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arXiv:2503.19027 · Physical Review Letters

Tensor-Network Study of the Roughening Transition in a ( 2 + 1 ) D Z 2 Lattice Gauge Theory with Matter

Wen-Tao Xu, Michael Knap, Frank Pollmann

Published Jun 27, 2025• 6 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Within the confined phase of (2+1)D lattice gauge theories a roughening transition arises between a weakly confined regime with floppy string excitations and a strongly confined regime with stiff string excitations. In this Letter, we use an infinite Density Matrix Renormalization Group (iDMRG) algorithm to quantitatively characterize the properties of confined strings. To this end, we stabilize the state with a string excitation by 't Hooft loop operators. While for zero gauge-matter coupling we can use bare 't Hooft loop operators to do so, for finite gauge-matter coupling we have to transform them to emergent ones, which we achieve with an adiabatic protocol. By analyzing the scaling of both a novel order parameter and the entanglement entropy, our approach allows us to accurately determine the roughening transition, even at finite gauge-matter coupling.

DOI
10.1103/3lxj-dx76

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Within the confined phase of (2+1)D lattice gauge theories a roughening transition arises between a weakly confined regime with floppy string excitations and a strongly confined regime with stiff string excitations. In this Letter, we use an infinite Density Matrix Renormalization Group (iDMRG) algorithm to quantitatively characterize the properties of confined strings. To this end, we stabilize the state with a string excitation by 't Hooft loop operators. While for zero gauge-matter coupling we can use bare 't Hooft loop operators to do so, for finite gauge-matter coupling we have to transform them to emergent ones, which we achieve with an adiabatic protocol. By analyzing the scaling of both a novel order parameter and the entanglement entropy, our approach allows us to accurately determine the roughening transition, even at finite gauge-matter coupling.
Lattice gauge theories (LGTs) describe fundamental interactions in particle physics. A central phenomenon in these theories is confinement, which binds quarks and antiquarks into hadrons through the formation of string-like flux tubes of gauge fields. Simulating confinement dynamics is a challenging task, but recent advances in quantum simulation are enabling the exploration of LGTs in regimes beyond the reach of classical computation. For analog devices, a major difficulty is the realization of strong plaquette interactions, which generate string fluctuations that can drive a roughening transition. Understanding string roughening -- where strong transversal functions lead to an effective restoration of translational symmetry at long distances -- is of central importance in the study of confinement. In this work, we show that string roughening emerges naturally in an analog Rydberg quantum simulator. We first map a triangular Rydberg array onto a (2+1)D U(1) LGT where plaquette terms appear as first-order processes. We study flux strings connecting static charges and demonstrate that, near a deconfined quantum critical point, the string exhibits logarithmic growth of its transverse width as the separation between charges increases, along with the universal Lüscher correction to the confining potential -- both signatures of string roughening. Finally, we investigate the real-time dynamics of an initially rigid string, observing large fluctuations after quenching into the roughening regime, as well as string breaking via particle-pair creation. Our results indicate that rough strings can be realized in experimentally accessible quantum simulators, opening the door to detailed studies of how strong fluctuations influence string-breaking dynamics.
We perform a zero temperature analysis of a non-Abelian lattice gauge model corresponding to an SU(3) Yang-Mills theory in 1+1D1+1\mathrm{D}1+1D at low energies. Specifically, we characterize the model ground states via gauge-invariant matrix product states, identifying its phase diagram at finite density as a function of the matter-gauge interaction coupling, the quark filling, and their bare mass. Overall, we observe an extreme robustness of baryons: For positive free-field energy couplings, all detected phases exhibit colorless quasiparticles, a strong numerical hint that QCD does not deconfine in 1D. Additionally, we show that, having access to finite-density properties, it is possible to study the stability of composite particles, including multibaryon bound states such as the deuteron.
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We investigate a non-Abelian SU(2)(2)(2) quantum link model in 2+12+12+1 dimensions on a hexagonal lattice using tensor network methods. We determine the static quark potential for a wide range of bare coupling values and find that the theory is confining. We also probe the existence of a Lüscher term and find a clear signal with a g2g^2g2 dependent coefficient, in qualitative agreement with a strong coupling expansion. Correspondingly, the width of the strings scales logarithmically with the string length again for all g2g^2g2-values, providing evidence for a rough string, with no indication for a roughening transition.
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String breaking is at the core of hadronization models of relevance to particle colliders. Yet, studies of string-breaking dynamics rooted in quantum chromodynamics remain fundamentally challenging. Tensor networks enable sign-problem-free studies of static and dynamical properties of lattice gauge theories. In this work, we develop and apply a tensor-network toolkit based on the loop-string-hadron formulation of an SU(2) lattice gauge theory in 1+1 dimensions with dynamical fermions. We apply this toolkit to study static and dynamical aspects of strings and their breaking in this theory. The simple, gauge-invariant, and local structure of the loop-string-hadron states and constraints removes the need to impose non-Abelian constraints in the algorithm, and allows for a systematic computation of observables at increasingly large bosonic cutoffs, and toward the infinite-volume and continuum limits. Our study of static strings yields a determination of the string tension in the continuum and thermodynamic limits. Our study of dynamical string breaking, performed at a fixed lattice spacing and system size, illuminates underlying processes at play during the quench dynamics of a string. The loop, string, and hadron description offers a systematic and intuitive way to diagnose these processes, including string expansion and contraction, endpoint splitting and particle shower, chain scattering events, and inelastic processes resulting from string dissociation and recombination, and particle production. We relate these processes to several features of the dynamics, such as energy transport, entanglement-entropy production, and correlation spreading. This work opens the way to future tensor-network studies of string breaking and particle production in increasingly complex lattice gauge theories.