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arXiv:2102.03295 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Phantom Bethe excitations and spin helix eigenstates in integrable periodic and open spin chains

Vladislav Popkov, Xin Zhang, Andreas Klümper

Published Aug 25, 2021• 29 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We demonstrate the existence of a special chiral ``phantom'' mode with some analogy to a Goldstone mode in the anisotropic quantum $XXZ$ Heisenberg spin chain. The phantom excitations contribute zero energy to the eigenstate, but a finite fixed quantum of momentum ${k}_{0}$. The mode exists not due to symmetry principles, but results from nontrivial scattering properties of magnons with momentum ${k}_{0}$ given by the anisotropy via $cos{k}_{0}=\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$. Different occupations of the phantom mode lead to energetical degeneracies between different magnetization sectors in the periodic case. This mode originates from special string-type solutions of the Bethe ansatz equations with unbounded rapidities, the phantom Bethe roots (PBRs). We derive criteria under which the spectrum contains eigenstates with PBRs, both in open and periodically closed integrable systems, for spin-$1/2$ and higher spins, and discuss the respective chiral eigenstates. The simplest of such eigenstates, the spin helix state, which is a periodically modulated state of chiral nature, is built up from the phantom excitations exclusively. Implications of our results for experiments are discussed.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.104.l081410

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We demonstrate the existence of a special chiral ``phantom'' mode with some analogy to a Goldstone mode in the anisotropic quantum XXZXXZXXZ Heisenberg spin chain. The phantom excitations contribute zero energy to the eigenstate, but a finite fixed quantum of momentum k0{k}_{0}k0​. The mode exists not due to symmetry principles, but results from nontrivial scattering properties of magnons with momentum k0{k}_{0}k0​ given by the anisotropy via cosk0=\ensuremathΔcos{k}_{0}=\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}cosk0​=\ensuremathΔ. Different occupations of the phantom mode lead to energetical degeneracies between different magnetization sectors in the periodic case. This mode originates from special string-type solutions of the Bethe ansatz equations with unbounded rapidities, the phantom Bethe roots (PBRs). We derive criteria under which the spectrum contains eigenstates with PBRs, both in open and periodically closed integrable systems, for spin-1/21/21/2 and higher spins, and discuss the respective chiral eigenstates. The simplest of such eigenstates, the spin helix state, which is a periodically modulated state of chiral nature, is built up from the phantom excitations exclusively. Implications of our results for experiments are discussed.
We investigate special solutions to the Bethe Ansatz equations (BAE) for open integrable XXZ Heisenberg spin chains containing phantom (infinite) Bethe roots. The phantom Bethe roots do not contribute to the energy of the Bethe state, so the energy is determined exclusively by the remaining regular excitations. We derive the phantom Bethe roots criterion and focus on BAE solutions for mixtures of phantom roots and regular (finite) Bethe roots. We prove that in the presence of phantom Bethe roots, all eigenstates are split between two invariant subspaces, spanned by chiral shock states. Bethe eigenstates are described by two complementary sets of Bethe ansatz equations for regular roots, one for each invariant subspace. The respective ``semiphantom'' Bethe vectors are states of chiral nature, with chirality properties getting less pronounced when more regular Bethe roots are added. For the easy plane case, ``semiphantom'' Bethe states carry nonzero magnetic current and are characterized by quasiperiodic modulation of the magnetization profile, the most prominent example being the spin helix states (SHS). We illustrate our results investigating ``semiphantom'' Bethe states generated by one regular Bethe root (the other Bethe roots being phantom), with a simple structure of the invariant subspace, in all details. We obtain the explicit expressions for Bethe vectors and calculate the simplest correlation functions, including the spin-current for all the states in the single-particle multiplet.
Exact solutions for quantum many-body systems are rare and provide valuable insight to universal phenomena. Here we show experimentally in anisotropic Heisenberg chains that special helical spin patterns can have very long lifetimes. This finding confirms the recent prediction of phantom Bethe states, exact many-body eigenstates carrying finite momenta yet no energy. We theoretically find analogous stable spin helices in higher dimensions and in other non-integrable systems, where they imply non-thermalizing dynamics associated with quantum many-body scars. We use phantom spin helices to directly measure the interaction anisotropy which has a major contribution from short-range off-site interactions that have not been observed before. Phantom helix states open new opportunities for quantum simulations of spin physics and studies of many-body dynamics.
We construct the coordinate Bethe ansatz for all eigenstates of the open $\mathrm{spin}\text{\ensuremath{-}}\frac{1}{2}$ XXZ chain that fulfill the phantom roots criterion (PRC). Under the PRC, the Hilbert space splits into two invariant subspaces and there are two sets of homogeneous Bethe ansatz equations (BAE) to characterize the subspaces in each case. We propose two sets of vectors with chiral shocks to span the invariant subspaces and expand the corresponding eigenstates. All the vectors are factorized and have symmetrical and simple structures. Using several simple cases as examples, we present the core elements of our generalized coordinate Bethe ansatz method. The eigenstates are expanded in our generating set and show clear chirality and certain symmetry properties. The bulk scattering matrices, the reflection matrices on the two boundaries and the BAE are obtained, which demonstrates the agreement with other approaches. Some hypotheses are formulated for the generalization of our approach.
In general, the summation of a set of sub-Hamiltonians cannot share a common eigenstate of each one, only if it is an unentangled product state, such as a phantom helix state in quantum spin system. Here we present a method, referred to as the building block method (BBM), for constructing possible spin-1/2 XXZ Heisenberg lattice systems possessing phantom helix states. We focus on two types of XXZ dimers as basic elements, with a non-Hermitian parity-time (PT ) field and Hermitian Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI), which share the same degenerate eigenstates. Based on these two building blocks, one can construct a variety of Heisenberg quantum spin systems, which support helix states with zero energy. The underlying mechanism is the existence of a set of degenerate eigenstates. Furthermore, we show that such systems act as quantum spin graphs since they obey the analogs of Kirchhoff's laws for sets of spin helix states when the non-Hermitian PT fields cancel each other out. In addition, the dynamic response of the helix states for three types of perturbations is also investigated analytically and numerically. Our findings provide a way to study quantum spin systems with irregular geometries beyond the Bethe ansatz approach.
The exact solution of an integrable anisotropic Heisenberg spin chain with nearest-neighbor, next-nearest-neighbor and scalar chirality couplings is studied, where the boundary condition is the antiperiodic one. The detailed construction of Hamiltonian and the proof of integrability are given. The antiperiodic boundary condition breaks the U(1)-symmetry of the system and we use the off-diagonal Bethe Ansatz to solve it. The energy spectrum is characterized by the inhomogeneous T−Q relations and the contribution of the inhomogeneous term is studied. The ground state energy and the twisted boundary energy in different regions are obtained. We also find that the Bethe roots at the ground state form the string structure if the coupling constant J=−1 although the Bethe Ansatz equations are the inhomogeneous ones.
We investigate the structure of Bethe-root configurations in the spin-1/2 XXZ chain with degenerate open boundaries. The physical solutions of the Bethe Ansatz equations are classified into three types in the fully degenerate case and two types in the partially degenerate case, for which we propose counting formulas for the number of physical solution sets of each type. Furthermore, we observe spectral degeneracies in the fully degenerate case and show that they can be naturally explained by the presence of specific phantom strings in the Bethe roots. The classification and resulting spectral degeneracies in the diagonal limit are also discussed.