We investigate the relativistic SO(2)- and SO(3)-invariant Gross-Neveu-Yukawa field theories for real, rank-two, symmetric, traceless tensor order parameters coupled to
Nf flavors of two-component Dirac fermions. These field theories arise as an effective description of fractionalized spin-orbital liquids. The two theories are the simplest and special cases of the more general class of field theories with
SO(N) symmetric tensor order parameter coupled to Dirac fermions, in which the symmetry is low enough to allow only one and not the usual two quartic self-interaction terms. Using a two-loop renormalization group near the upper critical dimension, we demonstrate that the theory exhibits an exotic critical fixed point for
N=3 and the concomitant continuous phase transition for any value of
Nf. For
N=2 the theory is equivalent to the chiral XY model. We discuss the crucial role of the symmetry-allowed sextic self-interactions in the selection of the ground state configuration in the case of SO(3). The universal quantities such as the anomalous dimensions of order parameters and fermions, the correlation length exponent, and the mass gap ratio between order parameter and fermion masses are computed up to ${\ensuremath{\epsilon}}^{2}$ order.
The three-dimensional cubic conformal field theory governs the critical behavior of Heisenberg magnets with cubic anisotropy. Studying this theory nonperturbatively is challenging because its most easily accessible observables are numerically very close to those of the more symmetric O ( 3 ) model. In this work, we overcome this difficulty using the fuzzy sphere regularization method. By adding a cubic-invariant two-body interaction to the quantum rotor Hamiltonian used for the O ( 3 ) model, we break the continuous rotational symmetry by construction and unambiguously isolate the cubic critical point. Using exact diagonalization and the density matrix renormalization group, we calculate the scaling dimensions of several key operators, including the leading scalar singlets, and resolve the splitting of the O ( 3 ) rank-two traceless symmetric tensor into the E g and T 2 g representations of the cubic group. Our results are consistent with existing Monte Carlo, conformal perturbation theory, and ɛ expansion benchmarks, demonstrating the power of the fuzzy sphere in resolving closely spaced universality classes.
Conformal invariance often accompanies criticality in Hermitian systems. However, its fate in non-Hermitian settings is less clear, especially near exceptional points where the Hamiltonian becomes non-diagonalizable. Here we investigate whether a 1+1-dimensional gapless non-Hermitian system can admit a conformal description, focusing on a PT-symmetric free-fermion field theory. Working in the biorthogonal formalism, we identify the conformal structure of this theory by constructing a traceless energy-momentum tensor whose Fourier modes generate a Virasoro algebra with central charge
c=−2. This yields a non-Hermitian, biorthogonal realization of a logarithmic conformal field theory, in which correlation functions exhibit logarithmic scaling and the spectrum forms Virasoro staggered modules that are characterized by universal indecomposability parameters. We further present a microscopic construction and show how the same conformal data (with finite-size corrections) can be extracted from the lattice model at exceptional-point criticality, thereby supporting the field-theory prediction.