No Arabic abstract
Using strong-disorder renormalization group, numerical exact diagonalization, and quantum Monte Carlo methods, we revisit the random antiferromagnetic XXZ spin-1/2 chain focusing on the long-length and ground-state behavior of the average time-independent spin-spin correlation function C(l)=upsilon l^{-eta}. In addition to the well-known universal (disorder-independent) power-law exponent eta=2, we find interesting universal features displayed by the prefactor upsilon=upsilon_o/3, if l is odd, and upsilon=upsilon_e/3, otherwise. Although upsilon_o and upsilon_e are nonuniversal (disorder dependent) and distinct in magnitude, the combination upsilon_o + upsilon_e = -1/4 is universal if C is computed along the symmetric (longitudinal) axis. The origin of the nonuniversalities of the prefactors is discussed in the renormalization-group framework where a solvable toy model is considered. Moreover, we relate the average correlation function with the average entanglement entropy, whose amplitude has been recently shown to be universal. The nonuniversalities of the prefactors are shown to contribute only to surface terms of the entropy. Finally, we discuss the experimental relevance of our results by computing the structure factor whose scaling properties, interestingly, depend on the correlation prefactors.
We study the time evolution of bi- and tripartite operator mutual information of the time-evolution operator and Paulis spin operators in the one-dimensional Ising model with magnetic field and the disordered Heisenberg model. In the Ising model, the early-time evolution qualitatively follows an effective light cone picture, and the late-time value is well described by Pages value for a random pure state. In the Heisenberg model with strong disorder, we find many-body localization prevents the information from propagating and being delocalized. We also find an effective Ising Hamiltonian describes the time evolution of bi- and tripartite operator mutual information for the Heisenberg model in the large disorder regime.
While there are well established methods to study delocalization transitions of single particles in random systems, it remains a challenging problem how to characterize many body delocalization transitions. Here, we use a generalized real-space renormalization group technique to study the anisotropic Heisenberg model with long-range interactions, decaying with a power $alpha$, which are generated by placing spins at random positions along the chain. This method permits a large-scale finite-size scaling analysis. We examine the full distribution function of the excitation energy gap from the ground state and observe a crossover with decreasing $alpha$. At $alpha_c$ the full distribution coincides with a critical function. Thereby, we find strong evidence for the existence of a many body localization transition in disordered antiferromagnetic spin chains with long range interactions.
We study the entanglement entropy of blocks of contiguous spins in non-periodic (quasi-periodic or more generally aperiodic) critical Heisenberg, XX and quantum Ising spin chains, e.g. in Fibonacci chains. For marginal and relevant aperiodic modulations, the entanglement entropy is found to be a logarithmic function of the block size with log-periodic oscillations. The effective central charge, c_eff, defined through the constant in front of the logarithm may depend on the ratio of couplings and can even exceed the corresponding value in the homogeneous system. In the strong modulation limit, the ground state is constructed by a renormalization group method and the limiting value of c_eff is exactly calculated. Keeping the ratio of the block size and the system size constant, the entanglement entropy exhibits a scaling property, however, the corresponding scaling function may be nonanalytic.
The entropy stabilized oxide Mg$_{0.2}$Co$_{0.2}$Ni$_{0.2}$Cu$_{0.2}$Zn$_{0.2}$O exhibits antiferromagnetic order and magnetic excitations, as revealed by recent neutron scattering experiments. This observation raises the question of the nature of spin wave excitations in such disordered systems. Here, we investigate theoretically the magnetic ground state and the spin-wave excitations using linear spin-wave theory in combination with the supercell approximation to take into account the extreme disorder in this magnetic system. We find that the experimentally observed antiferromagnetic structure can be stabilized by a rhombohedral distortion together with large second nearest neighbor interactions. Our calculations show that the spin-wave spectrum consists of a well-defined low-energy coherent spectrum in the background of an incoherent continuum that extends to higher energies.
We study the infinite-temperature properties of an infinite sequence of random quantum spin chains using a real-space renormalization group approach, and demonstrate that they exhibit non-ergodic behavior at strong disorder. The analysis is conveniently implemented in terms of SU(2)$_k$ anyon chains that include the Ising and Potts chains as notable examples. Highly excited eigenstates of these systems exhibit properties usually associated with quantum critical ground states, leading us to dub them quantum critical glasses. We argue that random-bond Heisenberg chains self-thermalize and that the excited-state entanglement crosses over from volume-law to logarithmic scaling at a length scale that diverges in the Heisenberg limit $krightarrowinfty$. The excited state fixed points are generically distinct from their ground state counterparts, and represent novel non-equilibrium critical phases of matter.