A number of problems in statistical physics can be reformulated in terms of a two-state system evolving in a random field. The corresponding evolution operator can be written in the form of time-ordered operator exponential. Functional formalism allows us to rewrite the latter as a product of usual matrix exponentials using a nonlinear change of functional integration variables. In this review I present this formalism applied to two physical systems the quantum Heisenberg magnet and one-dimensional quantum mechanics in a spatially random potential. First, I derive a representation of the partition function of a quantum Heisenberg ferromagnet as a functional integral over number valued fields (a real one and a complex one) free of constraints. The fields of integration as functions of time obey initial conditions instead of the usual periodic boundary conditions. This is a manifestation of the finite-dimensionality of the space of spin states. In the subsequent sections I study the one-dimensional localization problem. The change of functional integration variables gives simultaneously explicit expressions for the averaging weight and for the Green function of the stationary Schrödinger equation. It allows to compute density correlators of arbitrary orders. The generalization to the case of different energy correlators (Berezinskii-Gor’kov equations) is considered too. In the present review such technical points as regularizations of functional integrals and transformations are discussed in more details than in the original papers.
A number of problems in statistical physics can be reformulated in terms of a two-state system evolving in a random field. The corresponding evolution operator can be written in the form of time-ordered operator exponential. Functional formalism allows us to rewrite the latter as a product of usual matrix exponentials using a nonlinear change of functional integration variables. In this review I present this formalism applied to two physical systems the quantum Heisenberg magnet and one-dimensional quantum mechanics in a spatially random potential. First, I derive a representation of the partition function of a quantum Heisenberg ferromagnet as a functional integral over number valued fields (a real one and a complex one) free of constraints. The fields of integration as functions of time obey initial conditions instead of the usual periodic boundary conditions. This is a manifestation of the finite-dimensionality of the space of spin states. In the subsequent sections I study the one-dimensional localization problem. The change of functional integration variables gives simultaneously explicit expressions for the averaging weight and for the Green function of the stationary Schrödinger equation. It allows to compute density correlators of arbitrary orders. The generalization to the case of different energy correlators (Berezinskii-Gor’kov equations) is considered too. In the present review such technical points as regularizations of functional integrals and transformations are discussed in more details than in the original papers.
Representations for the generating functionals of static correlators of z-components of spins in the XY and XX Heisenberg spin chains are obtained in the form of sums of the fermionic functional integrals. The peculiarity of the functional integrals in question is because of the fact that the integration variables depend on the imaginary time ``automorphically''. In other words, the integration variables are multiplied with a certain complex number when the imaginary time is shifted by a period. Therefore, the corresponding boundary conditions at the ends of the imaginary time segment are not of the form corresponding to fermionic, or bosonic, variables taken in the Matsubara representation at nonzero temperature. In fact, one part of sites of the models corresponds to the integration variables which are subjected to the unusual boundary conditions, while the variables on the other sites depend on the imaginary time conventionally, i.e., as fermions (or bosons). Thus a situation, when an ``automorphic'' boundary condition is the same for all sites of a chain spin model, is generalized. The results of the functional integration are obtained in the form of determinants of the matrix operators which are regularized by means of the generalized zeta-function approach. The partition functions of the models and certain correlation functions at nonzero temperature are obtained explicitly thus demonstrating correctness of the functional integral representations proposed.
Abstract The functional integral representation of the density matrix at thermal equilibrium in non-relativistic quantum mechanics (QM) with many degrees of freedom, in the grand canonical formulation is introduced. In QM, Hamiltonians H(p,q) can be also expressed in terms of creation and annihilation operators, a method adapted to the study of perturbed harmonic oscillators. In the holomorphic formalism, quantum operators act by multiplication and differentiation on a vector space of analytic functions. Alternatively, they can also be represented by kernels, functions of complex variables that correspond in the classical limit to a complex parametrization of phase space. The formalism is adapted to the description of many-body boson systems. To this formalism corresponds a path integral representation of the density matrix at thermal equilibrium, where paths belong to complex spaces, instead of the more usual position–momentum phase space. A parallel formalism can be set up to describe systems with many fermion degrees of freedom, with Grassmann variables replacing complex variables. Both formalisms can be generalized to quantum gases of Bose and Fermi particles in the grand canonical formulation. Field integral representations of the corresponding quantum partition functions are derived.
In this paper, four distinct ideas are combined, which under a wide range of circumstances can give very rapidly converging series expansions for functional integrals. (1) Expansion of the functional being integrated in functional Taylor series. In the familiar case arising in quantum statistical mechanics, that of the Wiener integral of exp[−∫V(x(t))dt],V(x) being the perturbing potential, this is equivalent to expanding the characteristic functional of the probability functional of V(x(t)) in central moments of V(x(t)). The lowest-order term of the series is the approximation obtained by Feynman and Hibbs through a variational method. (2) Transfer of the harmonic term of the potential, when the functional integral is the quantum-statistical density matrix (Green's function of the Bloch equation), to the weighting function. This transforms the functional integral from a Wiener to an Uhlenbeck-Ornstein integral. The formal expressions for the terms of the expansion are somewhat more complicated, but they can be worked out, and the result is a great improvement in the speed of convergence of the series with decreasing temperature and/or decreasing relative magnitude of the anharmonic part of the potential. (3) ``Reservation of variables'' in the integration. This amounts to breaking the averaging process down into an average over subsets of the distributed random function (conditional average), followed by an averaging of these averages. Any step of this kind (it may be repeated within the subsets, etc.) gives an improvement of accuracy. (4) When the quantity being evaluated through functional integration is the partition function, the device introduced by Feynman and Hibbs, of interchanging the functional integration with the integration of the Green's function over the equated initial and final configuration-space points, may be combined with the above techniques. This eliminates one integration in the terms of the expansion and seems to improve accuracy at the same time. The general series obtained is correlated with more conventional operator techniques of quantum-mechanical perturbation theory, in order to answer the perennial question, does the path-integral method bring with it anything that could not be derived by other methods? It is in some sense a Feynman-Dyson expansion of the Green's function, but one that is further modified mathematically in a way characteristic only of the path-integral point of view, and which, moreover, improves its accuracy. It thus appears unlikely that the result is merely one of standard type disguised as a functional integral result. Sample numerical calculations are given to assay the accuracy of the methods, which are shown to compare very favorably with the traditional approximation of finite subdivision of the time interval.
We present a unified formulation for quantum statistical physics based on the representation of the density matrix as a functional integral. For quantum statistical (thermal) field theory, the stochastic variable of the statistical theory is a boundary field configuration. We explore the properties of an effective theory for such boundary configurations and apply it to the computation of the partition function of an interacting one-dimensional quantum-mechanical system at finite temperature. Plots of free energy and specific heat show excellent agreement with more involved semiclassical results. The method of calculation provides an alternative to the usual sum over periodic trajectories: it sums over paths with coincident end points and includes nonvanishing boundary terms. An appropriately modified expansion into modified Matsubara modes is presented.
We have thus far looked at the classical statistical mechanics of a collection of Ising spins in terms of their partition function. We have seen how to extract the free energy per site and correlation functions of the d = 1 Ising model. We will now consider a second way to do this. While the results are, of course, going to be the same, the method exposes a deep connection between classical statistical mechanics in d = 1 and the quantum mechanics of a single spin-12 particle. This is the simplest way to learn about a connection that has a much wider range of applicability: the classical statistical mechanics of a problem in d dimensions may be mapped on to a quantum problem in d – 1 dimensions. The nature of the quantum variable will depend on the nature of the classical variable. In general, the allowed values of the classical variable ( s =±1 in our example) will correspond to the maximal set of simultaneous eigenvalues of the operators in the quantum problem ( σz in our example). Subsequently we will study a problem where the classical variable called x lies in the range –∞ < x < ∞ and will correspond to the eigenvalues of the familiar position operator X that appears in the quantum problem. The correlation functions will become the expectation values in the ground state of a certain transfer matrix . The different sites in the d = 1 lattice will correspond to different, discrete, times in the life of the quantum degree of freedom. By the same token, a quantum problem may be mapped into a statistical mechanics problem in one-higher dimensions, essentially by running the derivation backwards. In this case the resulting partition function is also called the path integral for the quantum problem. There is, however, no guarantee that the classical partition function generated by a legitimate quantum problem (with a Hermitian Hamiltonian) will always make physical sense: the corresponding Boltzmann weights may be negative, or even complex! In the quantum mechanics we first learn, time t is a real parameter. For our purposes we also need to get familiar with quantum mechanics in which time takes on purely imaginary values t = –iτ , where τ is real. It turns out that it is possible to define such a Euclidean quantum mechanics .
The quantizer–dequantizer method is employed. Using the construction of probability distributions describing density operators of a quantum system states, the connection between the Feynman path integral and the time evolution of the density operator (Landau density matrix) as well as the wave function of the stateconsidered. For single–mode systems with continuous variables, a tomographic propagator is introduced in the probability representation of quantum mechanics. An explicit expression for the probability in terms of the Green function of the Schrödinger equation is obtained. Equations for the Green functions defined by arbitrary integrals of motion are derived. Examples of probability distributions describing the evolution of state of a free particle, as well as states of systems with integrals of motion that depend on time (oscillator type) are discussed.