Lattice regularization of chiral fermions has been a long-standing problem in physics. In this Letter, we present the density matrix renormalization group simulation of the 3-4-5-0 model of (1+1)D chiral fermions with an anomaly-free chiral U(1) symmetry, which contains two left-moving and two right-moving fermions carrying U(1) charges 3,4 and 5,0, respectively. Following the Wang-Wen chiral fermion model, we realize the chiral fermions and their mirror partners on the opposite boundaries of a thin strip of (2+1)D lattice model of multilayer Chern insulator, whose finite width implies the quantum system is effectively (1+1)D. By introducing two sets of carefully designed six-fermion local interactions to the mirror sector only, we demonstrate that the mirror fermions can be gapped out by the interaction beyond a critical strength without breaking the chiral U(1) symmetry, via the symmetric mass generation mechanism. We show that the interaction-driven gapping transition is in the Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless universality class. We determine the evolution of Luttinger parameters before the transition, which confirms that the transition happens exactly at the point when the interaction term becomes marginal. As the mirror sector is gapped after the transition, we check that the fermions in the light chiral fermion sector remain gapless, which provides the desired lattice regularization of chiral fermions.
Symmetric mass generation is the interaction-induced opening of a fermion gap without spontaneous symmetry breaking. The anomaly-free 3-4-5-0 model of Wang and Wen provides a minimal one-dimensional setting for this phenomenon, but a direct lattice realization faces two obstacles: fermion doubling for local chiral discretizations and perturbative irrelevance of the six-fermion gapping interaction. We address both obstacles. First, we formulate the model on a strictly one-dimensional tangent-fermion lattice, where a nonlocal hopping produces a single chiral branch without a mirror partner while retaining an efficient tensor-network representation. Second, we add a Hubbard-type density-density interaction (Luttinger parameter
K) that reduces the scaling dimension of the 3-4-5-0 interaction from
5 to
5K, making it relevant for
K<2/5. Density-matrix renormalization group calculations show the opening of an excitation gap in this regime without the appearance of a degenerate ground state, the hallmark of symmetric mass generation.
A nonperturbative lattice regularization of chiral fermions and bosons with anomaly-free chiral symmetry
G in
1+1D spacetime is proposed. More precisely, we ask ``whether there is a local short-range quantum Hamiltonian with a finite Hilbert space for a finite system realizing on-site symmetry
G defined on a 1D spatial lattice with continuous time, such that its low-energy physics produces a
1+1D anomaly-free chiral matter theory of symmetry
G?'' In particular, we propose that the chiral fermion theory with chiral U(1) ${3}_{L}\text{\ensuremath{-}}{5}_{R}\text{\ensuremath{-}}{4}_{L}\text{\ensuremath{-}}{0}_{R}$ symmetry, with two left-moving fermions of charge 3 and 4, and two right-moving fermions of charge 5 and 0 at IR low energy, can emerge from a 1D UV spatial lattice with a chiral U(1) symmetry, if we include properly designed multi-fermion interactions with intermediate strength (i.e., the dimensionless coupling constant is naturally order 1). In general, we propose that any
1+1D U(1)-anomaly-free chiral matter theory can be defined as a finite system on a 1D lattice with on-site symmetry by using a quantum Hamiltonian with continuous time, but without suffering from Nielsen-Ninomiya theorem's fermion doubling, if we include properly designed interactions between matter fields. We propose how to design such interactions by looking for extra anomaly-free symmetries via bosonization/fermionization. We comment on the new ingredients and the differences of ours compared to Ginsparg-Wilson fermion, Eichten-Preskill and Chen-Giedt-Poppitz (CGP) models, and suggest modifying CGP model to have successful mirror decoupling. Since a lattice on-site internal symmetry can be gauged, we thus can further define a nonperturbative regularization of any anomaly-free U(1) chiral gauge theory in
1+1D. As an additional remark, we show a topological nonperturbative proof of the equivalence relation between the
G-symmetric 't Hooft anomaly cancellation conditions and the
G-symmetry-preserving gapping rules (e.g. Haldane's stability conditions for Luttinger liquid) for multiple U(1) symmetries. We expect that our result holds universally regardless of spatial Hamiltonian or spacetime Lagrangian/path integral formulation of quantum theory. Numerical tests on our proposal are demanding tasks but highly desirable for future work.
A non-perturbative lattice regularization of chiral fermions and bosons with anomaly-free symmetry
G in 1+1D spacetime is proposed. More precisely, we ask whether there is a local short-range quantum Hamiltonian with a finite Hilbert space for a finite system realizing onsite symmetry
G defined on a 1D spatial lattice with continuous time, such that its low energy physics produces a 1+1D anomaly-free chiral matter theory of symmetry
G? In particular, we show that the 3
L-5
R-4
L-0
R U(1) chiral fermion theory, with two left-moving fermions of charge-3 and 4, and two right-moving fermions of charge-5 and 0 at low energy, can be put on a 1D spatial lattice where the U(1) symmetry is realized as an onsite symmetry, if we include properly designed multi-fermion interactions with intermediate strength. In general, we propose that any 1+1D U(1)-anomaly-free chiral matter theory can be defined as a finite system on a 1D lattice with onsite symmetry by using a quantum Hamiltonian with continuous time, but without suffered from Nielsen-Ninomiya theorem's fermion-doubling, if we include properly-designed interactions between matter fields. We propose how to design such interactions by looking for extra symmetries via bosonization/fermionization. We comment on the new ingredients and the differences of ours compared to Ginsparg-Wilson fermion, Eichten-Preskill, and Chen-Giedt-Poppitz (CGP) models, and suggest modifying CGP model to have successful mirror-decoupling. As an additional remark, we show a topological non-perturbative proof on the equivalence relation between the 't Hooft anomaly matching conditions and the boundary fully gapping rules (e.g. Haldane's stability conditions for Luttinger liquid) of U(1) symmetry. Our proof holds universally independent from Hamiltonian or Lagrangian/path integral formulation of quantum theory.
Symmetric mass generation (SMG) is a mechanism to give gapless fermions a mass gap by nonperturbative interactions without generating any fermion bilinear condensation. The previous studies of SMG have been limited to Dirac/Weyl/Majorana fermions with zero Fermi volume in the free fermion limit. In this paper, we generalize the concept of SMG to Fermi liquid (FL) with a finite Fermi volume and discuss how to gap out the Fermi surfaces (FSs) by interactions without breaking the U(1) loop group symmetry or developing topological orders. We provide examples of FS SMG in both
(1+1)-dimensional
[(1+1)D] and
(2+1)-dimensional FL systems when several FSs together cancel the FS anomaly. However, the U(1) loop group symmetry in these cases is still restrictive enough to rule out all possible fermion bilinear gapping terms, such that a nonperturbative interaction mechanism is the only way to gap out the FSs. This symmetric FS reconstruction is in contrast to the conventional symmetry-breaking gapping mechanism in the FL. As a side product, our model provides a pristine one-dimensional lattice regularization for the
(1+1)D U(1) symmetric chiral fermion model (e.g., the 3-4-5-0 model) by utilizing a lattice translation symmetry as an emergent U(1) symmetry at low energy. This opens up the opportunity for efficient numerical simulations of chiral fermions in their own dimensions without introducing mirror fermions under the domain wall fermion construction.
We show that the 3450 U(1) chiral fermion theory can appear as the low energy effective field theory of a 1+1D local lattice model, with an on-site U(1) symmetry and finite-range interactions. The on-site U(1) symmetry means that the U(1) symmetry can be gauged (gaugeable for both background probe and dynamical fields), which leads to a non-perturbative definition of chiral gauge theory --- a chiral fermion theory coupled to U(1) gauge theory. Our construction can be generalized to regularize any U(1)-anomaly-free 1+1D gauged chiral fermion theory with a zero chiral central charge (thus no gravitational anomaly) by a lattice, thanks to the recently proven Poincare dual equivalence between the U(1) 't Hooft anomaly free condition and the U(1) symmetric interaction gapping rule, via a bosonization-fermionization technique.
Quantized charge pumping in quantum Hall systems is a bulk topological property, typically manifesting on gapless boundaries as spectral flow through chiral edge modes upon flux insertion. When the boundary is anomaly-free, it can be symmetrically gapped by symmetric mass generation (SMG) interactions. However, the effects on quantized charge pumping at an interacting gapped boundary are unclear. We address this using density-matrix renormalization group simulations of a four-leg ladder quasi-(2+1)d realization of the (1+1)d 3-4-5-0 lattice chiral fermion model with six-fermion interactions at one edge. We find gapless modes near the interacting edge for both weak and strong couplings, but the edge can be in a fully gapped SMG phase at intermediate coupling. We also identify spontaneous breaking of the model's
Z2 symmetry above a critical interaction strength. Across all three boundary phases, we find quantized charge pumping with the same pumped charge per flux quantum. The spatial distribution of the pumped charge varies between phases. Besides charge pumping, we study how a single injected fermion propagates under open boundary conditions. In the SMG phase, an interaction-induced flavor-mixing current develops at the endpoints of the gapped edge, which is absent in the weak- and strong-coupling limits. This current reveals a charge-redistribution mechanism unique to the SMG phase. Additionally, we propose an analogy between charge pumping in this model and a topological leptogenesis scenario in the (3+1)d Standard Model. The anomaly-free chiral U(1) symmetries of the 3-4-5-0 model play a role analogous to the baryon-minus-lepton symmetry of the Standard Model. In both settings, charge pumping can be associated with a continuous deformation along a classically defined but quantum-anomalous direction, while a discrete subgroup remains an exact quantum symmetry.