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arXiv:1211.0294 · Journal of Physics Condensed Matter

Kibble–Zurek scaling and string-net coarsening in topologically ordered systems

Anushya Chandran, F. J. Burnell, Vedika Khemani, Shivaji L. Sondhi

Published Sep 11, 2013• 28 citations
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Abstract

We consider the non-equilibrium dynamics of topologically ordered systems driven across a continuous phase transition into proximate phases with no, or reduced, topological order. This dynamics exhibits scaling in the spirit of Kibble and Zurek but now without the presence of symmetry breaking and a local order parameter. The late stages of the process are seen to exhibit a slow, coarsening dynamics for the string-net that underlies the physics of the topological phase, a potentially interesting signature of topological order. We illustrate these phenomena in the context of particular phase transitions out of the Abelian Z2 topologically ordered phase of the toric code/Z2 gauge theory, and the non-Abelian SU(2)k ordered phases of the relevant Levin-Wen models.

DOI
10.1088/0953-8984/25/40/404214

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We consider the non-equilibrium dynamics of topologically ordered systems driven across a continuous phase transition into proximate phases with no, or reduced, topological order. This dynamics exhibits scaling in the spirit of Kibble and Zurek but now without the presence of symmetry breaking and a local order parameter. The late stages of the process are seen to exhibit a slow, coarsening dynamics for the string-net that underlies the physics of the topological phase, a potentially interesting signature of topological order. We illustrate these phenomena in the context of particular phase transitions out of the Abelian Z2 topologically ordered phase of the toric code/Z2 gauge theory, and the non-Abelian SU(2)k ordered phases of the relevant Levin-Wen models.
We analyze scaling behaviors of simulated annealing carried out on various classical systems with topological order, obtained as appropriate limits of the toric code in two and three dimensions. We first consider the three-dimensional Z2{\mathbb{Z}}_{2}Z2​ (Ising) lattice gauge model, which exhibits a continuous topological phase transition at finite temperature. We show that a generalized Kibble-Zurek scaling ansatz applies to this transition, in spite of the absence of a local order parameter. We find perimeter-law scaling of the magnitude of a nonlocal order parameter (defined using Wilson loops) and a dynamic exponent $z=2.70\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.03$, the latter in good agreement with previous results for the equilibrium dynamics (autocorrelations). We then study systems where (topological) order forms only at zero temperature---the Ising chain, the two-dimensional Z2{\mathbb{Z}}_{2}Z2​ gauge model, and a three-dimensional star model (another variant of the Z2{\mathbb{Z}}_{2}Z2​ gauge model). In these systems the correlation length diverges exponentially, in a way that is nonsmooth as a finite-size system approaches the zero temperature state. We show that the Kibble-Zurek theory does not apply in any of these systems. Instead, the dynamics can be understood in terms of diffusion and annihilation of topological defects, which we use to formulate a scaling theory in good agreement with our simulation results. We also discuss the effect of open boundaries where defect annihilation competes with a faster process of evaporation at the surface.
In the first part of this dissertation, we study the dynamics of isolated and clean quantum systems out of equilibrium. We initially address the Kibble-Zurek (KZ) problem of determining the dynamical evolution of a system close to its critical point under slow changes of a control parameter. We formulate a scaling limit in which the nonequilibrium behavior is universal and discuss the universal content. We then report computations of some scaling functions in model Gaussian and large-N problems. Next, we apply KZ scaling to topologically ordered systems with no local order parameter. In the examples of the Ising gauge theory and the SU(2)k phases of the Levin-Wen models, we observe a slow, coarsening dynamics for the string-net that underlies the physics of the topological phase at late times for ramps across transitions that reduce topological order. We conclude by studying quenches in the quantum O(N) model in the infinite N limit in varying spatial dimensions. Despite the failure to equilibrate owing to an infinite number of emergent conservation laws, the qualitative features of late time states following quenches is predicted by the equilibrium phase diagram. In the second part of this dissertation, we explore the relationship between entanglement and topological order in fractional quantum Hall (FQH) phases. In 2008, Li and Haldane conjectured that the entanglement spectrum (ES), a presentation of the Schmidt values of a real space cut, reflects the energy spectrum of the FQH chiral edge. Specifically, both spectra should have the same quasi-degeneracy of eigenvalues everywhere in the phase. We offer an analytic, microscopic proof of this conjecture in the Read-Rezayi sequence of model states. We further identify a different ES that reflects the bulk quasihole spectrum and prove a bulk-edge correspondence in the ES. Finally, we show that the finite-size corrections of the ES of the Laughlin states reveal the fractionalization of the underlying quasiparticles.
The Kibble-Zurek (KZ) mechanism describes the scaling behavior when driving a system across a continuous symmetry-breaking transition. Previous studies have shown that the KZ-like scaling behavior also lies in the topological transitions in the Qi-Wu-Zhang model (2D) and the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model (1D), although symmetry breaking does not exist in these systems. Both models with linear band crossings yield $\ensuremath{\nu}\ensuremath{\simeq}1$ and $z\ensuremath{\simeq}1$. A natural question is whether different critical exponents can emerge in topological transitions beyond the linear band crossings. In this paper, we look into the KZ behavior in a topological 2D checkerboard lattice with a quadratic band crossing. We investigate from dual perspectives: momentum distribution of the Berry curvature in clean systems for simplicity, and real-space analysis of domain-like local Chern marker configurations in disordered systems, which is a more intuitive analog to conventional KZ description. In equilibrium, we find the correlation length diverges at the transition with a power $\ensuremath{\nu}\ensuremath{\simeq}1/2$. Then, by slowly quenching the system across the topological phase transition, we find that the freeze-out time tf{t}_{\mathrm{f}}tf​ and the unfrozen length scale $\ensuremath{\xi}({t}_{\mathrm{f}})$ both satisfy the KZ scaling, verifying $z\ensuremath{\simeq}2$. We subsequently explore KZ behavior in topological phase transitions with other higher-order band crossings and find the relationship between the critical exponents and the order. Our results extend the understanding of the KZ mechanism and nonequilibrium topological phase transitions.
The discovery of nonlocal order parameters in real space provides a feasible scheme for studying dynamical critical behavior in topological systems. We study the critical phenomena in the one-dimensional Su-Schrieffer-Heeger (SSH) model by investigating the inhomogeneities in the local winding number in real space. By slowly quenching the system across the topological phase transition during a finite time interval, we find that the length scale defined through the local winding number satisfies the Kibble-Zurek mechanism. In contrast to the density of excitation, the scaling of this length scale is in full analog to the behavior of traditional continuous phase transitions with local order parameter and spontaneous symmetry breaking. In addition, the critical behavior and Kibble-Zurek mechanism in the generalized SSH with next-nearest-neighbor hopping are also studied. These results extend our understanding to the Kibble-Zurek mechanism and topological phase transition in nonequilibrium.
We study the phase diagram of a topological string-net-type lattice model in the presence of geometrically frustrated interactions. These interactions drive several phase transitions that reduce the topological order, leading to a rich phase diagram including both Abelian (Z2)({\mathbb{Z}}_{2})(Z2​) and non-Abelian $(\text{Ising}\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}\overline{\text{Ising}})$ topologically ordered phases, as well as phases with broken translational symmetry. Interestingly, one of these phases simultaneously exhibits (Abelian) topological order and long-ranged order due to translational symmetry breaking, with nontrivial interactions between excitations in the topological order and defects in the long-ranged order. We introduce a variety of effective models, valid along certain lines in the phase diagram, which can be used to characterize both topological and symmetry-breaking order in these phases and in many cases allow us to characterize the phase transitions that separate them. We use exact diagonalization and high-order series expansion to study areas of the phase diagram where these models break down and to approximate the location of the phase boundaries.
The Kibble-Zurek mechanism predicts a universal scaling behavior of the defect production when a system is slowly quenched across a critical phase transition point. Here, we discover that the universal scaling behavior across a higher-order topological phase transition does not conform to the traditional Kibble-Zurek mechanism. To explain the anomalous scaling exponent, we develop a solvable Landau-Zener model that takes into account the role of topological edge band that dominates the phase transition. For a two-dimensional boundary-obstructed higher-order topological system, the Kibble-Zurek scaling must be modified to adopt the effective dimension of topological edge band instead of the real physical dimension. We also find that across the boundary-obstructed higher-order topological phase transition, boundary conditions can drastically modify the scaling behaviors. For comparison, we investigate the slow quench dynamics across the bulk-obstructed phase transitions and a single multicritical point, which obeys the Kibble-Zurek mechanism with physical dimension.