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arXiv:1412.3546 · Journal of Statistical Mechanics Theory and Experiment

Scaling of entanglement in 2 + 1-dimensional scale-invariant field theories

Xiao Chen, Gil Young Cho, Thomas Faulkner, Eduardo Fradkin

Published Feb 10, 2015• 24 citations
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Abstract

We study the universal scaling behavior of the entanglement entropy of critical theories in 2 + 1 dimensions. We specially consider two fermionic scale-invariant models, free massless Dirac fermions and a model of fermions with quadratic band touching, and numerically study the two-cylinder entanglement entropy of the models on the torus. We find that in both cases the entanglement entropy satisfies the area law and has the subleading term which is a scaling function of the aspect ratios of the cylindrical regions. We test the scaling of entanglement in both the free fermion models using three possible scaling functions for the subleading term derived from (a) the quasi-1D conformal field theory, (b) the bosonic quantum Lifshitz model and (c) the holographic AdS/CFT correspondence. For the later case we construct an analytic scaling function using holography, appropriate for critical theories with a gravitational dual description. We find that the subleading term in the fermionic models is well described, for a range of aspect ratios, by the scaling form derived from the quantum Lifshitz model as well as that derived using the AdS/CFT correspondence (in this case only for the Dirac model). For the case where the fermionic models are placed on a square torus we find the fit to the different scaling forms is in agreement to surprisingly high precision.

DOI
10.1088/1742-5468/2015/02/p02010

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We numerically determine subleading scaling terms in the ground-state entanglement entropy of several two-dimensional (2D) gapless systems, including a Heisenberg model with N\'eel order, a free Dirac fermion in the $\ensuremath{\pi}$-flux phase, and the nearest-neighbor resonating-valence-bond wave function. For these models, we show that the entanglement entropy between cylindrical regions of length xxx and $L\ensuremath{-}x$, extending around a torus of length LLL, depends on the dimensionless ratio x/Lx/Lx/L. This can be well approximated on finite-size lattices by a function $\mathrm{ln}(\mathrm{sin}(\ensuremath{\pi}x/L)),$ akin to the familiar chord-length dependence in one dimension. We provide evidence, however, that the precise form of this bulk-dependent contribution is a more general function in the 2D thermodynamic limit.
We study different aspects of quantum entanglement and its measures, including entanglement entropy in the vacuum state of a certain Lifshitz free scalar theory. We present simple intuitive arguments based on “non-local” effects of this theory that the scaling of entanglement entropy depends on the dynamical exponent as a characteristic parameter of the theory. The scaling is such that in the massless theory for small entangling regions it leads to area law in the Lorentzian limit and volume law in the z → ∞ limit. We present strong numerical evidences in (1+1) and (2+1)-dimensions in support of this behavior. In (2 + 1)-dimensions we also study some shape dependent aspects of entanglement. We argue that in the massless limit corner contributions are no more additive for large enough dynamical exponent due to non-local effects of Lifshitz theories. We also comment on possible holographic duals of such theories based on the sign of tripartite information.
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Abstract We investigate the entanglement entropy (EE) of circular entangling cuts in the 2 + 1-dimensional quantum Lifshitz model. The ground state in this model is a spatially conformal invariant state of the Rokhsar–Kivelson type, whose amplitude is the Gibbs weight of 2D Euclidean free boson. We show that the finite subleading corrections of EE to the area-law term, as well as the mutual information, are conformal invariants and calculate them for cylinder, disk-like and spherical manifolds with various spatial cuts. The subtlety due to the boson compactification in the replica trick is carefully addressed. We find that in the geometry of a punctured plane with many small holes, the constant piece of EE is proportional to the number of holes, indicating the ability of entanglement to detect topological information of the configuration. Finally, we compare the mutual information of two small distant disks with Cardy’s relativistic CFT scaling proposal. We find that in the quantum Lifshitz model, the mutual information also scales at long distance with a power determined by the lowest scaling dimension local operator in the theory.