Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Lattice Bisognano-Wichmann modular Hamiltonian in critical quantum spin chains

  Jiaju Zhang, Pasquale Calabrese, Marcello Dalmonte, M. A. Rajabpour

  SciPost Phys. Core 2, 007 (2020) · published 7 May 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We carry out a comprehensive comparison between the exact modular Hamiltonian and the lattice version of the Bisognano-Wichmann (BW) one in one-dimensional critical quantum spin chains. As a warm-up, we first illustrate how the trace distance provides a more informative mean of comparison between reduced density matrices when compared to any other Schatten $n$-distance, normalized or not. In particular, as noticed in earlier works, it provides a way to bound other correlation functions in a precise manner, i.e., providing both lower and upper bounds. Additionally, we show that two close reduced density matrices, i.e. with zero trace distance for large sizes, can have very different modular Hamiltonians. This means that, in terms of describing how two states are close to each other, it is more informative to compare their reduced density matrices rather than the corresponding modular Hamiltonians. After setting this framework, we consider the ground states for infinite and periodic XX spin chain and critical Ising chain. We provide robust numerical evidence that the trace distance between the lattice BW reduced density matrix and the exact one goes to zero as $\ell^{-2}$ for large length of the interval $\ell$. This provides strong constraints on the difference between the corresponding entanglement entropies and correlation functions. Our results indicate that discretized BW reduced density matrices reproduce exact entanglement entropies and correlation functions of local operators in the limit of large subsystem sizes. Finally, we show that the BW reduced density matrices fall short of reproducing the exact behavior of the logarithmic emptiness formation probability in the ground state of the XX spin chain.

  26 citations

• Unimodular jordanian deformations of integrable superstrings

  Stijn J. van Tongeren

  SciPost Phys. 7, 011 (2019) · published 23 July 2019 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We find new homogeneous r matrices containing supercharges, and use them to find new backgrounds of Yang-Baxter deformed superstrings. We obtain these as limits of unimodular inhomogeneous r matrices and associated deformations of AdS2 x S2 x T6 and AdS5 x S5. Our r matrices are jordanian, but also unimodular, and lead to solutions of the regular supergravity equations of motion. In general our deformations are equivalent to particular non-abelian T duality transformations. Curiously, one of our backgrounds is also equivalent to one produced by TsT transformations and an S duality transformation.

  26 citations

• Quantum chaos in 2D gravity

  Alexander Altland, Boris Post, Julian Sonner, Jeremy van der Heijden, Erik Verlinde

  SciPost Phys. 15, 064 (2023) · published 16 August 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We present a quantitative and fully non-perturbative description of the ergodic phase of quantum chaos in the setting of two-dimensional gravity. To this end we describe the doubly non-perturbative completion of semiclassical 2D gravity in terms of its associated universe field theory. The guiding principle of our analysis is a flavor-matrix theory (fMT) description of the ergodic phase of holographic gravity, which exhibits $\mathrm{U}(n|n)$ causal symmetry breaking and restoration. JT gravity and its 2D-gravity cousins alone do not realize an action principle with causal symmetry, however we demonstrate that their universe field theory, the Kodaira-Spencer (KS) theory of gravity, does. After directly deriving the fMT from brane-antibrane correlators in KS theory, we show that causal symmetry breaking and restoration can be understood geometrically in terms of different (topological) D-brane vacua. We interpret our results in terms of an open-closed string duality between holomorphic Chern-Simons theory and its closed-string equivalent, the KS theory of gravity. Emphasis will be put on relating these geometric principles to the characteristic spectral correlations of the quantum ergodic phase.

  26 citations

• Lessons from the Ramond sector

  Nathan Benjamin, Ying-Hsuan Lin

  SciPost Phys. 9, 065 (2020) · published 6 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We revisit the consistency of torus partition functions in (1+1)$d$ fermionic conformal field theories, combining traditional ingredients of modular invariance/covariance with a modernized understanding of bosonization/fermionization dualities. Various lessons can be learned by simply examining the oft-ignored Ramond sector. For several extremal/kinky modular functions in the bootstrap literature, we can either rule out or identify the underlying theory. We also revisit the ${\cal N} = 1$ Maloney-Witten partition function by calculating the spectrum in the Ramond sector, and further extending it to include the modular sum of seed Ramond characters. Finally, we perform the full ${\cal N} = 1$ RNS modular bootstrap and obtain new universal results on the existence of relevant deformations preserving different amounts of supersymmetry.

  25 citations

• Ruling out light axions: The writing is on the wall

  Konstantin A. Beyer, Subir Sarkar

  SciPost Phys. 15, 003 (2023) · published 10 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We revisit the domain wall problem for QCD axion models with more than one quark charged under the Peccei-Quinn symmetry. Symmetry breaking during or after inflation results in the formation of a domain wall network which would cause cosmic catastrophe if it comes to dominate the Universe. The network may be made unstable by invoking a "tilt" in the axion potential due to Planck scale suppressed non-renormalisable operators. Alternatively the random walk of the axion field during inflation can generate a "bias" favouring one of the degenerate vacua, but we find that this mechanism is in practice irrelevant. Consideration of the axion abundance generated by the decay of the wall network then requires the Peccei-Quinn scale to be rather low - thus e.g. ruling out the DFSZ axion with mass below $\sim$ 11 meV, where most experimental searches are in fact focused.

  25 citations

• Liberating confinement from Lagrangians: 1-form symmetries and lines in 4d N=1 from 6d N=(2,0)

  Lakshya Bhardwaj, Max Hübner, Sakura Schäfer-Nameki

  SciPost Phys. 12, 040 (2022) · published 26 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study confinement in 4d N=1 theories obtained by deforming 4d N=2 theories of Class S. We argue that confinement in a vacuum of the N=1 theory is encoded in the 1-cycles of the associated N=1 curve. This curve is the spectral cover associated to a generalized Hitchin system describing the profiles of two Higgs fields over the Riemann surface upon which the 6d (2,0) theory is compactified. Using our method, we reproduce the expected properties of confinement in various classic examples, such as 4d N=1 pure Super-Yang-Mills theory and the Cachazo-Seiberg-Witten setup. More generally, this work can be viewed as providing tools for probing confinement in non-Lagrangian N=1 theories, which we illustrate by constructing an infinite class of non-Lagrangian N=1 theories that contain confining vacua. The simplest model in this class is an N=1 deformation of the N=2 theory obtained by gauging $SU(3)^3$ flavor symmetry of the $E_6$ Minahan-Nemeschansky theory.

  25 citations

• Complexity of frustration: A new source of non-local non-stabilizerness

  Jovan Odavić, Tobias Haug, Gianpaolo Torre, Alioscia Hamma, Fabio Franchini, Salvatore Marco Giampaolo

  SciPost Phys. 15, 131 (2023) · published 3 October 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We advance the characterization of complexity in quantum many-body systems by examining $W$-states embedded in a spin chain. Such states show an amount of non-stabilizerness or "magic", measured as the Stabilizer Rényi Entropy, that grows logarithmically with the number of qubits/spins. We focus on systems whose Hamiltonian admits a classical point with extensive degeneracy. Near these points, a Clifford circuit can convert the ground state into a $W$-state, while in the rest of the phase to which the classical point belongs, it is dressed with local quantum correlations. Topological frustrated quantum spin-chains host phases with the desired phenomenology, and we show that their ground state's Stabilizer Rényi Entropy is the sum of that of the $W$-states plus an extensive local contribution. Our work reveals that $W$-states/frustrated ground states display a non-local degree of complexity that can be harvested as a quantum resource and has no counterpart in GHZ states/non-frustrated systems.

  25 citations

• Genuine multipartite entanglement in time

  Simon Milz, Cornelia Spee, Zhen-Peng Xu, Felix A. Pollock, Kavan Modi, Otfried Gühne

  SciPost Phys. 10, 141 (2021) · published 11 June 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  While spatial quantum correlations have been studied in great detail, much less is known about the genuine quantum correlations that can be exhibited by temporal processes. Employing the quantum comb formalism, processes in time can be mapped onto quantum states, with the crucial difference that temporal correlations have to satisfy causal ordering, while their spatial counterpart is not constrained in the same way. Here, we exploit this equivalence and use the tools of multipartite entanglement theory to provide a comprehensive picture of the structure of correlations that (causally ordered) temporal quantum processes can display. First, focusing on the case of a process that is probed at two points in time -- which can equivalently be described by a tripartite quantum state -- we provide necessary as well as sufficient conditions for the presence of bipartite entanglement in different splittings. Next, we connect these scenarios to the previously studied concepts of quantum memory, entanglement breaking superchannels, and quantum steering, thus providing both a physical interpretation for entanglement in temporal quantum processes, and a determination of the resources required for its creation. Additionally, we construct explicit examples of W-type and GHZ-type genuinely multipartite entangled two-time processes and prove that genuine multipartite entanglement in temporal processes can be an emergent phenomenon. Finally, we show that genuinely entangled processes across multiple times exist for any number of probing times.

  25 citations

• The quantum entropy cone of hypergraphs

  Ning Bao, Newton Cheng, Sergio Hernández-Cuenca, Vincent P. Su

  SciPost Phys. 9, 067 (2020) · published 10 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  In this work, we generalize the graph-theoretic techniques used for the holographic entropy cone to study hypergraphs and their analogously-defined entropy cone. This allows us to develop a framework to efficiently compute entropies and prove inequalities satisfied by hypergraphs. In doing so, we discover a class of quantum entropy vectors which reach beyond those of holographic states and obey constraints intimately related to the ones obeyed by stabilizer states and linear ranks. We show that, at least up to 4 parties, the hypergraph cone is identical to the stabilizer entropy cone, thus demonstrating that the hypergraph framework is broadly applicable to the study of entanglement entropy. We conjecture that this equality continues to hold for higher party numbers and report on partial progress on this direction. To physically motivate this conjectured equivalence, we also propose a plausible method inspired by tensor networks to construct a quantum state from a given hypergraph such that their entropy vectors match.

  25 citations

• Renormalised spectral flows

  Jens Braun, Yong-rui Chen, Wei-jie Fu, Andreas Geißel, Jan Horak, Chuang Huang, Friederike Ihssen, Jan M. Pawlowski, Manuel Reichert, Fabian Rennecke, Yang-yang Tan, Sebastian Töpfel, Jonas Wessely, Nicolas Wink

  SciPost Phys. Core 6, 061 (2023) · published 4 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We derive renormalised finite functional flow equations for quantum field theories in real and imaginary time that incorporate scale transformations of the renormalisation conditions, hence implementing a flowing renormalisation. The flows are manifestly finite in general non-perturbative truncation schemes also for regularisation schemes that do not implement an infrared suppression of the loops in the flow. Specifically, this formulation includes finite functional flows for the effective action with a spectral Callan-Symanzik cutoff, and therefore gives access to Lorentz invariant spectral flows. The functional setup is fully non-perturbative and allows for the spectral treatment of general theories. In particular, this includes theories that do not admit a perturbative renormalisation such as asymptotically safe theories. Finally, the application of the Lorentz invariant spectral functional renormalisation group is briefly discussed for theories ranging from real scalar and Yukawa theories to gauge theories and quantum gravity.

  25 citations