Violation of ensemble equivalence in the antiferromagnetic mean-field XY model

Abstract

It is well known that long-range interactions pose serious problems for the formulation of statistical mechanics. We show in this paper that ensemble equivalence is violated in a simple mean-field model of N fully coupled classical rotators with repulsive interaction (antiferromagnetic XY model). While in the canonical ensemble the rotators are randomly dispersed over all angles, in the microcanonical ensemble a bi-cluster of rotators separated by angle $\pi$, forms in the low energy limit. We attribute this behavior to the extreme degeneracy of the ground state: only one harmonic mode is present, together with N-1 zero modes. We obtain empirically an analytical formula for the probability density function for the angle made by the rotator, which compares extremely well with numerical data and should become exact in the zero energy limit. At low energy, in the presence of the bi-cluster, an extensive amount of energy is located in the single harmonic mode, with the result that the energy temperature relation is modified. Although still linear, $T = \alpha U$, it has the slope $\alpha \approx 1.3$, instead of the canonical value $\alpha =2$.