Anomalous local coordination, density fluctuations, and void statistics in disordered hyperuniform many-particle ground states

Abstract

We provide numerical constructions of one-dimensional hyperuniform many-particle distributions that exhibit unusual clustering and asymptotic local number density fluctuations growing more slowly than the volume of an observation window but faster than the surface area. Hyperuniformity, defined by vanishing infinite-wavelength local density fluctuations, provides a quantitative metric of global order within a many-particle configuration and signals the onset of an "inverted" critical point in which the direct correlation function becomes long ranged. By targeting a specified form of the structure factor at small wavenumbers (S(k)~k(α) for 0<α<1) using collective density variables, we are able to tailor the form of asymptotic local density fluctuations while simultaneously measuring the effect of imposing weak and strong constraints on the available degrees of freedom within the system. This procedure is equivalent to finding the (possibly disordered) classical ground state of an interacting many-particle system with up to four-body interactions. Even in one dimension, the long-range effective interactions induce clustering and nontrivial phase transitions in the resulting ground-state configurations. We provide an analytical connection between the fraction of constrained degrees of freedom within the system and the disorder-order phase transition for a class of target structure factors by examining the realizability of the constrained contribution to the pair correlation function. Our results explicitly demonstrate that disordered hyperuniform many-particle ground states, and therefore also point distributions, with substantial clustering can be constructed. We directly relate the local coordination structure of our point patterns to the distribution of the void space external to the particles, and we provide a scaling argument for the configurational entropy (analogous to spin-frustated system) of the disordered ground states. By emphasizing the intimate connection between geometrical constraints on the particle distribution and structural regularity, our work has direct implications for higher-dimensional systems, including an understanding of the appearance of hyperuniformity and quasi-long-range pair correlations in maximally random strictly jammed packings of hard spheres.