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.
We study the quantum critical phase of an SU(2) symmetric spin-2 chain obtained from spin-2 bosons in a one-dimensional lattice. We obtain the scaling of the finite-size energies and entanglement entropy by exact diagonalization and density-matrix renormalization group methods. From the numerical results of the energy spectra, central charge, and scaling dimension we identify the conformal field theory describing the whole critical phase to be the SU(3)_{1} Wess-Zumino-Witten model. We find that, while the Hamiltonian is only SU(2) invariant, in this critical phase there is an emergent SU(3) symmetry in the thermodynamic limit.
In this thesis we have studied the emergence of spontaneously dimerized phases in frustrated spin-S chains, with emphasis on the nature of the critical lines between the dimerized and non-dimerized phases. The main numerical method used in this thesis is the Density Matrix Renormalization Group (DMRG). The DMRG algorithm is a relatively old and well established method for the investigation of the ground-state. In this thesis, we show how to use this algorithm to calculate the excitation spectra of one-dimensional critical systems, known in the context of conformal field theory as conformal towers of states. We have demonstrated that the method works very well for two simple minimal models (the transverse-field Ising model and the three-state Potts model), and we have used it systematically to identify the universality classes and the underlying conformal field theories of various one-dimensional spin systems. It has been known for a long time that the transition to a spontaneously dimerized phase in a spin-1 chain can be either continuous, in the Wess-Zumino-Witten (WZW) SU(2) level 2 universality class, or first order. By combining a careful numerical investigation with a conformal field theory analysis, we were able to detect in a frustrated spin-1 chain with competing next-nearest-neighbor and three-site interactions the presence of yet another type of continuous phase transition that belongs to the Ising universality class. In contrast to the WZW SU(2) level 2 critical line, at which the singlet-triplet gap closes, the Ising transition occurs entirely in the singlet sector, while the singlet-triplet gap remains open. The use of the standard DMRG approach, along the lines mentioned above, has allowed us to provide explicit numerical evidence for the presence of a conformal tower of singlets inside the spin gap. Moreover, according to field theory, a WZW SU(2) level k critical line can turn into a first order transition due to the presence of a marginal operator in the WZW SU(2) level k model. A careful investigation of the conformal towers along the critical lines has allowed us to find the precise location of this point in both S=1 and S=3/2 chains. We have also shown that the nature of the continuous dimerization transitions is related to the topological properties of the corresponding phases, and that the phase diagrams of various frustrated spin chains can be effectively extracted by looking at the local topological order parameter - the degeneracy of the lowest state in the entanglement spectrum. When coupled with the conformal field theory of open systems, DMRG appears to be an extremely powerful tool to characterize not only the phase diagram and the ground-state correlations of quantum one-dimensional systems, but also the excitation spectrum and the conformal structure along critical lines.
Quantum criticality in one-dimensional quantum systems is characterized by emergent conformal field theories (CFTs), whose central charge counts independent gapless degrees of freedom. Establishing a microscopic connection between this universal conformal structure and the momentum-space topology of the underlying quasiparticle spectrum remains challenging. Here, we uncover a direct correspondence between Fermi-point topology, conformal criticality, and quantum entanglement in an extended quantum spin chain with competing cluster interactions, exchange anisotropy, and a transverse magnetic field. We show that interaction- and field-driven Lifshitz transitions generate conformal critical phases with effective central charges
ceff=1/2,
1,
3/2,
2, and
3, including a multicritical point where Ising and Luttinger-liquid sectors coexist. Importantly, the central charge is not determined simply by the number of lattice gap closings or Fermi points, but by the number and conformal content of independent low-energy continuum sectors after accounting for lattice symmetries, reciprocal-lattice identifications, and mode equivalences. Thus, Lifshitz transitions may leave the conformal anomaly unchanged or modify the central charge depending on whether spectral reconstruction generates new independent continuum sectors. Real- and momentum-space entanglement spectra provide complementary microscopic signatures, revealing both the conformal content and momentum-space organization of critical modes. Our results establish a microscopic framework linking Fermi-point topology to emergent CFTs and show how interaction-driven spectral reconstruction can generate higher-central-charge criticality and unconventional multicritical behavior.
We study spontaneous dimerization transitions in a Heisenberg spin-1 chain with additional next-nearest-neighbor and three-site interactions using extensive numerical simulations and a conformal field-theory analysis. We show that the transition can be second order in the Wess-Zumino-Witten (WZW)
SU(2)2 or Ising universality class, or first order. We argue that these features are generic because of a marginal operator in the WZW
SU(2)2 model and because of two topologically distinct nondimerized phases with or without edge states. We also provide explicit numerical evidence of conformal towers of singlets inside the spin gap at the Ising transition. Implications for other models are briefly discussed.
We discuss the entanglement spectrum of the ground state of a (1+1)-dimensional system in a gapped phase near a quantum phase transition. In particular, in proximity to a quantum phase transition described by a conformal field theory (CFT), the system is represented by a gapped Lorentz invariant field theory in the ``scaling limit'' (correlation length $\ensuremath{\xi}$ much larger than microscopic ``lattice'' scale ``
a''), and can be thought of as a CFT perturbed by a relevant perturbation. We show that for such (1+1) gapped Lorentz invariant field theories in infinite space, the low-lying entanglement spectrum obtained by tracing out, say, left half-infinite space, is precisely equal to the physical spectrum of the unperturbed gapless, i.e., conformal field theory defined on a finite interval of length ${L}_{\ensuremath{\xi}}=\phantom{\rule{0.16em}{0ex}}ln(\ensuremath{\xi}/a)$ with certain boundary conditions. In particular, the low-lying entanglement spectrum of the gapped theory is the finite-size spectrum of a boundary conformal field theory, and is always discrete and universal. Each relevant perturbation, and thus each gapped phase in proximity to the quantum phase transition, maps into a particular boundary condition. A similar property has been known to hold for Baxter's corner transfer matrices in a very special class of fine-tuned, namely, integrable off-critical lattice models, for the entire entanglement spectrum and independent of the scaling limit. In contrast, our result applies to completely general gapped Lorentz invariant theories in the scaling limit, without the requirement of integrability, for the low-lying entanglement spectrum. While the entanglement spectrum of the ground state of a gapped theory on a finite interval of length
2R with suitable boundary conditions, bipartitioned into two equal pieces, turns out to exhibit a crossover between the finite-size spectra of the same CFT with in general different boundary conditions as the system size
R crosses the correlation length from the ``critical regime'' $R\ensuremath{\ll}\ensuremath{\xi}$ to the ``gapped regime'' $R\ensuremath{\gg}\ensuremath{\xi}$, the physical spectrum on a finite interval of length
R with the same boundary conditions, on the other hand, is known to undergo a dramatic reorganization during the same crossover from being discrete to being continuous.