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Journal of Physics A Mathematical and General

ϵ expansion for the free energy of the continuous three-state Potts model: evidence for a first-order transition

Joseph Rudnick

Published Jul 1, 1975• 44 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Low-order terms in an epsilon expansion for the free energy of the continuous three-state Potts model are displayed. The free energy has a scaling form and predicts a first-order transition to the order state. Two universal ratios are calculated to first order in epsilon from the expression. The results of this analysis are in good agreement with corresponding results of previous renormalization group analyses of the continuous Potts model.

DOI
10.1088/0305-4470/8/7/015

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Low-order terms in an epsilon expansion for the free energy of the continuous three-state Potts model are displayed. The free energy has a scaling form and predicts a first-order transition to the order state. Two universal ratios are calculated to first order in epsilon from the expression. The results of this analysis are in good agreement with corresponding results of previous renormalization group analyses of the continuous Potts model.
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A renormalization-group calculation has been carried out in $d=6\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\epsilon}$ dimensions to lowest order in $\ensuremath{\epsilon}$, using the continuum generalization of the Potts model. The equation of state and the various thermodynamic functions have been calculated explicitly by integrating up the recursion relations in both the ordered and disordered phases. The transition is found to be first order for p>2p>2p>2. For 2<p<1032<p<\frac{10}{3}2<p<310​ the transition is first order in spite of the fact that there is an accessible stable fixed point for all p<103p<\frac{10}{3}p<310​. At the first-order transition, instead of the usual expansion in temperature, the various thermodynamic functions are studied as functions of ($p\ensuremath{-}2$). Finally it is shown that the free energy of the Potts model has an essential singularity at the first-order transition temperature Tc{T}_{c}Tc​, due to instantons, which is of the same form as that of the Ising model at H=0H=0H=0.
The critical behavior of three-state statistical models invariant under the full symmetry group S 3 and its dependence on space dimension have been a matter of interest and debate. In particular, the phase transition of the 3-state Potts model in three dimensions is believed to be of the first order, without a definitive proof of absence of scale invariance in three-dimensional field theory with S 3 symmetry. This scale invariance should appear as a non-trivial fixed point of the renormalization group, which has not been found. Our new search, with the non-perturbative renormalization group, finds such a fixed point, as a bifurcation from the trivial fixed point at the critical space dimension d = 10 / 3 , which extends continuously to d = 3 . It does not correspond to a second-order phase transition of the 3-state Potts model , but is interesting in its own right. In particular, it shows how the ε -expansion can fail.
We report the numerical study, using Wilson's $\ensuremath{\eta}=0$ approximate renormalization-group recursion formula, of a continuous-spin generalization of the three-component Potts model. Previous numerical studies, based on series expansions of the partition function, have indicated strongly that the model has a phase transition of second order. This is in conflict with Landau theory which predicts that the transition be of first order. We find, in agreement with Landau theory, that our model exhibits a first-order phase transition having finite zero-field spontaneous magnetization at the transition point.
We present a large- q expansion of the 2d q -states Potts model free energies up to order 9 in 1/√ q . Its analysis leads us to an ansatz which, in the first-order region, incorporates properties inferred from the known critical regime at q = 4, and predicts, for q > 4, the n -th energy cumulant scales as the power (3 n /2 - 2) of the correlation length. The parameter-free energy distributions reproduce accurately, without reference to any interface effect, the numerical data obtained in a simulation for q = 10 with lattices of linear dimensions up to L = 50. The pure-phase specific heats are predicted to be much larger, at q ⩽ 10, than the values extracted from the current finite-size scaling analysis of the extrema. Implications for safe numerical determinations of interface tensions are discussed.