Quantum statistical mechanics of general mean field systems

Nikolay N. Bogolubov

Hidetoshi Nishimori

Abstract Methods of statistical mechanics have been enormously successful in clarifying the macroscopic properties of many-body systems. Typical examples are found in magnetic systems, which have been a test bed for a variety of techniques. This chapter introduces the Ising model of magnetic systems and explains its mean-field treatment, a very useful technique of analysis of many-body systems by statistical mechanics. Mean-field theory explained here forms the basis of the methods used repeatedly throughout this book. The arguments in the present chapter represent a general mean-field theory of phase transitions in the Ising model with uniform ferromagnetic interactions. Special features of spin glasses and related disordered systems are taken into account in subsequent chapters.

Gerardo Ortíz, Cristian D. Batista

We present a theoretical framework and a calculational scheme to study the coexistence and competition of thermodynamic phases in quantum statistical mechanics. The crux of the method is the realization that the microscopic Hamiltonian, modeling the system, can always be written in a hierarchical operator language that unveils all symmetry generators of the problem and, thus, possible thermodynamic phases. In general, one cannot compute the thermodynamic or zero-temperature properties exactly and an approximate scheme named ``hierarchical mean-field approach'' is introduced. This approach treats all possible competing orders on an equal footing. We illustrate the methodology by determining the phase diagram and quantum critical point of a bosonic lattice model which displays coexistence and competition between antiferromagnetism and superfluidity.

Kenneth S. Schmitz

T. Banks

Roberto Scipioni

By means of the recently introduced g statistics we provide a new way of symmetry realisation in quantum statistical mechanics and, in general, in field theory. Crudely speaking we are able to introduce objects whose statistics depend on the symmetries of ground state.