Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Assessing the role of interatomic position matrix elements in tight-binding calculations of optical properties

  Julen Ibañez-Azpiroz, Fernando de Juan, Ivo Souza

  SciPost Phys. 12, 070 (2022) · published 22 February 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study the role of hopping matrix elements of the position operator $\mathbf{\hat{r}}$ in tight-binding calculations of linear and nonlinear optical properties of solids. Our analysis relies on a Wannier-interpolation scheme based on ab initio calculations, which automatically includes matrix elements of $\mathbf{\hat{r}}$ between different Wannier orbitals. A common approximation, both in empirical tight-binding and in Wannier-interpolation calculations, is to discard those matrix elements, in which case the optical response only depends on the on-site energies, Hamiltonian hoppings, and orbital centers. We find that interatomic $\mathbf{\hat{r}}$-hopping terms make a sizeable contribution to the shift photocurrent in monolayer BC$_2$N, a covalent acentric crystal. If a minimal basis of $p_z$ orbitals on the carbon atoms is used to model the band-edge response, even the dielectric function becomes strongly dependent on those terms.

  21 citations

• Page curve for entanglement negativity through geometric evaporation

  Jaydeep Kumar Basak, Debarshi Basu, Vinay Malvimat, Himanshu Parihar, Gautam Sengupta

  SciPost Phys. 12, 004 (2022) · published 5 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We compute the entanglement negativity for various pure and mixed state configurations in a bath coupled to an evaporating two dimensional non-extremal Jackiw-Teitelboim (JT) black hole obtained through the partial dimensional reduction of a three dimensional BTZ black hole. Our results exactly reproduce the analogues of the Page curve for the entanglement negativity which were recently determined through diagrammatic technique developed in the context of random matrix theory.

  21 citations

• Perturbative unitarity and the wavefunction of the Universe

  Soner Albayrak, Paolo Benincasa, Carlos Duaso Pueyo

  SciPost Phys. 16, 157 (2024) · published 20 June 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Unitarity of time evolution is one of the basic principles constraining physical processes. Its consequences in the perturbative Bunch-Davies wavefunction in cosmology have been formulated in terms of the cosmological optical theorem. In this paper, we re-analyse perturbative unitarity for the Bunch-Davies wavefunction, focusing on: $i)$ the role of the $i\epsilon$-prescription and its compatibility with the requirement of unitarity; $ii)$ the origin of the different ``cutting rules''; $iii)$ the emergence of the flat-space optical theorem from the cosmological one. We take the combinatorial point of view of the cosmological polytopes, which provide a first-principle description for a large class of scalar graphs contributing to the wavefunctional. The requirement of the positivity of the geometry together with the preservation of its orientation determine the $i\epsilon$-prescription. In kinematic space it translates into giving a small negative imaginary part to all the energies, making the wavefunction coefficients well-defined for any value of their real part along the real axis. Unitarity is instead encoded into a non-convex part of the cosmological polytope, which we name \textit{optical polytope}. The cosmological optical theorem emerges as the equivalence between a specific polytope subdivision of the optical polytope and its triangulations, each of which provides different cutting rules. The flat-space optical theorem instead emerges from the non-convexity of the optical polytope. On the more mathematical side, we provide two definitions of this non-convex geometry, none of them based on the idea of the non-convex geometry as a union of convex ones.

  21 citations

• Unbounded entanglement production via a dissipative impurity

  Vincenzo Alba

  SciPost Phys. 12, 011 (2022) · published 10 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We investigate the entanglement dynamics in a free-fermion chain initially prepared in a Fermi sea and subjected to localized losses (dissipative impurity). We derive a formula describing the dynamics of the entanglement entropies in the hydrodynamic limit of long times and large intervals. The result depends only on the absorption coefficient of the effective delta potential describing the impurity in the hydrodynamic limit. Genuine dissipation-induced entanglement is certified by the linear growth of the logarithmic negativity. Finally, in the quantum Zeno regime at strong dissipation the entanglement growth is arrested (Zeno entanglement death).

  21 citations

• Duality and hidden equilibrium in transport models

  Rouven Frassek, Cristian Giardina, Jorge Kurchan

  SciPost Phys. 9, 054 (2020) · published 20 October 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  A large family of diffusive models of transport that has been considered in the past years admits a transformation into the same model in contact with an equilibrium bath. This mapping holds at the full dynamical level, and is independent of dimension or topology. It provides a good opportunity to discuss questions of time reversal in out of equilibrium contexts. In particular, thanks to the mapping one may define the free-energy in the non-equilibrium states very naturally as the (usual) free energy of the mapped system.

  21 citations

• On the low-energy description for tunnel-coupled one-dimensional Bose gases

  Yuri D van Nieuwkerk, Fabian H L Essler

  SciPost Phys. 9, 025 (2020) · published 25 August 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We consider a model of two tunnel-coupled one-dimensional Bose gases with hard-wall boundary conditions. Bosonizing the model and retaining only the most relevant interactions leads to a decoupled theory consisting of a quantum sine-Gordon model and a free boson, describing respectively the antisymmetric and symmetric combinations of the phase fields. We go beyond this description by retaining the perturbation with the next smallest scaling dimension. This perturbation carries conformal spin and couples the two sectors. We carry out a detailed investigation of the effects of this coupling on the non-equilibrium dynamics of the model. We focus in particular on the role played by spatial inhomogeneities in the initial state in a quantum quench setup.

  21 citations

• Low-energy effective description of dark $Sp(4)$ theories

  Suchita Kulkarni, Axel Maas, Seán Mee, Marco Nikolic, Josef Pradler, Fabian Zierler

  SciPost Phys. 14, 044 (2023) · published 22 March 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Strongly interacting massive particles are viable dark matter candidates. We consider a dark $Sp(4)$ gauge theory with $N_f=2$ fermions in the pseudo-real fundamental representation and construct the chiral low-energy effective theory. We determine the flavour multiplet structure and the chiral Lagrangian, including the Wess-Zumino-Witten term for mass-degenerate and non-degenerate flavours. We then study the possible charge assignments under a $U(1)'$ gauge symmetry, emphasizing on dark state stability, and provide the full Lagrangian description for Goldstone bosons and vector resonances, including the Wess-Zumino-Witten term. Finally, we use dedicated lattice simulations to determine the chiral low-energy effective theory's validity and low-energy constants. This work represents a self-consistent study of this non-Abelian theory. It thereby provides a framework for future phenomenological exploration in connection to the dark matter problem.

  21 citations

• One-shot holography

  Chris Akers, Adam Levine, Geoff Penington, Elizabeth Wildenhain

  SciPost Phys. 16, 144 (2024) · published 4 June 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Following the work of [J. High Energy Phys. 04, 062 (2021)], we define a generally covariant max-entanglement wedge of a boundary region B, which we conjecture to be the bulk region reconstructible from B. We similarly define a covariant min-entanglement wedge, which we conjecture to be the bulk region that can influence the state on B. We prove that the min- and max-entanglement wedges obey various properties necessary for this conjecture, such as nesting, inclusion of the causal wedge, and a reduction to the usual quantum extremal surface prescription in the appropriate special cases. These proofs rely on one-shot versions of the (restricted) quantum focusing conjecture (QFC) that we conjecture to hold. We argue that these QFCs imply a one-shot generalized second law (GSL) and quantum Bousso bound. Moreover, in a particular semiclassical limit we prove this one-shot GSL directly using algebraic techniques. Finally, in order to derive our results, we extend both the frameworks of one-shot quantum Shannon theory and state-specific reconstruction to finite-dimensional von Neumann algebras, allowing nontrivial centers.

  21 citations

• Areas and entropies in BFSS/gravity duality

  Tarek Anous, Joanna L. Karczmarek, Eric Mintun, Mark Van Raamsdonk, Benson Way

  SciPost Phys. 8, 057 (2020) · published 15 April 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The BFSS matrix model provides an example of gauge-theory / gravity duality where the gauge theory is a model of ordinary quantum mechanics with no spatial subsystems. If there exists a general connection between areas and entropies in this model similar to the Ryu-Takayanagi formula, the entropies must be more general than the usual subsystem entanglement entropies. In this note, we first investigate the extremal surfaces in the geometries dual to the BFSS model at zero and finite temperature. We describe a method to associate regulated areas to these surfaces and calculate the areas explicitly for a family of surfaces preserving $SO(8)$ symmetry, both at zero and finite temperature. We then discuss possible entropic quantities in the matrix model that could be dual to these regulated areas.

  21 citations

• Accuracy of restricted Boltzmann machines for the one-dimensional $J_1-J_2$ Heisenberg model

  Luciano Loris Viteritti, Francesco Ferrari, Federico Becca

  SciPost Phys. 12, 166 (2022) · published 19 May 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Neural networks have been recently proposed as variational wave functions for quantum many-body systems [G. Carleo and M. Troyer, Science 355, 602 (2017)]. In this work, we focus on a specific architecture, known as Restricted Boltzmann Machine (RBM), and analyse its accuracy for the spin-1/2 $J_1-J_2$ antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model in one spatial dimension. The ground state of this model has a non-trivial sign structure, especially for $J_2/J_1>0.5$, forcing us to work with complex-valued RBMs. Two variational Ans\"atze are discussed: one defined through a fully complex RBM, and one in which two different real-valued networks are used to approximate modulus and phase of the wave function. In both cases, translational invariance is imposed by considering linear combinations of RBMs, giving access also to the lowest-energy excitations at fixed momentum $k$. We perform a systematic study on small clusters to evaluate the accuracy of these wave functions in comparison to exact results, providing evidence for the supremacy of the fully complex RBM. Our calculations show that this kind of Ans\"atze is very flexible and describes both gapless and gapped ground states, also capturing the incommensurate spin-spin correlations and low-energy spectrum for $J_2/J_1>0.5$. The RBM results are also compared to the ones obtained with Gutzwiller-projected fermionic states, often employed to describe quantum spin models [F. Ferrari, A. Parola, S. Sorella and F. Becca, Phys. Rev. B 97, 235103 (2018)]. Contrary to the latter class of variational states, the fully-connected structure of RBMs hampers the transferability of the wave function from small to large clusters, implying an increase of the computational cost with the system size.

  21 citations