Publications

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• Entanglement spreading in non-equilibrium integrable systems

  Pasquale Calabrese

  SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 20 (2020) · published 1 December 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  These are lecture notes for a short course given at the Les Houches Summer School on ``Integrability in Atomic and Condensed Matter Physics'', in summer 2018. Here, I pedagogically discuss recent advances in the study of the entanglement spreading during the non-equilibrium dynamics of isolated integrable quantum systems. I first introduce the idea that the stationary thermodynamic entropy is the entanglement accumulated during the non-equilibrium dynamics and then join such an idea with the quasiparticle picture for the entanglement spreading to provide quantitive predictions for the time evolution of the entanglement entropy in arbitrary integrable models, regardless of the interaction strength.

  37 citations

• Topological entanglement properties of disconnected partitions in the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model

  Tommaso Micallo, Vittorio Vitale, Marcello Dalmonte, Pierre Fromholz

  SciPost Phys. Core 3, 012 (2020) · published 1 December 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study the disconnected entanglement entropy, $S^D$, of the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model. $S^D$ is a combination of both connected and disconnected bipartite entanglement entropies that removes all area and volume law contributions, and is thus only sensitive to the non-local entanglement stored within the ground state manifold. Using analytical and numerical computations, we show that $S^D$ behaves as a topological invariant, i.e., it is quantized to either $0$ or $2 \log (2)$ in the topologically trivial and non-trivial phases, respectively. These results also hold in the presence of symmetry-preserving disorder. At the second-order phase transition separating the two phases, $S^D$ displays a system-size scaling behavior akin to those of conventional order parameters, that allows us to compute entanglement critical exponents. To corroborate the topological origin of the quantized values of $S^D$, we show how the latter remain quantized after applying unitary time evolution in the form of a quantum quench, a characteristic feature of topological invariants.

  20 citations

• Shot noise distinguishes Majorana fermions from vortices injected in the edge mode of a chiral p-wave superconductor

  C. W. J. Beenakker, D. O. Oriekhov

  SciPost Phys. 9, 080 (2020) · published 23 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The chiral edge modes of a topological superconductor support two types of excitations: fermionic quasiparticles known as Majorana fermions and $\pi$-phase domain walls known as edge vortices. Edge vortices are injected pairwise into counter-propagating edge modes by a flux bias or voltage bias applied to a Josephson junction. An unpaired edge mode carries zero electrical current on average, but there are time-dependent current fluctuations. We calculate the shot noise power produced by a sequence of edge vortices and find that it increases logarithmically with their spacing - even if the spacing is much larger than the core size so the vortices do not overlap. This nonlocality produces an anomalous V log V increase of the shot noise in a voltage-biased geometry, which serves as a distinguishing feature in comparison with the linear-in-V Majorana fermion shot noise.

  7 citations

• Fracton-elasticity duality of two-dimensional superfluid vortex crystals: defect interactions and quantum melting

  Dung Xuan Nguyen, Andrey Gromov, Sergej Moroz

  SciPost Phys. 9, 076 (2020) · published 19 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Employing the fracton-elastic duality, we develop a low-energy effective theory of a zero-temperature vortex crystal in a two-dimensional bosonic superfluid which naturally incorporates crystalline topological defects. We extract static interactions between these defects and investigate several continuous quantum transitions triggered by the Higgs condensation of vortex vacancies/interstitials and dislocations. We propose that the quantum melting of the vortex crystal towards the hexatic or smectic phase may occur via a pair of continuous transitions separated by an intermediate vortex supersolid phase.

  37 citations

• Diffusion from convection

  Marko Medenjak, Jacopo De Nardis, Takato Yoshimura

  SciPost Phys. 9, 075 (2020) · published 19 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We introduce non-trivial contributions to diffusion constant in generic many-body systems arising from quadratic fluctuations of ballistically propagating, i.e. convective, modes. Our result is obtained by expanding the current operator in the vicinity of equilibrium states in terms of powers of local and quasi-local conserved quantities. We show that only the second-order terms in this expansion carry a finite contribution to diffusive spreading. Our formalism implies that whenever there are at least two coupled modes with degenerate group velocities, the system behaves super-diffusively, in accordance with the non-linear fluctuating hydrodynamics theory. Finally, we show that our expression saturates the exact diffusion constants in quantum and classical interacting integrable systems, providing a general framework to derive these expressions.

  17 citations

• More exotic field theories in 3+1 dimensions

  Pranay Gorantla, Ho Tat Lam, Nathan Seiberg, Shu-Heng Shao

  SciPost Phys. 9, 073 (2020) · published 16 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We continue the exploration of nonstandard continuum field theories related to fractons in 3+1 dimensions. Our theories exhibit exotic global and gauge symmetries, defects with restricted mobility, and interesting dualities. Depending on the model, the defects are the probe limits of either fractonic particles, strings, or strips. One of our models is the continuum limit of the plaquette Ising lattice model, which features an important role in the construction of the X-cube model.

  49 citations

• Many-body quantum dynamics slows down at low density

  Xiao Chen, Yingfei Gu, Andrew Lucas

  SciPost Phys. 9, 071 (2020) · published 12 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study quantum many-body systems with a global U(1) conservation law, focusing on a theory of $N$ interacting fermions with charge conservation, or $N$ interacting spins with one conserved component of total spin. We define an effective operator size at finite chemical potential through suitably regularized out-of-time-ordered correlation functions. The growth rate of this density-dependent operator size vanishes algebraically with charge density; hence we obtain new bounds on Lyapunov exponents and butterfly velocities in charged systems at a given density, which are parametrically stronger than any Lieb-Robinson bound. We argue that the density dependence of our bound on the Lyapunov exponent is saturated in the charged Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model. We also study random automaton quantum circuits and Brownian Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev models, each of which exhibit a different density dependence for the Lyapunov exponent, and explain the discrepancy. We propose that our results are a cartoon for understanding Planckian-limited energy-conserving dynamics at finite temperature.

  25 citations

• Phase diagram of the $\mathbb{Z}_3$-Fock parafermion chain with pair hopping

  Iman Mahyaeh, Jurriaan Wouters, Dirk Schuricht

  SciPost Phys. Core 3, 011 (2020) · published 12 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study a tight binding model of $\mathbb{Z}_3$-Fock parafermions with single-particle and pair-hopping terms. The phase diagram has four different phases: a gapped phase, a gapless phase with central charge $c=2$, and two gapless phases with central charge $c=1$. We characterise each phase by analysing the energy gap, entanglement entropy and different correlation functions. The numerical simulations are complemented by analytical arguments.

  4 citations

• Effective field theory for quasicrystals and phasons dynamics

  Matteo Baggioli, Michael Landry

  SciPost Phys. 9, 062 (2020) · published 4 November 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We build an effective field theory (EFT) for quasicrystals -- aperiodic incommensurate lattice structures -- at finite temperature, entirely based on symmetry arguments and a well-define action principle. By means of Schwinger-Keldysh techniques, we derive the full dissipative dynamics of the system and we recover the experimentally observed diffusion-to-propagation crossover of the phason mode. From a symmetry point of view, the diffusive nature of the phason at long wavelengths is due to the fact that the internal translations, or phason shifts, are symmetries of the system with no associated Noether currents. The latter feature is compatible with the EFT description only because of the presence of dissipation (finite temperature) and the lack of periodic order. Finally, we comment on the similarities with certain homogeneous holographic models and we formally derive the universal relation between the pinning frequency of the phonons and the damping and diffusion constant of the phason.

  34 citations

• Light-induced topological magnons in two-dimensional van der Waals magnets

  Emil Viñas Boström, Martin Claassen, James W. McIver, Gregor Jotzu, Angel Rubio, Michael A. Sentef

  SciPost Phys. 9, 061 (2020) · published 30 October 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Driving a two-dimensional Mott insulator with circularly polarized light breaks time-reversal and inversion symmetry, which induces an optically-tunable synthetic scalar spin chirality interaction in the effective low-energy spin Hamiltonian. Here, we show that this mechanism can stabilize topological magnon excitations in honeycomb ferromagnets and in optical lattices. We find that the irradiated quantum magnet is described by a Haldane model for magnons that hosts topologically-protected edge modes. We study the evolution of the magnon spectrum in the Floquet regime and via time propagation of the magnon Hamiltonian for a slowly varying pulse envelope. Compared to similar but conceptually distinct driving schemes based on the Aharanov-Casher effect, the dimensionless light-matter coupling parameter $\lambda = eEa/\hbar\omega$ at fixed electric field strength is enhanced by a factor $\sim 10^5$. This increase of the coupling parameter allows to induce a topological gap of the order of $\Delta \approx 2$ meV with realistic laser pulses, bringing an experimental realization of light-induced topological magnon edge states within reach.

  19 citations