The low-temperature series expansion for the partition function of the two-dimensional Ising model on a square lattice can be determined exactly for finite lattices using Kaufman's generalization of Onsager's solution. The exact distribution function for the energy can then be determined from the coefficients of the partition function. This provides an exact solution with which one can compare energy histograms determined in Monte Carlo simulations. This solution should prove useful for detailed studies of statistical and systematic errors in histogram reweighting.
There is no an accepted exact partition function (PF) for the two-dimensional (2D) Ising model with a non-zero external magnetic field to our knowledge. Here we infer an empirical PF for such an Ising model. We compare the PFs for two finite-size Ising lattices (
4×4 and
4×6) from this empirical PF with those from Wei (2018) (Wei, R.Q., 2018. An exact solution to the partition function of the finite-size Ising Model, arXiv: General Physics: 1805.01366.), and find that they are consistent very well. Based on this empirical PF, we further analyze and calculate the thermodynamic functions (heat capacity, magnetization, susceptibility) of this 2D Ising model and discuss the model's singularity semiquantitatively. Analysis and calculations from this PF show that they are coincident with those from other related studies; Especially the 2D Ising model in an external magnetic field has spontaneous magnetization (SM) calling the phenomenon at the critical temperature a phase transition, and the SM decreases with the increasing temperature. However, the decreasing variation of the SM here is different from that obtained by Yang (1952) from the 2D Ising model in a weak magnetic field.