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arXiv:2607.13675

Stoner transitions beyond mean-field in two-dimensional electronic systems: a diagrammatic Monte Carlo study

Yueh-Chen Lee, Nikolay V. Prokof'ev, Andrey V. Chubukov

Published Jul 15, 2026• 0 citations
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Abstract

Stoner instabilities for fermions with repulsive interaction have been well studied within the mean-field (ladder) approximation. In this study, we consider two-dimensional electronic systems with one or two valleys and discuss a Stoner transition beyond the ladder approximation. At weak coupling, the corrections to the ladder approximation come predominantly from the renormalization of the particle-hole vertex in the particle-particle channel, and the lowest-order corrections are logarithmically singular in the low-density limit. To investigate the problem beyond the lowest order, we apply the diagrammatic Monte Carlo algorithm and treat ladder and non-ladder renormalizations on equal footing. We find that in a one-valley system, a Stoner transition to a ferromagnetism occurs at low density only if there is a cutoff on the momentum transfer carried by the interaction. In a two-valley system, the restriction is less severe. Here we find either a direct Stoner transition into a spin- and valley-polarized state, or a set of two Stoner transitions via an intermediate valley-polarized state. The pathway is controlled by the anisotropy of the fermionic dispersion.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2607.13675

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Stoner instabilities for fermions with repulsive interaction have been well studied within the mean-field (ladder) approximation. In this study, we consider two-dimensional electronic systems with one or two valleys and discuss a Stoner transition beyond the ladder approximation. At weak coupling, the corrections to the ladder approximation come predominantly from the renormalization of the particle-hole vertex in the particle-particle channel, and the lowest-order corrections are logarithmically singular in the low-density limit. To investigate the problem beyond the lowest order, we apply the diagrammatic Monte Carlo algorithm and treat ladder and non-ladder renormalizations on equal footing. We find that in a one-valley system, a Stoner transition to a ferromagnetism occurs at low density only if there is a cutoff on the momentum transfer carried by the interaction. In a two-valley system, the restriction is less severe. Here we find either a direct Stoner transition into a spin- and valley-polarized state, or a set of two Stoner transitions via an intermediate valley-polarized state. The pathway is controlled by the anisotropy of the fermionic dispersion.
When the Fermi surface and the Brillouin zone boundary touch at a Van Hove point, mean-field analysis predicts a ferromagnetic (Stoner) instability at finite TMFT_{MF}TMF​ for any coupling strength due to the divergent density of states. However, the predicted effect has not been observed experimentally. Several qualitative theoretical proposals have been put forward to explain why the mean-field prediction fails. Based on numerically exact results for the two-dimensional Hubbard model with an ordinary Van Hove singularity, we uncover the mechanisms behind the suppression of the ferromagnetic instability. We employ two diagrammatic Monte Carlo approaches: (i) the four-channel self-consistent approximation and (ii) numerically exact method of combinatorial summation of diagrams with controlled resummation of the truncated expansion. We find that the system avoids the Stoner instability down to temperatures an order of magnitude below TMFT_{MF}TMF​ due to the combination of the downward renormalization of the effective coupling and the suppression of the density of states by the loss of the quasiparticle residue.
The dual fermion approach provides a formally exact prescription for calculating properties of a correlated electron system in terms of a diagrammatic expansion around dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT). Most practical implementations, however, neglect higher-order interaction vertices beyond two-particle scattering in the dual effective action and further truncate the diagrammatic expansion in the two-particle scattering vertex to a leading-order or ladder-type approximation. In this work, we compute the dual fermion expansion for the two-dimensional Hubbard model including all diagram topologies with two-particle interactions to high orders by means of a stochastic diagrammatic Monte Carlo algorithm. We benchmark the obtained self-energy against numerically exact diagrammatic determinant Monte Carlo simulations to systematically assess convergence of the dual fermion series and the validity of these approximations. We observe that, from high temperatures down to the vicinity of the DMFT N\'eel transition, the dual fermion series converges very quickly to the exact solution in the whole range of Hubbard interactions considered ($4\ensuremath{\le}U/t\ensuremath{\le}12$), implying that contributions from higher-order vertices are small. As the temperature is lowered further, we observe slower series convergence, convergence to incorrect solutions, and ultimately divergence. This happens in a regime where magnetic correlations become significant. We find, however, that the self-consistent particle-hole ladder approximation yields reasonable and often even highly accurate results in this regime.
The two-dimensional electron gas is of fundamental importance in quantum many-body physics. We study a minimal extension of this model with C_{4} (as opposed to full rotational) symmetry and an electronic dispersion with two valleys with anisotropic effective masses. Electrons in our model interact via Coulomb repulsion, screened by distant metallic gates. Using variational Monte Carlo simulations, we find a broad intermediate range of densities with a metallic valley-polarized, spin-unpolarized ground state. Our results are of direct relevance to the recently discovered "nematic" state in AlAs quantum wells. For the effective mass anisotropy relevant to this system, m_{x}/m_{y}≈5.2, we obtain a transition from an anisotropic metal to a valley-polarized metal at r_{s}≈12 (where r_{s} is the dimensionless Wigner-Seitz radius). At still lower densities, we find a (possibly metastable) valley and spin-polarized state with a reduced electronic anisotropy.
A model of spin-polarized fermions hopping on a two-dimensional lattice with a nearest-neighbor interaction V is studied. Random-phase-approximation calculations predict that the half-filled system undergoes a density-wave transition for positive values of V, an odd-angular-momentum pairing transition for small negative V, and a condensation-phase-separation transition for more negative values of V. The classical lattice-gas Ising limit matches onto the density-wave transition for V>0 and the condensation transition for V<0. A strong-coupling expansion in powers of the ratio of single-fermion transfer-matrix element t to the two-body interaction V provides the leading corrections to the Ising limit. In order to explore the intermediate-coupling regime, fermion Monte Carlo calculations were carried out and various Green's functions characterizing the quantum correlations evaluated. With use of finite-size scaling techniques, the density-wave and condensation phase boundaries were followed into the intermediate-coupling regime. At these transitions, measured quantities scaled well with the usual Ising indices. Unfortunately, the weak-coupling regime lies beyond the reach of these simulations, and we conclude that a method suitable for the weak-coupling regime is needed to complete the phase diagram.
Monte Carlo simulations of the magnetic structure factor of the two-dimensional Hubbard model are in qualitative agreement with the slave-boson approach and, in the low-temperature intermediate-coupling limit, they are in even better quantitative agreement with the random-phase approximation, as long as a renormalized repulsion U is used. This renormalization comes from maximally crossed diagrams, which account for two-body short-range correlations. One of the consequences is that Stoner ferromagnetism is not a generic property of the two-dimensional one-band Hubbard model.
We predict the phase separations of two-dimensional Fermi gases with repulsive contact-type interactions between two spin components. Using density-potential functional theory with systematic semiclassical approximations, we address the long-standing problem of itinerant ferromagnetism in realistic settings. We reveal a universal transition from the paramagnetic state at small repulsive interactions toward ferromagnetic density profiles at large interaction strengths, with intricate particle-number dependent phases in between. Building on quantum Monte Carlo results for uniform systems, we benchmark our simulations against Hartree–Fock calculations for a small number of trapped fermions. We thereby demonstrate that our employed corrections to the bare contact interaction energy and especially to the Thomas–Fermi kinetic energy functional are necessary for reliably predicting properties of trapped mesoscopic Fermi gases. The density patterns of the ground state survive at low finite temperatures and confirm the Stoner-type polarization behavior across a universal interaction parameter, albeit with substantial quantitative differences that originate in the trapping potential and the quantum-corrected kinetic energy. We also uncover a plethora of metastable configurations that are energetically comparable to the ground-state density profiles and are thus likely to be observed in experiments. We argue that our density-functional approach can be easily applied to interacting multi-component Fermi gases in general.