Free Boson Research Articles

Free boson realization of the Dunkl intertwining operator in one dimension

The operator that intertwines between the [Formula: see text]-Dunkl operator and the derivative is shown to have a realization in terms of the oscillator operators in one dimension. This observation rests on the fact that the Dunkl intertwining operator maps the Hermite polynomials on the generalized Hermite polynomials.

Integrability of the ν=4/3 fractional quantum Hall edge states

We investigate the homogeneous chiral edge theory of the filling ν=4/3 fractional quantum Hall state, which is parameterized by a Luttinger liquid velocity matrix and an electron tunneling amplitude (ignoring irrelevant terms). We identify two solvable cases: one case where the theory gives two free chiral boson modes, and the other case where the theory yields one free charge 2e3 chiral fermion and two free chiral Bogoliubov (Majorana) fermions. For generic parameters, the energy spectrum from our exact diagonalization shows Poisson level spacing statistics (LSS) in each conserved charge and momentum sector, indicating the existence of hidden conserved quantities and the possibility that the generic edge theory of the ν=4/3 fractional quantum Hall state is integrable. We further show that a global symmetry preserving irrelevant nonlinear kinetic term will lead to the transition of LSS from Poisson to Wigner-Dyson at high energies. This further supports the possibility that the model without irrelevant terms is integrable.

Adding flavor to the Narain ensemble

We revisit the proposal that the ensemble average over free boson CFTs in two dimensions — parameterized by Narain’s moduli space — is dual to an exotic theory of gravity in three dimensions dubbed U(1) gravity. We consider flavored partition functions, where the usual genus g partition function is weighted by Wilson lines coupled to the conserved U(1) currents of these theories. These flavored partition functions obey a heat equation which relates deformations of the Riemann surface moduli to those of the chemical potentials which measure these U(1) charges. This allows us to derive a Siegel-Weil formula which computes the average of these flavored partition functions. The result takes the form of a “sum over geometries”, albeit with modifications relative to the unflavored case.

Scaling of the finite-size effect of the α -Rényi entropy in disjointed intervals under dilation

The $\alpha$-R\'enyi entropy in the gapless models have been obtained by the conformal field theory, which is exact in the thermodynamic limit. However, the calculation of its finite size effect (FSE) is challenging. So far only the FSE in a single interval in the XX model has been understood and the FSE in the other models and in the other conditions are totally unknown. Here we report the FSE of this entropy in disjointed intervals $A = \cup_i A_i$ under a uniform dilation $\lambda A$ in the XY model, showing of a universal scaling law as \begin{equation*} \Delta_{\lambda A}^\alpha = \Delta_A^\alpha \lambda^{-\eta} \mathcal{B}(A, \lambda), \end{equation*} where $|\mathcal{B}(A, \lambda)| \le 1$ is a bounded function and $\eta = \text{min}(2, 2/\alpha)$ when $\alpha < 10$. We verify this relation in the phase boundaries of the XY model, in which the different central charges correspond to the physics of free Fermion and free Boson models. We find that in the disjointed intervals, two FSEs, termed as extrinsic FSE and intrinsic FSE, are required to fully account for the FSE of the entropy. Physically, we find that only the edge modes of the correlation matrix localized at the open ends $\partial A$ have contribution to the total entropy and its FSE. Our results provide some incisive insight into the entanglement entropy in the many-body systems.

Chirally factorised truncated conformal space approach

Truncated Conformal Space Approach (TCSA) is a highly efficient method to compute spectra, operator matrix elements and time evolution in quantum field theories defined as relevant perturbations of 1+1-dimensional conformal field theories. However, similarly to other exact diagonalisation methods, TCSA is ridden with the “curse of dimensionality”: the dimension of the Hilbert space increases exponentially with the (square root of the) truncation level, limiting its precision by the available memory resources. Here we describe an algorithm which exploits the chiral factorisation property of conformal field theory with periodic boundary conditions to achieve a substantial improvement in the truncation level. The Chirally Factorised TCSA (CFTCSA) algorithm presented here works with inputs describing the necessary CFT data in a specified format. It makes possible much more precise calculations with given computing resources and extends the reach of the method to problems requiring large Hilbert space dimensions. In fact, it has already been used in a number of recent works ranging from determination of form factors, through studying confinement of topological excitations to non-equilibrium dynamics. Besides the description of the algorithm, a MATLAB implementation of the algorithm is also provided as an ancillary file package, supplemented with example codes computing spectra, matrix elements and time evolution, and with CFT data for three different quantum field theories. We also give a detailed how-to guide for constructing the required CFT data for Virasoro minimal models with central charge c<1, and for the massless free boson with c=1.

Thermodynamics of perturbations of some single particle field theories

We study the thermodynamic Bethe ansatz (TBA) equations for pure perturbations of some simple integrable quantum field theories with a single bosonic or fermionic particle, in particular the massive sinh-Gordon model and its ultraviolet (UV) limit which is a deformation of the conformally invariant free massless boson. Whereas the TBA equations for deformations of massive theories are in principle known, the TBA equations we propose for the deformations of conformal field theories are relatively new and require a special factorization in rapidity variables of the CDD factor for the scattering of the massless particles. The latter TBA equations can be solved exactly and reproduce the known results for the ground state energy on a cylinder of circumference R which were previously obtained using different methods based for instance on the Burgers differential equation. Special attention is paid to the c-theorem in this context which is discussed in some detail. For positive infra-red central charge c IR, for flows consistent with the c-theorem the ground state energy develops a (previously known) square-root singularity toward the UV, which strongly suggests the theories are UV incomplete in these physically important cases. We suggest that the singularity indicates a tachyonic vacuum instability. Other cases with c IR < 0 do not have this singularity are interpreted as being UV complete with c UV = 0. We extend our results to a continuously variable c IR by introducing a chemical potential and suggest this as a possible toy model for the perturbed Liouville theory.

Bounding 3d CFT correlators

We consider the problem of bounding CFT correlators on the Euclidean section. By reformulating the question as an optimization problem, we construct functionals numerically which determine upper and lower bounds on correlators under several circumstances. A useful outcome of our analysis is that the gap maximization bootstrap problem can be reproduced by a numerically easier optimization problem. We find that the 3d Ising spin correlator takes the minimal possible allowed values on the Euclidean section. Turning to the maximization problem we find that for d > 2 there are gap-independent maximal bounds on CFT correlators. Under certain conditions we show that the maximizing correlator is given by the generalized free boson for general Euclidean kinematics. In our explorations we also uncover an intriguing 3d CFT which saturates gap, OPE maximization and correlator value bounds. Finally we comment on the relation between our functionals and the Polyakov bootstrap.

FZZ-triality and large [formula omitted] super Liouville theory

We examine dualities of two dimensional conformal field theories by applying the methods developed in previous works. We first derive the duality between SL(2|1)k/(SL(2)k⊗U(1)) coset and Witten's cigar model or sine-Liouville theory. The latter two models are Fateev-Zamolodchikov-Zamolodchikov (FZZ-)dual to each other, hence the relation of the three models is named FZZ-triality. These results are used to study correlator correspondences between large N=4 super Liouville theory and a coset of the form Y(k1,k2)/SL(2)k1+k2, where Y(k1,k2) consists of two SL(2|1)ki and free bosons or equivalently two U(1) cosets of D(2,1;ki−1) at level one. These correspondences are a main result of this paper. The FZZ-triality acts as a seed of the correspondence, which in particular implies a hidden SL(2)k′ in SL(2|1)k or D(2,1;k−1)1. The relation of levels is k′−1=1/(k−1). We also construct boundary actions in sine-Liouville theory as another use of the FZZ-triality. Furthermore, we generalize the FZZ-triality to the case with SL(n|1)k/(SL(n)k⊗U(1)) for arbitrary n>2.

Entanglement properties and ground-state statistics of free bosons

We calculate analytically the entanglement and R\'enyi entropies, the negativity, and the mutual information together with all the density and many-particle correlation functions for free bosons on a lattice in the ground state, for both homogeneous and inhomogeneous systems. We show that all those quantities can be derived from a multinomial form of the reduced density matrix in the configuration space whose diagonal elements dictate the statistics of the particle distribution, while the off-diagonal coherence terms control the quantum fluctuations. We provide by this analysis a unified approach based on a reduced density matrix technique useful to calculate both the entanglement properties and an infinite number of correlation functions.

Wormholes and spectral statistics in the Narain ensemble

We study the spectral statistics of primary operators in the recently formulated ensemble average of Narain’s family of free boson conformal field theories, which provides an explicit (though exotic) example of an averaged holographic duality. In particular we study moments of the partition function by explicit computation of higher-degree Eisenstein series. This describes the analog of wormhole contributions coming from a sum of over geometries in the dual theory of “U(1) gravity” in AdS3. We give an exact formula for the two-point correlation function of the density of primary states. We compute the spectral form factor and show that the wormhole sum reproduces precisely the late time plateau behaviour related to the discreteness of the spectrum. The spectral form factor does not exhibit a linear ramp.

Phase Diagram of 1+1D Abelian-Higgs Model and Its Critical Point.

We determine the phase diagram of the Abelian-Higgs model in one spatial dimension and time (1+1D) on a lattice. We identify a line of first order phase transitions separating the Higgs region from the confined one. This line terminates in a quantum critical point above which the two regions are connected by a smooth crossover. We analyze the critical point and find compelling evidence for its description as the product of two noninteracting systems: a massless free fermion and a massless free boson. However, we find also some surprising results that cannot be explained by our simple picture, suggesting this newly discovered critical point is an unusual one.

Supersymmetric free fermions and bosons: Locality, symmetry, and topology

Supersymmetry, originally proposed in particle physics, refers to a dual relation that connects fermionic and bosonic degrees of freedom in a system. Recently, there has been considerable interest in applying the idea of supersymmetry to topological phases, motivated by the attempt to gain insights from the fermion side into the boson side and vice versa. We present a systematic study of this construction when applied to band topology in noninteracting systems. First, on top of the conventional ten-fold way, we find that topological insulators and superconductors are divided into three classes depending on whether the supercharge can be local and symmetric, must break a symmetry to preserve locality, or needs to break locality. Second, we resolve the apparent paradox between the nontriviality of free fermions and the triviality of free bosons by noting that the topological information is encoded in the identification map. We also discuss how to understand a recently revealed supersymmetric entanglement duality in this context. These findings are illustrated by prototypical examples. Our work sheds new light on band topology from the perspective of supersymmetry.

Constraining momentum space CFT correlators with consistent position space OPE limit and the collider bound

Consistency with position space OPE limit requires three-point momentum space CFT correlators to have only total energy singularity. We show that this requirement gives a simple proof of the known result that in three dimensions the parity-odd structure cannot exist for three-point correlators of exactly conserved currents with spins si, sj, sk, when triangle inequality si ≤ sj + sk is violated. We also show that even for parity even correlation functions the properties are different inside and outside the triangle. It was previously shown that if we allow for weakly broken higher spin symmetry, parity-odd correlators can exist even when triangle inequality is violated. In this paper we establish a relation between non-conservation Ward-Takahashi (WT) identities for weakly broken currents at large N and the WT identities for exactly conserved currents with the help of a few examples. This allows us to calculate the parity violating results outside the triangle using parity-even free bosonic and free fermionic results.In general, there is one parity-odd structure and two parity-even structures for three-point functions. It can be shown that the coefficient of one of the parity-even and odd parts can be combined into a complex parameter c when correlators are expressed in spinor-helicity variables. When this complex parameter takes real value c = ±1 it corresponds to either the free boson or free fermion theory. When c is a pure phase, it corresponds to Chern-Simons matter theories. Furthermore, re-expressing known results for conformal collider bounds we see that |c| ≤ 1 for generic 3d CFTs and |c| ≤ f(∆gap) for holographic CFTs.

Charged Rényi negativity of massless free bosons

In this paper, we consider the computation of charged moments of the reduced density matrix of two disjoint intervals in the 1+1 dimensional free compactified boson conformal field theory (CFT) by studying the four-point function of the fluxed twist fields. We obtained the exact scaling function of this four-point function and discussed its decompactification limit. This scaling function was used to obtain the charged moments of the partial transpose which we refer as charged Rényi negativity. These charged moments and the charged moments of the partial transpose are essential for the problem of symmetry decomposition of the corresponding entanglement measures. We test our analytic formula against exact numerical computation in the complex harmonic chain, finding perfect agreements.

Entanglement in descendants

We study the single interval entanglement and relative entropies of conformal descendants in 2d CFT. Descendants contain non-trivial entanglement, though the entanglement entropy of the canonical primary in the free boson CFT contains no additional entanglement compared to the vacuum, we show that the entanglement entropy of the state created by its level one descendant is non-trivial and is identical to that of the U(1) current in this theory. We determine the first sub-leading corrections to the short interval expansion of the entanglement entropy of descendants in a general CFT from their four point function on the n-sheeted plane. We show that these corrections are determined by multiplying squares of appropriate dressing factors to the corresponding corrections of the primary. Relative entropy between descendants of the same primary is proportional to the square of the difference of their dressing factors. We apply our results to a class of descendants of generalized free fields and descendants of the vacuum and show that their dressing factors are universal.

Dissipative dynamics in the free massive boson limit of the sine-Gordon model

We study the dissipative dynamics of one-dimensional fermions, described in terms of the sine-Gordon model in its free massive boson or semi-classical limit, while keeping track of forward scattering processes. The system is prepared in the gapped ground state, and then coupled to environment through local currents within the Lindblad formalism. The heating dynamics of the system is followed using bosonization. The single particle density matrix exhibits correlations between the left and right moving particles. While the density matrix of right movers and left movers is translationally invariant, the left-right sector is not, corresponding to a translational symmetry breaking charge density wave state. Asymptotically, the single particle density matrix decays exponentially with exponent proportional to -\gamma t|x|\Delta^2−γt|x|Δ2 where \gammaγ and \DeltaΔ are the dissipative coupling and the gap, respectively. The charge density wave order parameter decays exponentially in time with an interaction independent decay rate. The second R'enyi entropy grows linearly with time and is essentially insensitive to the presence of the gap.

Continuous gaussian measurements of the free boson CFT: A model for exactly solvable and detectable measurement-induced dynamics

Hybrid evolution protocols, composed of unitary dynamics and repeated, weak or projective measurements, give rise to new, intriguing quantum phenomena, including entanglement phase transitions and unconventional conformal invariance. Defying the complications imposed by the non-linear and stochastic nature of the measurement process, we introduce a scenario of measurement-induced many body evolution, which possesses an exact analytical solution: bosonic Gaussian measurements. The evolution features a competition between the continuous observation of linear boson operators and a free Hamiltonian, and it is characterized by a unique and exactly solvable covariance matrix. Within this framework, we then consider an elementary model for quantum criticality, the free boson conformal field theory, and investigate in which way criticality is modified under measurements. Depending on the measurement protocol, we distinguish three fundamental scenarios (a) enriched quantum criticality, characterized by a logarithmic entanglement growth with a floating prefactor, or the loss of criticality, indicated by an entanglement growth with either (b) an area-law or (c) a volume-law. For each scenario, we discuss the impact of imperfect measurements, which reduce the purity of the wavefunction and are equivalent to Markovian decoherence, and present a set of observables, e.g., real-space correlations, the relaxation time, and the entanglement structure, to classify the measurement-induced dynamics for both pure and mixed states. Finally, we present an experimental tomography scheme, which grants access to the density operator of the system by using the continuous measurement record only.

Topology by Dissipation: Majorana Bosons in Metastable Quadratic Markovian Dynamics.

Majorana bosons, that is, tight bosonic analogs of the Majorana fermionic quasiparticles of condensed-matter physics, are forbidden for gapped free bosonic matter within a standard Hamiltonian scenario. We show how the interplay between dynamical metastability and nontrivial bulk topology makes their emergence possible in noninteracting bosonic chains undergoing Markovian dissipation. This leads to a distinctive form of topological metastability, whereby a conserved Majorana boson localized on one edge is paired, in general, with a symmetry generator localized on the opposite edge. We argue that Majorana bosons are robust against disorder and identifiable by signatures in the zero-frequency steady-state power spectrum. Our results suggest that symmetry-protected topological phases for free bosons may arise in transient metastable regimes, which persist over practical timescales.

A note on ensemble holography for rational tori

We study simple examples of ensemble-averaged holography in free compact boson CFTs with rational values of the radius squared. These well-known rational CFTs have an extended chiral algebra generated by three currents. We consider the modular average of the vacuum character in these theories, which results in a weighted average over all modular invariants. In the simplest case, when the chiral algebra is primitive (in a sense we explain), the weights in this ensemble average are all equal. In the non-primitive case the ensemble weights are governed by a semigroup structure on the space of modular invariants.These observations can be viewed as evidence for a holographic duality between the ensemble of CFTs and an exotic gravity theory based on a compact U(1) × U(1) Chern-Simons action. In the bulk description, the extended chiral algebra arises from soliton sectors, and including these in the path integral on thermal AdS3 leads to the vacuum character of the chiral algebra. We also comment on wormhole-like contributions to the multi-boundary path integral.

Tensor Renormalization Group for interacting quantum fields

We present a new tensor network algorithm for calculating the partition function of interacting quantum field theories in 2 dimensions. It is based on the Tensor Renormalization Group (TRG) protocol, adapted to operate entirely at the level of fields. This strategy was applied in Ref.[1] to the much simpler case of a free boson, obtaining an excellent performance. Here we include an arbitrary self-interaction and treat it in the context of perturbation theory. A real space analogue of the Wilsonian effective action and its expansion in Feynman graphs is proposed. Using a λϕ4 theory for benchmark, we evaluate the order λ correction to the free energy. The results show a fast convergence with the bond dimension, implying that our algorithm captures well the effect of interaction on entanglement.