Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Ballistic conductance with and without disorder in a boundary-driven XXZ spin chain

  Adam J. McRoberts, Roderich Moessner

  SciPost Phys. 18, 015 (2025) · published 14 January 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Motivated by recent experiments on Google's sycamore NISQ platform on the spin transport resulting from a non-unitary periodic boundary drive of an XXZ chain, we study a classical variant thereof by a combination of analytical and numerical means. We find the classical model reproduces the quantum results in remarkable detail, and provides an analytical handle on the nature and shape of the spin transport's three distinct regimes: ballistic (easy-plane), subdiffusive (isotropic) and insulating (easy-axis). Further, we show that this phenomenology is remarkably robust to the inclusion of bond disorder – albeit that the transient dynamics approaching the steady states differs qualitatively between the clean and disordered cases – providing an accessible instance of ballistic transport in a disordered setting.

• Vacua, symmetries, and Higgsing of Chern-Simons matter theories

  Fabio Marino, Marcus Sperling

  SciPost Phys. 18, 174 (2025) · published 3 June 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Three-dimensional supersymmetric Chern–Simons matter (CSM) theories typically preserve $\mathcal{N}=3$ supersymmetry but can exhibit enhanced $\mathcal{N}=4$ supersymmetry under special conditions. A detailed understanding of the moduli space of CSM theories, however, has remained elusive. This paper addresses this gap by systematically analysing the maximal branches of the moduli space of $\mathcal{N}=3$ and $\mathcal{N}=4$ CSM realised via Type IIB brane constructions. Firstly, for $\mathcal{N}=4$ theories with Chern–Simons levels equal $1$, the $SL(2,\mathbb{Z})$ dualisation algorithm is employed to construct dual Lagrangian 3d $\mathcal{N}=4$ theories without CS terms. This allows the full moduli space to be determined using quiver algorithms that compute Higgs and Coulomb branch Hasse diagrams and associated RG flows. Secondly, for $\mathcal{N}=4$ theories with CS-levels greater $1$, where $SL(2,\mathbb{Z})$ dualisation does not yield CS-free Lagrangians, a new prescription is introduced to derive two magnetic quivers, $\mathsf{MQ}_A $ and $\mathsf{MQ}_B$, whose Coulomb branches capture the maximal A and B branches of the original $\mathcal{N}=4$ CSM theory. Applying the decay and fission algorithm to $ \mathsf{MQ}_{A/B}$ then enables the systematic analysis of A/B branch RG flows and their geometric structures. Thirdly, for $\mathcal{N}=3$ CSM theories, one magnetic quiver for each maximal (hyper-Kähler) branch is derived from the brane system. This provides an efficient and comprehensive characterisation of these previously scarcely studied features.

• Composition dependence of the specific heat of FeSi

  Carolina Burger, Andreas Bauer, Christian Pfleiderer

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 11, 020 (2023) · published 6 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Recently, a high-mobility surface conduction channel and in-gap states were identified in the correlated small-gap semiconductor FeSi using electrical transport measurements and high-resolution tunneling spectroscopy. The mobility of the charge carriers in the surface channel is quantitatively reminiscent of topological insulators, but displays a lack of sensitivity to the presence of ferromagnetic impurities as studied by means of a series of single crystals with slightly different starting compositions. Here, we report measurements of the specific heat of these crystals. At low temperatures, a shallow maximum is observed in the specific heat divided by temperature. This maximum is suppressed under magnetic field, characteristic of a Schottky anomaly associated with magnetic impurities. In comparison, the height of this maximum decreases with increasing initial iron content.

• Political or environmental refugees? Re-examining the flight of the Vietnamese boat people, 1975-1995

  Saphia Fleury

  Mig. Pol. 4, 001 (2025) · published 15 May 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  This paper examines ecocide in South Vietnam during the Vietnam War (1954 to 1975) and the extent to which it drove the ‘boat people’ mass migration from Vietnam from 1975 to the mid-1990s. The exodus has become an archetype of a ‘political’ refugee flow, based on a Western Cold War narrative of people fleeing en masse from the persecution of an autocratic Communist regime. This paper challenges this assumption, showing how the interplay of environmental factors with political and military decisions contributed to the post-war exodus. These findings are reached through the analysis of historical primary sources as well as 229 oral history interviews, some 40 per cent of which were conducted with former child refugees. The implications have contemporary relevance because modern migration flows are frequently mixed, and climate change is further complicating the reasons that people leave their homes and their ability to access asylum. The conclusion argues that ecocide can, in some contexts, be considered a form of persecution for the purpose of refugee determination.

• Top quark pair and single top cross sections and ttX (CMS)

  Ravindra K Verma

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 8, 108 (2022) · published 13 July 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Latest results on inclusive and differential top quark pair and single top quark production cross sections are presented using proton-proton collision data collected by the CMS experiment. The differential cross sections are measured as a function of various kinematic observables of the top quarks and the jets and leptons of the event final state. The results are confronted with precise theory calculations and used to constrain Standard Model parameters. Measurements are performed also with high pT top quarks, i.e., in boosted regimes.

• A differential-geometry approach to operator mixing in massless QCD-like theories and Poincaré-Dulac theorem

  Matteo Becchetti

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 7, 032 (2022) · published 21 June 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We review recent progress on operator mixing in the light of the theory of canonical forms for linear systems of differential equations and, in particular, of the Poincar\'e-Dulac theorem. We show that the matrix $A(g) = -\frac{\gamma(g)}{\beta(g)} =\frac{\gamma_0}{\beta_0}\frac{1}{g} + \cdots $ determines which different cases of operator mixing can occur, and we review their classification. We derive a sufficient condition for $A(g)$ to be set in the one-loop exact form $A(g) = \frac{\gamma_0}{\beta_0}\frac{1}{g}$. Finally, we discuss the consequences of the unitarity requirement in massless QCD-like theories, and we demonstrate that $\gamma_0$ is always diagonalizable if the theory is conformal invariant and unitary in its free limit at $g =0$.

• State-of-the-art cross sections for $t\bar t H$: NNLO predictions matched with NNLL resummation and EW corrections

  Roger Balsach, Alessandro Broggio, Simone Devoto, Andrea Ferroglia, Rikkert Frederix, Massimiliano Grazzini, Stefan Kallweit, Anna Kulesza, Javier Mazzitelli, Leszek Motyka, Davide Pagani, Benjamin D. Pecjak, Chiara Savoini, Tomasz Stebel, Malgorzata Worek, Marco Zaro

  SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 10 (2025) · published 13 August 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We present new, state-of-the-art predictions for the associated production of the SM Higgs boson with top quarks, computed in accordance with the recommendations of the LHC Higgs Working Group. The NNLO QCD predictions, derived through suitable approximations of the two-loop virtual contribution, are supplemented with soft-gluon resummation up to NNLL accuracy. Two distinct resummation frameworks are employed – one based on direct QCD and the other on soft-collinear effective theory – and their features are compared in detail. These results are further combined with the complete-NLO corrections, yielding the most precise SM predictions for this process to date. The relevant sources of theoretical uncertainties are thoroughly estimated and discussed.

• Adaptive sampling-based optimization of quantics tensor trains for noisy functions: Applications to quantum simulations

  Kohtaroh Sakaue, Hiroshi Shinaoka, Rihito Sakurai

  SciPost Phys. 19, 038 (2025) · published 14 August 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Tensor cross interpolation (TCI) is a powerful technique for learning a tensor train (TT) by adaptively sampling a target tensor based on an interpolation formula. However, when the tensor evaluations contain random noise, optimizing the TT is more advantageous than interpolating the noise. Here, we propose a new method that starts with an initial guess of TT and optimizes it using non-linear least-squares by fitting it to measured points obtained from TCI. We use quantics TCI (QTCI) in this method and demonstrate its effectiveness on sine and two-time correlation functions, with each evaluated with random noise. The resulting QTT exhibits increased robustness against noise compared to the QTCI method. Furthermore, we employ this optimized QTT of the correlation function in quantum simulation based on pseudo-imaginary-time evolution, resulting in ground-state energy with higher accuracy than the QTCI or Monte Carlo methods.

• Mechanical stability of resonant Bose-Fermi mixtures

  Christian Gualerzi, Leonardo Pisani, Pierbiagio Pieri

  SciPost Phys. 19, 039 (2025) · published 14 August 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We investigate the mechanical stability of Bose-Fermi mixtures at zero temperature in the presence of a tunable Feshbach resonance, which induces a competition between boson condensation and boson-fermion pairing when the boson density is smaller than the fermion density. Using a many-body diagrammatic approach validated by fixed-node Quantum Monte Carlo calculations and supported by recent experimental observations, we determine the minimal amount of boson-boson repulsion required to guarantee the stability of the mixture across the entire range of boson-fermion interactions from weak to strong coupling. Our stability phase diagrams indicate that mixtures with boson-to-fermion mass ratios near two, such as the $^{87}$Rb-$^{40}$K system, exhibit optimal stability conditions. Moreover, by applying our results to a recent experiment with a $^{23}$Na-$^{40}$K mixture, we find that the boson-boson repulsion was insufficient to ensure stability, suggesting that the experimental timescale was short enough to avoid mechanical collapse. On the other hand, we also show that even in the absence of boson-boson repulsion, Bose-Fermi mixtures become intrinsically stable beyond a certain coupling strength, preceding the quantum phase transition associated with the vanishing of the bosonic condensate. We thus propose an experimental protocol for observing this quantum phase transition in a mechanically stable configuration.

• Pair production of charged IDM scalars at high energy CLIC

  Jan Klamka

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 8, 097 (2022) · published 13 July 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The Compact Linear Collider (CLIC) was proposed as the next energy-frontier infrastructure at CERN, to study e$^+$e$^-$ collisions at three centre-of-mass energy stages: 380 GeV, 1.5 TeV and 3 TeV. The main goal of its high-energy stages is to search for the new physics beyond the Standard Model (SM). The Inert Doublet Model (IDM) is one of the simplest SM extensions and introduces four new scalar particles: H$^\pm$, A and H; the lightest, H, is stable and hence a natural dark matter (DM) candidate. A set of benchmark points is considered, which are consistent with current theoretical and experimental constraints and promise detectable signals at future colliders. Prospects for observing pair-production of the IDM scalars at CLIC were previously studied using signatures with two leptons in the final state. In the current study, discovery reach for the IDM charged scalar pair-production is considered for the semi-leptonic final state at the two high-energy CLIC stages. Full simulation analysis, based on the current CLIC detector model, is presented for five selected IDM scenarios. Results are then extended to the larger set of benchmarks using the Delphes fast simulation framework. The CLIC detector model for Delphes has been modified to take pile-up contribution from the beam-induced $\gamma\gamma$ interactions into account, which is crucial for the presented analysis. Results of the study indicate that heavy, charged IDM scalars can be discovered at CLIC for most of the proposed benchmark scenarios, with very high statistical significance.