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Physical review. B, Solid state

Global features of nonlinear renormalization-group equations

Jeffrey F. Nicoll, T. S. Chang, Eugene Stanley

Published Jul 1, 1975• 34 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The analysis of selected nonlinear problems in the renormalization group is found to show striking contrasts between the usual local linearized fixed-point analysis and the properties of global solutions of nonlinear equations derived from an approximation of the Wegner-Houghton differential formulation. The competition between various fixed points that is incorporated in general global solutions can upset the asymptotically valid critical behavior deduced from the local analysis. In general, the critical-point exponents of such a solution will not satisfy equalities, but rather the corresponding inequalities. However, these nonscaling solutions have extraneous singularities that are not related to the thermodynamic singularities of the system. If singularities of this type are excluded, then the global solution has the same critical-point exponents as the local solution derived by linearizing around the stablest fixed point. It is shown that in this case the critical surface in the Hamiltonian space is closely related to the surface of order-2 critical points in a thermodynamic field space. The boundaries of this surface are correspondingly related to the critical points of higher order in this thermodynamic space. The nonlinear global solution predicts multiple power scaling behavior from a single scaling equation deduced from the renormalization group. Previously such behavior was obtained by postulating the simultaneous validity of two of more "linear" scaling hypotheses.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.12.458

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The analysis of selected nonlinear problems in the renormalization group is found to show striking contrasts between the usual local linearized fixed-point analysis and the properties of global solutions of nonlinear equations derived from an approximation of the Wegner-Houghton differential formulation. The competition between various fixed points that is incorporated in general global solutions can upset the asymptotically valid critical behavior deduced from the local analysis. In general, the critical-point exponents of such a solution will not satisfy equalities, but rather the corresponding inequalities. However, these nonscaling solutions have extraneous singularities that are not related to the thermodynamic singularities of the system. If singularities of this type are excluded, then the global solution has the same critical-point exponents as the local solution derived by linearizing around the stablest fixed point. It is shown that in this case the critical surface in the Hamiltonian space is closely related to the surface of order-2 critical points in a thermodynamic field space. The boundaries of this surface are correspondingly related to the critical points of higher order in this thermodynamic space. The nonlinear global solution predicts multiple power scaling behavior from a single scaling equation deduced from the renormalization group. Previously such behavior was obtained by postulating the simultaneous validity of two of more "linear" scaling hypotheses.
Recent applications of the renormalization group to critical phenomena in magnetic systems have been based mainly on local linear arguments. It has been implicitly assumed that the global nonlinear effects are important only in crossover effects and that the behavior asymptotically close to the critical point is determined by the stablest fixed point alone. We have given a nonlinear analysis which incorporates the crossover between the Wilson–Fisher and mean field behavior. We point out in this paper that this competition expresses itself in globally valid solutions which can upset the dominance presumed from the linear stability analysis unless certain regularity conditions are imposed.
We give the first nonlinear solution of renormalization-group equations. This solution, based on the differential generator of Wegner and Houghton, exhibits an explicit mixing of (or crossover between) critical and mean-field behavior. The solution is given for all values of the spin dimension nnn and to first order in $\ensuremath{\epsilon}\ensuremath{\equiv}4\ensuremath{-}d$, where ddd is the lattice dimensionality.
The renormalization-group (RG) method is applied to the problem of formation of a localized state of a particle moving in a given potential. It is shown that RG transformation on the particle's Green's function can be performed exactly. The fixed-point equations yield information on the critical binding strength, while the transformation equations near the fixed points give scaling laws and critical exponents, e.g., for the dependence of the localization radius on the energy and the potential strength. The general theory is illustrated by considering the simplest case of the Slater-Koster problem in detail. We find that it is possible to take all the irrelevant variables into account and thus obtain the exact result for the critical binding point. Critical exponents and scaling laws are, however, universal in character. The method is then extended to the case of motion in random potentials, and some applications are pointed out. In particular it is shown that the RG properties of the averaged absolute value squared (〈∣G∣2〉〈{|G|}^{2}〉〈∣G∣2〉) of the Green's function do not correspond to a simple second-order phase transition. The analysis illustrates certain features of RG methods which have not heretofore been encountered in other problems and which are likely to be found in treatments of disordered materials. In particular, the runaway behavior observed in the RG transformation of 〈G〉〈G〉〈G〉 and 〈∣G∣2〉〈{|G|}^{2}〉〈∣G∣2〉 as well as in many random-spin systems, might be associated with the formation of bound states in the band tail for any amount of randomness.
Critical points of higher order can exist in complex magnetic and fluid systems. By definition, at a critical point of order O\mathcal{O}O, O\mathcal{O}O phases become identical simultaneously. Here the Wilson renormalization-group method is generalized from ordinary critical points (O=2\mathcal{O}=2O=2) and Gaussian tricritical points (O=3\mathcal{O}=3O=3) to critical points of arbitrary order O\mathcal{O}O. An expansion scheme in ${\ensuremath{\epsilon}}_{\mathcal{O}}\ensuremath{\equiv}\frac{2\mathcal{O}}{(\mathcal{O}\ensuremath{-}1)\ensuremath{-}d}$ is proposed. The nontrivial fixed points and the critical exponents for O=3,4\mathcal{O}=3,4O=3,4 are calculated to order ${\ensuremath{\epsilon}}_{\mathcal{O}}$. We present the relevant scaling fields and densities for O=3\mathcal{O}=3O=3, and, in an appendix, justify the validity of the approximate recursion relation to order ${\ensuremath{\epsilon}}_{\mathcal{O}}$.
Abstract In this work, we define and calculate critical exponents associated with higher order thermodynamic phase transitions. Such phase transitions can be classified into two classes: with or without a local order parameter. For phase transitions involving a local order parameter, we write down the Landau theory and calculate critical exponents using the saddle point approximation. Further, we investigate fluctuations about the saddle point and demarcate when such fluctuations dominate over saddle point calculations by introducing the generalized Ginzburg criteria. We use Wilsonian renormalization group (RG) to derive scaling forms for observables near criticality and obtain scaling relations between the critical exponents. Afterwards, we find out fixed points of the RG flow using the one-loop beta function and calculate critical exponents about the fixed points for third and fourth order phase transitions.
Continuous phase transitions provide a natural setting for understanding universality. Near criticality, the correlation length diverges, microscopic details become increasingly irrelevant, and physical observables obey scaling laws characterized by universal critical exponents. Within the Functional Renormalization Group (FRG), this scale dependence is described through the Effective Average Action, which progressively incorporates fluctuations as the momentum scale is lowered. A first part of this thesis is developed within the Local Potential Approximation (LPA), where we study multicritical fixed points of scalar field theories. Their universal properties are compared with results obtained at higher orders in the derivative expansion. Particular attention is devoted to the relation between global fixed-point potentials and their local representations through finite polynomial truncations. We show that the convergence of such expansions is constrained by the analytic structure of the global solution, and that expanding around a suitable nonzero stationary point significantly improves the reconstruction of multicritical branches. Beyond the structure of individual fixed points, a central part of this thesis concerns RG irreversibility. In two dimensions, Zamolodchikov’s c-theorem describes the flow from the ultraviolet to the infrared through a monotonically decreasing c-function. Within the FRG framework, we develop a variational procedure to reconstruct RG trajectories between fixed points and integrate the corresponding c-function along them. The resulting quantity displays monotonic behaviour and becomes increasingly stable as the truncation order is raised, providing a manifestation of RG irreversibility within the approximation considered. Finally, close to the upper critical dimensions, the linearized FRG flow around the Gaussian fixed point is naturally organized in terms of Hermite polynomials. Using the epsilon-expansion, we derive a curvature-based candidate c-function and obtain an analytic explanation for the alternating curvature of successive multicritical fixed points and for their progressive accumulation around the Gaussian fixed point.