We carry out a numerical study of the bipartite entanglement entropy in the gapped regime of two paradigmatic quantum spin chain models: the Ising chain in an external magnetic field and the antiferromagnetic XXZ model. The universal scaling limit of these models is described by the massive Ising field theory and the $SU(2)$-Thirring (sine-Gordon) model, respectively. We may therefore exploit quantum field theoretical results to predict the behavior of the entropy. We numerically confirm that in the scaling limit, corrections to the saturation of the entropy at large region size are proportional to a modified Bessel function of the first kind, ${K}_{0}(2mr)$, where $m$ is a mass scale (the inverse correlation length) and $r$ the length of the region under consideration. The proportionality constant is simply related to the number of particle types in the universal spectrum. This was originally predicted by J. L. Cardy, O. A. Castro-Alvaredo, and B. Doyon [J. Stat. Phys. 130, 129 (2008)] and B. Doyon [Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 031602 (2009)] for two-dimensional quantum field theories. Away from the universal region our numerics suggest an entropic behavior following quite closely the quantum field theory prediction, except for extra dependencies on the correlation length.
We carry out a numerical study of the bipartite entanglement entropy in the gapped regime of two paradigmatic quantum spin chain models: the Ising chain in an external magnetic field and the antiferromagnetic XXZ model. The universal scaling limit of these models is described by the massive Ising field theory and the SU(2)-Thirring (sine-Gordon) model, respectively. We may therefore exploit quantum field theoretical results to predict the behavior of the entropy. We numerically confirm that in the scaling limit, corrections to the saturation of the entropy at large region size are proportional to a modified Bessel function of the first kind, K0(2mr), where m is a mass scale (the inverse correlation length) and r the length of the region under consideration. The proportionality constant is simply related to the number of particle types in the universal spectrum. This was originally predicted by J. L. Cardy, O. A. Castro-Alvaredo, and B. Doyon [J. Stat. Phys. 130, 129 (2008)] and B. Doyon [Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 031602 (2009)] for two-dimensional quantum field theories. Away from the universal region our numerics suggest an entropic behavior following quite closely the quantum field theory prediction, except for extra dependencies on the correlation length.
In this dissertation, the momentum-space entanglement properties of several quantum spin chains are investigated. In the second chapter we re- view important results on many-body entanglement. In the third chapter, we numerically study the momentum-space entanglement spectra of bosonic and fermionic formulations of the spin-1/2 XXZ chain [Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 256404 (2014)]. We investigate the behavior of the entanglement gaps, present in both formulations, across quantum phase transitions in the XXZ chain. In both cases, finite size scaling suggests that the entanglement gap closure does not occur at the physical transition points. For bosons, we find that the entan- glement gap depends on the scaling dimension of the conformal field theory as varied by the X X Z anisotropy. For fermions, the infinite entanglement gap present at the XX point persists well past the phase transition at the Heisenberg point. We elaborate on how this may support the numerical study of phase transitions. In the third chapter, we advocate that in certain critical spin chains a gap in the momentum-space entanglement spectrum separates the universal part of the spectrum, which is determined by the associated conformal field theory, from the non-universal part, which is specific to the model [arXiv:1512.09030]. We provide affirmative evidence from multicritical spin-1 chains with low energy sectors described by the SU(2)2 or the SU(3)1 Wess-Zumino-Witten model. In chapter four, we study momentum- space en- tanglement in quantum spin-half ladders [Phys. Rev. B 93, 125107 (2016)]. When the system is gapped, we analytically find the momentum-space entan- glement Hamiltonian is described by a chiral conformal field theory with a central charge of two. When the system is gapless, the entanglement Hamil- tonian consists of one gapless mode that is linear in subsystem momentum and one mode with a flat dispersion relation. We also analytically include the effect of a certain irrelevant terms (in the renormalization group sense) on the entanglement spectrum. In chapter six, we investigate the momentum- space entanglement spectrum after a quantum quench [arXiv:1603.01997]. We show that the momentum-space entanglement spectrum of the XXZ spin- half chain possesses many universal features both in equilibrium and after a quantum quench.
This thesis is a review of the works and ideas I have been developing in my doctoral studies, and it is mainly based on Castro-Alvaredo & Levi [2011]; Castro-Alvaredo et al. [2011]; Levi [2012]; Levi et al. [2013]. The specific aims of these works were to explore the methods developed in Calabrese & Cardy [2004]; Cardy et al. [2008] with the purpose of quantifying entanglement in a quantum field theory, and have a deeper understanding of their predicting power on lattice systems. The first chapter is meant to be a review of quantum entanglement in many-body physics, and the methods we use to establish the link to QFT. In the second chapter, after a small introduction on conformal field theory, we collect the results of Calabrese & Cardy [2004], focusing in particular on the replica trick and the twist field. The third chapter is devoted to adapting these tools to massive QFT, as performed in Cardy et al. [2008]. In particular we focus on the form factor program for the twist field, by means of which we are able to outline the behavior of entanglement entropy in massive theories in a non perturbative way. We expand on the results found in Castro-Alvaredo & Levi [2011], where higher particle form factors were studied for the roaming trajectory model, and the SU(3)2-homogenous sine-Gordon model. We then carry out a numerical study of the Δ-function of the twist field for these two models. In the fourth chapter we focus on the connection between the Δ-function of the twist field and Zamolodchikov c-function, as performed in Castro-Alvaredo et al. [2011]. In addressing this issue we perform a thorough study of the two point function of the twist field and the trace of the stress-energy tensor. This allows us to introduce a class of composite twist fields, which were the main topic of Levi [2012]. In the fifth and last chapter we group the most common methods used to study the entanglement entropy of quantum spin chains. We start with the XY chain analysis, which is performed with a combination of analytical and numerical methods based on free fermion techniques. We then perform a numerical study of the XXZ chain by means of the density matrix renormalization group approach. Eventually we present the results obtained for these two models in Levi et al. [2013].
We recently showed [Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 220602 (2018)] that the average bipartite entanglement entropy of all energy eigenstates of the quantum Ising chain exhibits a universal (for translationally invariant quadratic fermionic models) leading term that scales linearly with the subsystem's volume, while in the thermodynamic limit the first subleading correction does not vanish at the critical field (it only depends on the ratio f between the volume of the subsystem and volume of the system) and vanishes otherwise. Here we show, analytically for bounds and numerically for averages, that the same remains true for the spin-1/2 XY chain in a transverse magnetic field. We then tighten the bounds for the coefficient of the universal volume-law term, which is a concave function of f. We develop a systematic approach to compute upper and lower bounds, and we provide explicit analytic expressions for up to the fourth-order bounds.
The half-chain entanglement entropy (EE) of the one-dimensional XX (isotropic XY) chain and quantum Ising chain (QIC) at the critical point are calculated numerically for large lattices. The periodic, free-free, fixed-fixed (++) and ($+\ensuremath{-}$), and fixed-free boundary conditions (BCs) are studied. The models are transformed into a fermion system with a Jordan-Wigner transformation. The correlation functions of these fermions are obtained numerically. With the correlation functions, the entanglement entropy is obtained. The numerical calculation is performed with quadruple precision. The numerical results agree with the exact relationship with an accuracy of ${10}^{\ensuremath{-}28}$ between the EEs of the XX chain and QICs: (1) the EE of the XX chain with periodic BCs is the sum of two QICs with periodic BCs; (2) the EE of the XX chain with free-free BCs is the sum of two QICs with free-free BCs; (3) the EE of the XX chain with fixed-free BCs is the sum of the EE of a QIC with fixed-free BCs and that with free-free BCs; (4) the EE of the XX chain with fixed-fixed (++) BCs is the sum of the EE of a QIC with fixed-fixed (++) BCs and that with free-free BCs; and (5) the EE of the XX chain with fixed-fixed ($+\ensuremath{-}$) BCs is the sum of the EE of a QIC with fixed-fixed (++) BCs and that of the first excited state of a QIC with free-free BCs. We fit the half-chain EE with finite-size scaling expansion of terms ${L}^{\ensuremath{-}n}$ and ${L}^{\ensuremath{-}n}lnL$, where L is the length of the spin chain. We find that the fitted parameters for the leading term lnL and the constant term are consistent with conformal field theory and that the exact solutions are highly accurate. The fitting accuracy is so high that the fitted central charge of the Ising model is $0.5\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}1\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}26}$ for the periodic boundary condition. From the higher-order corrections in the fitted expansion, we find that there exist ${L}^{\ensuremath{-}4}lnL$ and higher-order corrections for the fixed-fixed ($+\ensuremath{-}$) boundary conditions, whereas there exist ${L}^{\ensuremath{-}3}lnL$ and higher-order corrections for the fixed-free boundary conditions. These types of corrections mean corrections of the central charge.
Recently, the finite-size corrections to the geometrical entanglement per lattice site in the spin-1/2 chain have been numerically shown to scale inversely with system size, and its prefactor b has been suggested to be possibly universal [Q-Q. Shi et al., New J. Phys. 12, 025008 (2010)]. As possible evidence of its universality, the numerical values of the prefactors have been confirmed analytically by using the Affleck-Ludwig boundary entropy with a Neumann boundary condition for a free compactified field [J-M. Stephan et al., Phys. Rev. B 82, 180406(R) (2010)]. However, the Affleck-Ludwig boundary entropy is not unique and does depend on conformally invariant boundary conditions. Here, we show that a unique Affleck-Ludwig boundary entropy corresponding to a finitesize correction to the geometrical entanglement per lattice site exists and show that the ratio of the prefactor b to the corresponding minimum groundstate degeneracy gmin for the Affleck- Ludwig boundary entropy is a constant for any critical region of the spin-1 XXZ system with the single-ion anisotropy, i.e., b/(2 log2 g min ) = −1. Previously studied spin-1/2 systems, including the quantum three-state Potts model, have verified the universal ratio. Hence, the inverse finite-size correction to the geometrical entanglement per lattice site and its prefactor b are universal for one-dimensional critical systems.
We study analytically the corrections to the leading terms in the R\'enyi entropy of a massive lattice theory, showing significant deviations from naive expectations. In particular, we show that finite size and finite mass effects give rise to different contributions (with different exponents) and thus violate a simple scaling argument. In the specific, we look at the entanglement entropy of a bipartite XYZ spin-1/2 chain in its ground state. When the system is divided into two semi-infinite half-chains, we have an analytical expression of the R\'enyi entropy as a function of a single mass parameter. In the scaling limit, we show that the entropy as a function of the correlation length formally coincides with that of a bulk Ising model. This should be compared with the fact that, at criticality, the model is described by a c=1 conformal field theory and the corrections to the entropy due to finite size effects show exponents depending on the compactification radius of the theory. We will argue that there is no contradiction between these statements. If the lattice spacing is retained finite, the relation between the mass parameter and the correlation length generates new subleading terms in the entropy, whose form is path dependent in phase space and whose interpretation within a field theory is not available yet. These contributions arise as a consequence of the existence of stable bound states and are thus a distinctive feature of truly interacting theories, such as the XYZ chain.