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arXiv:1507.03987 · Physical Review X

Deformation of a Quantum Many-Particle System by a Rotating Impurity

Richard Schmidt, Mikhail Lemeshko

Published Feb 12, 2016• 69 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

During the past 70 years, the quantum theory of angular momentum has been successfully applied to describing the properties of nuclei, atoms, and molecules, and their interactions with each other as well as with external fields.Because of the properties of quantum rotations, the angular-momentum algebra can be of tremendous complexity even for a few interacting particles, such as valence electrons of an atom, not to mention larger many-particle systems.In this work, we study an example of the latter: a rotating quantum impurity coupled to a many-body bosonic bath.In the regime of strong impurity-bath couplings, the problem involves the addition of an infinite number of angular momenta, which renders it intractable using currently available techniques.Here, we introduce a novel canonical transformation that allows us to eliminate the complex angular-momentum algebra from such a class of many-body problems.In addition, the transformation exposes the problem's constants of motion, and renders it solvable exactly in the limit of a slowly rotating impurity.We exemplify the technique by showing that there exists a critical rotational speed at which the impurity suddenly acquires one quantum of angular momentum from the many-particle bath.Such an instability is accompanied by the deformation of the phonon density in the frame rotating along with the impurity.

DOI
10.1103/physrevx.6.011012

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During the past 70 years, the quantum theory of angular momentum has been successfully applied to describing the properties of nuclei, atoms, and molecules, and their interactions with each other as well as with external fields.Because of the properties of quantum rotations, the angular-momentum algebra can be of tremendous complexity even for a few interacting particles, such as valence electrons of an atom, not to mention larger many-particle systems.In this work, we study an example of the latter: a rotating quantum impurity coupled to a many-body bosonic bath.In the regime of strong impurity-bath couplings, the problem involves the addition of an infinite number of angular momenta, which renders it intractable using currently available techniques.Here, we introduce a novel canonical transformation that allows us to eliminate the complex angular-momentum algebra from such a class of many-body problems.In addition, the transformation exposes the problem's constants of motion, and renders it solvable exactly in the limit of a slowly rotating impurity.We exemplify the technique by showing that there exists a critical rotational speed at which the impurity suddenly acquires one quantum of angular momentum from the many-particle bath.Such an instability is accompanied by the deformation of the phonon density in the frame rotating along with the impurity.
We develop a microscopic theory describing a quantum impurity whose rotational degree of freedom is coupled to a many-particle bath. We approach the problem by introducing the concept of an "angulon"-a quantum rotor dressed by a quantum field-and reveal its quasiparticle properties using a combination of variational and diagrammatic techniques. Our theory predicts renormalization of the impurity rotational structure, such as that observed in experiments with molecules in superfluid helium droplets, in terms of a rotational Lamb shift induced by the many-particle environment. Furthermore, we discover a rich many-body-induced fine structure, emerging in rotational spectra due to a redistribution of angular momentum within the quantum many-body system.
Feynman diagrams represent one of the most powerful techniques of modern many-particle theory. Applying such diagrammatic techniques to many-body processes involving angular momentum is, however, substantially challenging. Here, the authors introduce a diagrammatic approach to the angulon quasiparticle, which consists of an orbital quantum impurity -- such as a molecule or electron -- exchanging angular momentum with a bath of bosons (superfluid, lattice phonons). The new approach fuses the Feynman diagrams of solid-state physics with the angular momentum diagrams previously used in atomic and nuclear structure calculations.
The oft-quoted dictum by Arthur Schawlow: ``A diatomic molecule has one atom too many'' has been disavowed. Inspired by the possibility to experimentally manipulate and enhance chemical reactivity in helium nanodroplets, we investigate the rotation of coupled cold molecules in the presence of a many-body environment. In this thesis, we introduce new variational approaches to quantum impurities and apply them to the Fröhlich polaron - a quasiparticle formed out of an electron (or other point-like impurity) in a polar medium, and to the angulon - a quasiparticle formed out of a rotating molecule in a bosonic bath. With this theoretical toolbox, we reveal the self-localization transition for the angulon quasiparticle. We show that, unlike for polarons, self-localization of angulons occurs at finite impurity-bath coupling already at the mean-field level. The transition is accompanied by the spherical-symmetry breaking of the angulon ground state and a discontinuity in the first derivative of the ground-state energy. Moreover, the type of symmetry breaking is dictated by the symmetry of the microscopic impurity-bath interaction, which leads to a number of distinct self-localized states. For the system containing multiple impurities, by analogy with the bipolaron, we introduce the biangulon quasiparticle describing two rotating molecules that align with respect to each other due to the effective attractive interaction mediated by the excitations of the bath. We study this system from the strong-coupling regime to the weak molecule-bath interaction regime. We show that the molecules tend to have a strong alignment in the ground state, the biangulon shows shifted angulon instabilities and an additional spectral instability, where resonant angular momentum transfer between the molecules and the bath takes place. Finally, we introduce a diagonalization scheme that allows us to describe the transition from two separated angulons to a biangulon as a function of the distance between the two molecules.
Impurity motion in a many-body environment has been a central issue in the field of low-temperature physics for decades. In bosonic quantum fluids, the onset of a drag force experienced by point-like objects is due to collective environment excitations, driven by the exchange of linear momentum between the impurity and the many-body bath. In this work we consider a rotating impurity, with the aim of exploring how angular momentum is exchanged with the surrounding bosonic environment. In order to elucidate these issues, we employ a quasiparticle approach based on the angulon theory, which allows us to effectively deal with the non-trivial algebra of quantized angular momentum in the presence of a many-body environment. We uncover how impurity dressing by environmental excitations can establish an exchange channel, whose effectiveness crucially depends on the initial state of the impurity. Remarkably, we find that there is a critical value of initial angular momentum, above which this channel effectively freezes.
We introduce a Diagrammatic Monte Carlo (DiagMC) approach to complex molecular impurities with rotational degrees of freedom interacting with a many-particle environment. The treatment is based on the diagrammatic expansion that merges the usual Feynman diagrams with the angular momentum diagrams known from atomic and nuclear structure theory, thereby incorporating the non-Abelian algebra inherent to quantum rotations. Our approach works at arbitrary coupling, is free of systematic errors and of finite size effects, and naturally provides access to the impurity Green function. We exemplify the technique by obtaining an all-coupling solution of the angulon model, however, the method is quite general and can be applied to a broad variety of quantum impurities possessing angular momentum degrees of freedom.
We introduce a diagrammatic Monte Carlo approach to angular momentum properties of quantum many-particle systems possessing a macroscopic number of degrees of freedom. The treatment is based on a diagrammatic expansion that merges the usual Feynman diagrams with the angular momentum diagrams known from atomic and nuclear structure theory, thereby incorporating the non-Abelian algebra inherent to quantum rotations. Our approach is applicable at arbitrary coupling, is free of systematic errors and of finite-size effects, and naturally provides access to the impurity Green function. We exemplify the technique by obtaining an all-coupling solution of the angulon model; however, the method is quite general and can be applied to a broad variety of systems in which particles exchange quantum angular momentum with their many-body environment.