

  SciPost Phys. 18, 205 (2025) · published 24 June 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  A celebrated realization of the holographic principle posits an approximate duality between the $(0+1)$-dimensional quantum mechanical SYK model and two-dimensional Jackiw-Teitelboim gravity, mediated by the Schwarzian action as an effective low energy theory common to both systems. We here propose a generalization of this correspondence to one dimension higher. Starting from different microscopic realizations of effectively chiral $(1+1)$-dimensional generalizations of the SYK model, we derive a reduction to the Alekseev-Shatashvilli (AS)-action, a minimal extension of the Schwarzian action which has been proposed as the effective boundary action of three-dimensional gravity. In the bulk, we show how the same action describes fluctuations around the Euclidean BTZ black hole configuration, the dominant stationary solution of three-dimensional gravity. These two constructions allow us to match bulk and boundary coupling constants, and to compute observables. Specifically, we apply semiclassical techniques inspired by condensed matter physics to the computation of out-of-time-order correlation functions (OTOCs), demonstrating maximal chaos in the chiral SYK chain and its gravity dual.

  2 citations

• Frequency-independent optical spin injection in Weyl semimetals

  Yang Gao, Chong Wang, Di Xiao

  SciPost Phys. Core 7, 002 (2024) · published 22 January 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We demonstrate that in Weyl semimetals, the momentum-space helical spin texture can couple to the chirality of the Weyl node to generate a frequency-independent optical spin injection. This frequency-independence is rooted in the topology of the Weyl node. Since the helicity and the chirality are always locked for Weyl nodes, the injected spin from a pair of Weyl nodes always add up, implying no symmetry requirements for Weyl semimetals. Finally, we show that such frequency-independent spin injection is robust against multiband corrections and lattice-regularization effect and capable of realizing all-optical magnetization switching in the THz regime.

  2 citations

• Charge order and antiferromagnetism in twisted bilayer graphene from the variational cluster approximation

  B. Pahlevanzadeh, P. Sahebsara, D. Sénéchal

  SciPost Phys. 13, 040 (2022) · published 30 August 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study the possibility of charge order at quarter filling and antiferromagnetism at half-filling in a tight-binding model of magic angle twisted bilayer graphene. We build on the model proposed by Kang and Vafek, relevant to a twist angle of $1.30^\circ$, and add on-site and extended density-density interactions. Applying the variational cluster approximation with an exact-diagonalization impurity solver, we find that the system is indeed a correlated (Mott) insulator at fillings $\frac14$, $\frac12$ and $\frac34$. At quarter filling, we check that the most probable charge orders do not arise, for all values of the interaction tested. At half-filling, antiferromagnetism only arises if the local repulsion $U$ is sufficiently large compared to the extended interactions, beyond what is expected from the simplest model of extended interactions.

  2 citations