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Quantum brownian motion on a triangular lattice and c=2 boundary conformal field theory

Ian K. Affleck, Masaki Oshikawa, Hubert Saleur

Published Nov 30, 2006• 46 citations
OpenAlex

Abstract

We study a single particle diffusing on a triangular lattice and interacting with a heat bath, using boundary conformal field theory (CFT) and exact integrability techniques. We derive a correspondence between the phase diagram of this problem and that recently obtained for the 2-dimensional 3-state Potts model with a boundary. Exact results are obtained on phases with intermediate mobilities. These correspond to nontrivial boundary states in a conformal field theory with 2 free bosons which we explicitly construct for the first time. These conformally invariant boundary conditions are not simply products of Dirichlet and Neumann ones and unlike those trivial boundary conditions, are not invariant under a Heisenberg algebra.

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We study a single particle diffusing on a triangular lattice and interacting with a heat bath, using boundary conformal field theory (CFT) and exact integrability techniques. We derive a correspondence between the phase diagram of this problem and that recently obtained for the 2-dimensional 3-state Potts model with a boundary. Exact results are obtained on phases with intermediate mobilities. These correspond to nontrivial boundary states in a conformal field theory with 2 free bosons which we explicitly construct for the first time. These conformally invariant boundary conditions are not simply products of Dirichlet and Neumann ones and unlike those trivial boundary conditions, are not invariant under a Heisenberg algebra.
We consider the field theory of N massless bosons which are free except for an interaction localized on the boundary of their 1+1 dimensional world. The boundary action is the sum of two pieces: a periodic potential and a coupling to a uniform abelian gauge field. Such models arise in open string theory and dissipative quantum mechanics, and possibly in edge state tunneling in the fractional quantized Hall effect. We explicitly show that conformal invariance is unbroken for certain special choices of the gauge field and the periodic potential. These special cases are naturally indexed by semi-simple, simply laced Lie algebras. For each such algebra, we have a discrete series of conformally invariant theories where the potential and gauge field are conveniently given in terms of the weight lattice of the algebra. We compute the exact boundary state for these theories, which explicitly shows the group structure. The partition function and correlation functions are easily computed using the boundary state result.
We study two aspects of the problem of a particle moving on a lattice while subject to dissipation, often called the "Schmid model." First, a correspondence between the Schmid model and boundary sine-Gordon field theory is explored, and a new method is applied to the calculation of the partition function for the theory. Second, a traditional condensed matter formulation of the problem in one spatial dimension is extended to the case of an arbitrary two-dimensional Bravais lattice. A well-known mathematical analogy between one-dimensional dissipative quantum mechanics and string theory provides an equivalence between the Schmid model at the critical point and boundary sine-Gordon theory, which describes a free bosonic field subject to periodic interaction on the boundaries. Using the tools of conformal field theory, the partition function is calculated as a function of the temperature and the renormalized coupling constants of the boundary interaction. The method pursues an established technique of introducing an auxiliary free boson, fermionizing the system, and constructing the boundary state in fermion variables. However, a different way of obtaining the fermionic boundary conditions from the bosonic theory leads to an alternative renormalization for the coupling constants that occurs at a more natural level than in the established approach. Recent renormalization group analyses of the extension of the Schmid model to a two-dimensional periodic potential have yielded interesting new structure in the phase diagram for the mobility. We extend a classic one-dimensional, finite temperature calculation to the case of an arbitrary two-dimensional Bravais lattice. The duality between weak-potential and tightbinding lattice limits is reproduced in the two-dimensional case, and a perturbation expansion in the potential strength used to verify the change in the critical dependence of the mobility on the strength of the dissipation. With a triangular lattice the possibility of third order contributions arises, and we obtain some preliminary expressions for their contributions to the mobility.
We study the conformal field theory of a free massless scalar field living on the half line with interactions introduced via a periodic potential at the boundary. An SU(2)SU(2)SU(2) current algebra underlies this system and the interacting boundary state is given by a global SU(2)SU(2)SU(2) rotation of the left-moving fields in the zero-potential (Neumann) boundary state. As the potential strength varies from zero to infinity, the boundary state interpolates between the Neumann and the Dirichlet values. The full S-matrix for scattering from the boundary, with arbitrary particle production, is explicitly computed. To maintain unitarity, it is necessary to attribute a hidden discrete ``soliton'' degree of freedom to the boundary. The same unitarity puzzle occurs in the Kondo problem, and we anticipate a similar solution.
The entanglement spectra for a subsystem in a spin chain fine-tuned to a quantum-critical point contains signatures of the underlying quantum field theory that governs its low-energy properties. For an open chain with given boundary conditions described by a 2D conformal field theory~(CFT), the entanglement spectrum of the left/right half of the system coincides with a boundary CFT spectrum, where one of the boundary conditions arise due to the `entanglement cut'. The latter has been argued to be conformal and has been numerically found to be the `free' boundary condition for Ising, Potts and free boson theories. For these models, the `free' boundary condition for the lattice degree of freedom has a counterpart in the continuum theory. However, this is not true in general. Here, this question is analyzed for the unitary minimal models of 2D CFTs using the density matrix renormalization group technique. The entanglement spectra are computed for blocks of spins in open chains of A-type restricted solid-on-solid models with identical boundary conditions at the ends. The imposed boundary conditions are realized exactly for these lattice models due to their integrable nature. The obtained entanglement spectra are in good agreement with certain boundary CFT spectra. The boundary condition for the entanglement cut is found to be conformal and to coincide with the one with the highest boundary entropy. This identification enables determination of the exponents governing the unusual corrections to the entanglement entropy from the CFT partition functions. These are compared with numerical results.
Abstract We revisit the problem of Q -colourings of the triangular lattice using a mapping onto an integrable spin-one model, which can be solved exactly using Bethe ansatz techniques. In particular we focus on the low-energy excitations above the eigenlevel g 2 , which was shown by Baxter to dominate the transfer matrix spectrum in the Fortuin–Kasteleyn (chromatic polynomial) representation for , where . We argue that g 2 and its scaling levels define a conformally invariant theory, the so-called regime IV, which provides the actual description of the (analytically continued) colouring problem within a much wider range, namely . The corresponding conformal field theory is identified and the exact critical exponents are derived. We discuss their implications for the phase diagram of the antiferromagnetic triangular-lattice Potts model at non-zero temperature. Finally, we relate our results to recent observations in the field of spin-one anyonic chains.
We obtain long series expansions for the bulk, surface and corner free energies for several two-dimensional statistical models, by combining Enting's finite lattice method (FLM) with exact transfer matrix enumerations. The models encompass all integrable curves of the Q -state Potts model on the square and triangular lattices, including the antiferromagnetic transition curves and the Ising model ( Q = 2) at temperature T , as well as a fully packed O( n ) type loop model on the square lattice. The expansions are around the trivial fixed points at infinite Q , n or 1/ T . By using a carefully chosen expansion parameter, q ≪ 1, all expansions turn out to be of the form , where the coefficients α k and β k are periodic functions of k . Thanks to this periodicity property, we can conjecture the form of the expansions to all orders (except in a few cases where the periodicity is too large). These expressions are then valid for all 0 ⩽ q < 1. We analyse in detail the q → 1 − limit in which the models become critical. In this limit the divergence of the corner free energy defines a universal term which can be compared with the conformal field theory (CFT) predictions of Cardy and Peschel. This allows us to deduce the asymptotic expressions for the correlation length in several cases. Finally we work out the FLM formulae for the case where some of the system's boundaries are endowed with particular (non-free) boundary conditions. We apply this in particular to the square-lattice Potts model with Jacobsen–Saleur boundary conditions, conjecturing the expansions of the surface and corner free energies to arbitrary order for any integer value of the boundary interaction parameter r . These results are in turn compared with CFT predictions.