The Functional Renormalization Group Treatment of Disordered Systems, a Review

Abstract

We review current progress in the functional renormalization group treatment of disordered systems. After an elementary introduction into the phenomenology, we show why in the context of disordered systems a functional renormalization group treatment is necessary, contrary to pure systems, where renormalization of a single coupling constant is sufficient. This leads to a disorder distribution, which after a finite renormalization becomes non-analytic, thus overcoming the predictions of the seemingly exact dimensional reduction. We discuss, how a renormalizable field theory can be constructed, even beyond 1-loop order. We then discuss an elastic manifold embedded inNdimensions, and give the exact solution forN→ ∞. This is compared to predictions of the Gaussian replica variational ansatz, using replica symmetry breaking. We finally review depinning, both isotropic and anisotropic, and the scaling function for the width distribution of an interface.KeywordsDomain WallDimensional ReductionUniversality ClassDirected PolymerReplica SymmetryThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.