Physical review. B, Solid state
Application of Kadanoff's lower-bound renormalization transformation to the Blume-Capel model
Theodore W. Burkhardt
Abstract
The critical behavior of the Blume-Capel model for $d=2,3$ is analyzed using a renormalization transformation based on Kadanoff's lower-bound transformation. There are fixed points associated with first-order, second-order, and tricritical phase transitions. The discontinuity fixed point onto which the line of first-order phase transition is mapped has two relevant eigenoperators with eigenvalue ${2}^{d}$, corresponding to the discontinuities in $〈\ensuremath{\sigma}〉$ and $〈{\ensuremath{\sigma}}^{2}〉$. Quite different values of the variational parameters in the renormalization transformation optimize the free energy at each fixed point, making it difficult to calculate crossover behavior with the present approach.