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arXiv:1510.07650 · Journal of High Energy Physics

Emergent Lorentz symmetry near fermionic quantum critical points in two and three dimensions

Bitan Roy, Vladimir Juričić, Igor F. Herbut

Published Apr 1, 2016• 66 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We study the renormalization group flow of the velocities in the field theory describing the coupling of the massless quasi-relativistic fermions to the bosons through the Yukawa coupling, as well as with both bosons and fermions coupled to a fluctuating U(1) gauge field in two and three spatial dimensions. Different versions of this theory describe quantum critical behavior of interacting Dirac fermions in various condensed-matter systems. We perform an analysis using one-loop ϵ-expansion about three spatial dimensions, which is the upper critical dimension in the problem. In two dimensions, we find that velocities of both charged fermions and bosons ultimately flow to the velocity of light, independently of the initial conditions, the number of fermionic and bosonic flavors, and the value of the couplings at the critical point. In three dimensions, due to the analyticity of the gauge field propagator, both the U(1) charge and the velocity of light flow, which leads to a richer behavior than in two dimensions. We show that all three velocities ultimately flow to a common terminal velocity, which is non-universal and different from the original velocity of light. Therefore, emergence of the Lorentz symmetry in the ultimate infrared regime seems to be a rather universal feature of this class of theories in both two and three dimensions.

DOI
10.1007/jhep04(2016)018

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We study the renormalization group flow of the velocities in the field theory describing the coupling of the massless quasi-relativistic fermions to the bosons through the Yukawa coupling, as well as with both bosons and fermions coupled to a fluctuating U(1) gauge field in two and three spatial dimensions. Different versions of this theory describe quantum critical behavior of interacting Dirac fermions in various condensed-matter systems. We perform an analysis using one-loop ϵ-expansion about three spatial dimensions, which is the upper critical dimension in the problem. In two dimensions, we find that velocities of both charged fermions and bosons ultimately flow to the velocity of light, independently of the initial conditions, the number of fermionic and bosonic flavors, and the value of the couplings at the critical point. In three dimensions, due to the analyticity of the gauge field propagator, both the U(1) charge and the velocity of light flow, which leads to a richer behavior than in two dimensions. We show that all three velocities ultimately flow to a common terminal velocity, which is non-universal and different from the original velocity of light. Therefore, emergence of the Lorentz symmetry in the ultimate infrared regime seems to be a rather universal feature of this class of theories in both two and three dimensions.
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The physics of interacting Fermi systems is extremely sensitive to the energy scale. Of particular interest is the low energy regime where correlation induced collective behavior emerges. The theory of interacting Fermi systems is confronted with the occurrence of very different phenomena along a continuum of scales calling for methods capable of computing physical observables as a function of energy scale. In this thesis, we perform a comprehensive renormalization group analysis of two and three-dimensional Fermi systems at low and zero temperature. We examine systems with spontaneous symmetry-breaking and quantum critical behavior by deriving and solving flow equations within the functional renormalization group framework. We extend the Hertz-Millis theory of quantumphase transitions in itinerant fermion systems to phases with discrete and continuous symmetry-breaking, and to quantum critical points where the zero temperature theory is associated with a non-Gaussian fixed point. The order parameter is implemented by a bosonic Hubbard-Stratonovich field, which - for continuous symmetry-breaking - splits into two components corresponding to longitudinal and transversal Goldstone fluctuations. We compute the finite temperature phase boundary near the quantum critical point explicitly including non-Gaussian fluctuations. We then set up a coupled fermion-boson renormalization group theory that captures the mutual interplay of gapless fermions with massless order parameter fluctuations when approaching a quantum critical point. As a first application, we compute the complete set of quantum critical exponents at the semimetal-to-superfluid quantum phase transition of attractively interacting Dirac fermions in two dimensions. Both, the order parameter propagator and the fermion propagator become nonanalytic functions of momenta destroying the Fermi liquid behavior. We finally compute the effects of quantum fluctuations in the superfluid ground state of an attractively interacting Fermi system, employing the attractive Hubbard model as a prototype. The flow equations capture the influence of longitudinal and Goldstone order parameter fluctuations on non-universal quantities such as the fermionic gap and the fermion-boson vertex, as well as the exact universal infrared asymptotics present in every fermionic superfluid.
Dirac and Weyl fermions appear as quasiparticle excitations in many different condensed-matter systems. They display various quantum transitions which represent unconventional universality classes related to the variants of the Gross-Neveu model. In this paper we study the bosonized version of the standard Gross-Neveu model---the Gross-Neveu-Yukawa theory---at three-loop order, and compute critical exponents in $4\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\epsilon}$ dimensions for a general number of fermion flavors. Our results fully encompass the previously known two-loop calculations, and agree with the known three-loop results in the purely bosonic limit of the theory. We also find the exponents to satisfy the emergent superscaling relations in the limit of a single-component fermion, order by order up to three loops. Finally, we apply the computed series for the exponents and their Pad\'e approximants to several phase transitions of current interest: metal-insulator transitions of spin-1/2 and spinless fermions on the honeycomb lattice, emergent supersymmetric surface field theory in topological phases, as well as the disorder-induced quantum transition in Weyl semimetals. Comparison with the results of other analytical and numerical methods is discussed.
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