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arXiv:2204.04517

The spin-one Motzkin chain is gapped for any area weight $t<1$

Radu Andrei, Marius Lemm, Ramis Movassagh

Published Apr 9, 2022• 1 citation
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Abstract

We consider the spin-one Motzkin chain with area weight $t>0$. We resolve three questions from the literature about this model. We prove (i) existence of a uniform spectral gap for all $t<1$ as conjectured by Zhang--Ahmadein--Klich \cite{zhang2017novel} (ii) an explicit formula for the long-distance limit of the string order parameter, which implies it is non-vanishing at small $t$, confirming a conjecture by Barbiero et al. \cite{barbiero2017haldane}, and (iii) that gaplessness for $t>1$ is robust and extends to hard boundary conditions, answering a question of Zhang--Klich \cite{zhang2017entropy}. These conclusions rest on an effective approximate description of the ground states of finite open Motzkin chains in terms of height-controlled imbalanced Motzkin walks.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2204.04517

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The spin-one Motzkin chain is gapped for any area weight t<1t<1t<1
We consider the spin-one Motzkin chain with area weight t>0t>0t>0. We resolve three questions from the literature about this model. We prove (i) existence of a uniform spectral gap for all t<1t<1t<1 as conjectured by Zhang--Ahmadein--Klich \cite{zhang2017novel} (ii) an explicit formula for the long-distance limit of the string order parameter, which implies it is non-vanishing at small ttt, confirming a conjecture by Barbiero et al. \cite{barbiero2017haldane}, and (iii) that gaplessness for t>1t>1t>1 is robust and extends to hard boundary conditions, answering a question of Zhang--Klich \cite{zhang2017entropy}. These conclusions rest on an effective approximate description of the ground states of finite open Motzkin chains in terms of height-controlled imbalanced Motzkin walks.
Abstract We prove that the energy gap of the model proposed by Zhang et al (2016 arXiv:1606.07795) is exponentially small in the square of the system size. In Movassagh and Shor (2016 Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA ) a class of exactly solvable quantum spin chain models was proposed that have integer spins ( s ), with a nearest neighbors Hamiltonian, and a unique ground state. The ground state can be seen as a uniform superposition of all s -colored Motzkin walks. The half-chain entanglement entropy provably violates the area law by a square root factor in the system’s size (∼ n ) for s > 1. For s = 1, the violation is logarithmic (Bravyi et al 2012 Phys. Rev. Lett . 109 207202). Moreover in Movassagh and Shor (2016 Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA ) it was proved that the gap vanishes polynomially and is O ( n − c ) with c ⩾ 2 . Recently, a deformation of Movassagh and Shor (2016 Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA ), which we call ‘weighted Motzkin quantum spin chain’ was proposed Zhang et al (2016 arXiv:1606.07795). This model has a unique ground state that is a superposition of the s -colored Motzkin walks weighted by t a r e a { M o t z k i n w a l k } with t > 1. The most surprising feature of this model is that it violates the area law by a factor of n . Here we prove that the gap of this model is upper bounded by 8 n s t − n 2 / 3 for t > 1 and s > 1.
Motzkin spin chains are frustration-free models whose ground state is a combination of Motzkin paths. The weight of such path contributions can be controlled by a deformation parameter ttt. As a function of the latter, these models, besides the formation of domain wall structures, exhibit gapped Haldane topological orders with a constant decay of string order parameters for t<1t<1t<1. A behavior compatible with a Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless phase transition at t=1t=1t=1 is also presented. By means of numerical calculations we show that the topological properties of the Haldane phases depend on the spin value. This allows one to classify different kinds of hidden antiferromagnetic Haldane gapped regimes associated with nontrivial features such as symmetry-protected topological order. On one hand, our results allow one to clarify the physical properties of Motzkin frustration-free chains, and on the other hand, suggest them as an interesting and paradigmatic class of local spin Hamiltonians.
Motzkin chain is a model of nearest-neighbor interacting quantum s = 1 spins with open boundary conditions. It is known that it has a unique ground state which can be viewed as a sum of Motzkin paths. We consider the case of periodic boundary conditions and provide several conjectures about structure of the ground state space and symmetries of the Hamiltonian. We conjecture that the ground state is degenerate and independent states are distinguished by eigenvalues of the third component of total spin operator. Each of these states can be described as a sum of paths, similar to the Motzkin paths. Moreover, there exist two operators commuting with the Hamiltonian, which play the roles of lowering and raising operators when acting at these states. We conjecture also that these operators generate a C -type Lie algebra, with rank equal to the number of sites. The symmetry algebra of the Hamiltonian is actually wider, and extended, besides the cyclic shift operator, by a central element contained in the third component of total spin operator.
Abstract We introduce a multi-parameter deformation of the Fredkin spin 1 / 2 chain whose ground state is a weighted superposition of Dyck paths, depending on a set of parameters t i along the chain. The parameters are introduced in such a way to maintain a frustration-free system while allowing the exploration of a range of possible phases. In the case where the parameters are uniform, and a color degree of freedom is added, we establish a phase diagram with a transition between an area law and a volume law. The volume entropy obtained for half a chain is n log ⁡ s where n is the half-chain length and s is the number of colors. Next, we prove an upper bound on the spectral gap of the t > 1 , s > 1 phase, scaling as Δ = O ( ( 4 s ) n t − n 2 / 2 ) , similar to a recent a result about the deformed Motzkin model (Levine and Movassagh 2017 J. Phys. A: Math. Theor . 50 255302), albeit derived in a different way. Finally, using an additional variational argument we prove an exponential lower bound on the gap of the model for t > 1 , s = 1 , which provides an example of a system with bounded entanglement entropy and a vanishing spectral gap.
The Motzkin spin chain is a spin-1 model introduced in \cite{shor} as an example of a system exhibiting a high degree of quantum fluctuations whose ground state can be mapped to Motzkin paths that are generated with local equivalence moves. This model is difficult to solve in general but keeping just the height preserving local equivalence moves we show that the model becomes integrable which when projected to certain subspaces of the full Hilbert space is isomorphic to the spin-12\frac{1}{2}21​ XXX chain. In fact in the full Hilbert space the system is akin to two non-interacting spin-12\frac{1}{2}21​ XXX chains making the spectrum the same as the latter with the change coming in the degeneracy of the states. We then show that including the height-changing local-equivalence move is the same as introducing interactions in the above system.
Abstract We investigate ground- and excited-state properties of the deformed Fredkin spin chain proposed by Salberger, Zhang, Klich, Korepin, and the authors. This model is a one-parameter deformation of the Fredkin spin chain, whose Hamiltonian is 3-local and translationally invariant in the bulk. The model is frustration-free and its unique ground state can be expressed as a weighted superposition of colored Dyck paths. We focus on the case where the deformation parameter t > 1 . By using a variational method, we prove that the finite-size gap decays at least exponentially with increasing the system size. We prove that the magnetization in the ground state is along the z -direction, namely 〈 s x 〉 = 〈 s y 〉 = 0 , and show that the z -component 〈 s z 〉 exhibits a domain-wall structure. We then study the entanglement properties of the chain. In particular, we derive upper and lower bounds for the von Neumann and Rényi entropies, and entanglement spectrum for any bipartition of the chain.