Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Dark matter effective theory

  Joachim Brod

  SciPost Phys. Lect. Notes 38 (2022) · published 31 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Les Houches 2021 lectures on dark matter effective field theory (short course). The aim of these two lectures is to calculate the DM-nucleus cross section for a simple example, and then generalize to the treatment of general effective interactions of spin-1/2 DM. Relativistic local operators, the heavy-DM effective theory, the chiral effective Lagrangian, and nuclear effective operators are briefly discussed.

  1 citation

• On the dynamics of free-fermionic tau-functions at finite temperature

  Daniel Chernowitz, Oleksandr Gamayun

  SciPost Phys. Core 5, 006 (2022) · published 31 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  In this work we explore an instance of the $\tau$-function of vertex type operators, specified in terms of a constant phase shift in a free-fermionic basis. From the physical point of view this $\tau$-function has multiple interpretations: as a correlator of Jordan-Wigner strings, a Loschmidt Echo in the Aharonov-Bohm effect, or the generating function of the local densities in the Tonks-Girardeau gas. We present the $\tau$-function as a form-factors series and tackle it from four vantage points: (i) we perform an exact summation and express it in terms of a Fredholm determinant in the thermodynamic limit, (ii) we use bosonization techniques to perform partial summations of soft modes around the Fermi surface to acquire the scaling at zero temperature, (iii) we derive large space and time asymptotic behavior for the thermal Fredholm determinant by relating it to effective form-factors with an asymptotically similar kernel, and (iv) we identify and sum the important basis elements directly through a tailor-made numerical algorithm for finite-entropy states in a free-fermionic Hilbert space. All methods confirm each other. We find that, in addition to the exponential decay in the finite-temperature case the dynamic correlation functions exhibit an extra power law in time, universal over any distribution and time scale.

  10 citations

• The one-dimensional Bose gas with strong two-body losses: the effect of the harmonic confinement

  Lorenzo Rosso, Alberto Biella, Leonardo Mazza

  SciPost Phys. 12, 044 (2022) · published 28 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study the dynamics of a one-dimensional Bose gas in presence of strong two-body losses. In this dissipative quantum Zeno regime, the gas fermionises and its dynamics can be described with a simple set of rate equations. Employing the local density approximation and a Boltzmann-like dynamical equation, the description is easily extended to take into account an external potential. We show that in the absence of confinement the population is depleted in an anomalous way and that the gas behaves as a low-temperature classical gas. The harmonic confinement accelerates the depopulation of the gas and introduces a novel decay regime, which we thoroughly characterise.

  28 citations

• The Dark Machines Anomaly Score Challenge: Benchmark Data and Model Independent Event Classification for the Large Hadron Collider

  T. Aarrestad, M. van Beekveld, M. Bona, A. Boveia, S. Caron, J. Davies, A. De Simone, C. Doglioni, J. M. Duarte, A. Farbin, H. Gupta, L. Hendriks, L. Heinrich, J. Howarth, P. Jawahar, A. Jueid, J. Lastow, A. Leinweber, J. Mamuzic, E. Merényi, A. Morandini, P. Moskvitina, C. Nellist, J. Ngadiuba, B. Ostdiek, M. Pierini, B. Ravina, R. Ruiz de Austri, S. Sekmen, M. Touranakou, M. Vaškevičiūte, R. Vilalta, J. R. Vlimant, R. Verheyen, M. White, E. Wulff, E. Wallin, K. A. Wozniak, Z. Zhang

  SciPost Phys. 12, 043 (2022) · published 28 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We describe the outcome of a data challenge conducted as part of the Dark Machines Initiative and the Les Houches 2019 workshop on Physics at TeV colliders. The challenged aims at detecting signals of new physics at the LHC using unsupervised machine learning algorithms. First, we propose how an anomaly score could be implemented to define model-independent signal regions in LHC searches. We define and describe a large benchmark dataset, consisting of >1 Billion simulated LHC events corresponding to $10~\rm{fb}^{-1}$ of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. We then review a wide range of anomaly detection and density estimation algorithms, developed in the context of the data challenge, and we measure their performance in a set of realistic analysis environments. We draw a number of useful conclusions that will aid the development of unsupervised new physics searches during the third run of the LHC, and provide our benchmark dataset for future studies at https://www.phenoMLdata.org. Code to reproduce the analysis is provided at https://github.com/bostdiek/DarkMachines-UnsupervisedChallenge.

  80 citations

• Dynamics of fluctuations in quantum simple exclusion processes

  Denis Bernard, Fabian H. L. Essler, Ludwig Hruza, Marko Medenjak

  SciPost Phys. 12, 042 (2022) · published 28 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We consider the dynamics of fluctuations in the quantum asymmetric simple exclusion process (Q-ASEP) with periodic boundary conditions. The Q-ASEP describes a chain of spinless fermions with random hoppings that are induced by a Markovian environment. We show that fluctuations of the fermionic degrees of freedom obey evolution equations of Lindblad type, and derive the corresponding Lindbladians. We identify the underlying algebraic structure by mapping them to non-Hermitian spin chains and demonstrate that the operator space fragments into exponentially many (in system size) sectors that are invariant under time evolution. At the level of quadratic fluctuations we consider the Lindbladian on the sectors that determine the late time dynamics for the particular case of the quantum symmetric simple exclusion process (Q-SSEP). We show that the corresponding blocks in some cases correspond to known Yang-Baxter integrable models and investigate the level-spacing statistics in others. We carry out a detailed analysis of the steady states and slow modes that govern the late time behaviour and show that the dynamics of fluctuations of observables is described in terms of closed sets of coupled linear differential-difference equations. The behaviour of the solutions to these equations is essentially diffusive but with relevant deviations, that at sufficiently late times and large distances can be described in terms of a continuum scaling limit which we construct. We numerically check the validity of this scaling limit over a significant range of time and space scales. These results are then applied to the study of operator spreading at large scales, focusing on out-of-time ordered correlators and operator entanglement.

  19 citations

• Surface-acoustic-wave-induced unconventional superconducting pairing

  Viktoriia Kornich

  SciPost Phys. Core 5, 005 (2022) · published 27 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Unconventional superconductivity is usually associated with symmetry breaking in the system. Here we consider a simple setup consisting of a solid state material with conduction electrons and an applied surface acoustic wave (SAW), that can break time and spatial translation symmetries. We study the symmetries of the possible SAW-induced order parameters, showing that even-frequency spin-triplet odd-parity order parameter can occur. We suggest different methods of how to engineer the symmetries of the order parameters using SAWs and the applications of such setups.

  2 citations

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

  Á. Bácsi, C. P. Moca, G. Zaránd, B. Dóra

  SciPost Phys. Core 5, 004 (2022) · published 27 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  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 $-\gamma t|x|\Delta^2$ where $\gamma$ and $\Delta$ 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.

  4 citations

• Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless transition transport in spin-triplet superconductor

  Suk Bum Chung, Se Kwon Kim

  SciPost Phys. Core 5, 003 (2022) · published 27 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  As the spin-triplet superconductivity arises from the condensation of spinful Cooper pairs, its full characterization requires not only charge ordering, but also spin ordering. For a two-dimensional (2D) easy-plane spin-triplet superconductor, this naively seems to suggest the possibility of two distinct Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) phase transitions, one in the charge sector and the other in the spin sector. However, it has been recognized that there are actually three possible BKT transitions, involving the deconfinement of, respectively, the conventional vortices, the merons and the half-quantum vortices with vorticity in both the charge and the spin current. By considering equal-spin-pairing spin-triplet superconductors with bulk spin degeneracy, we show how all the transitions can be characterized by the relation between the voltage drop and the spin-polarized current bias. This study reveals that, due to the hitherto unexamined transport of half-quantum vortices, there is an upper bound on the spin supercurrent in a quasi-long range ordered spin-triplet superconductor, which provides a means for half-quantum vortex detection via transport measurements and deeper understanding of fluctuation effects in superconductor-based spintronic devices.

  6 citations

• Towards quantifying information flows: relative entropy in deep neural networks and the renormalization group

  Johanna Erdmenger, Kevin T. Grosvenor, Ro Jefferson

  SciPost Phys. 12, 041 (2022) · published 26 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We investigate the analogy between the renormalization group (RG) and deep neural networks, wherein subsequent layers of neurons are analogous to successive steps along the RG. In particular, we quantify the flow of information by explicitly computing the relative entropy or Kullback-Leibler divergence in both the one- and two-dimensional Ising models under decimation RG, as well as in a feedforward neural network as a function of depth. We observe qualitatively identical behavior characterized by the monotonic increase to a parameter-dependent asymptotic value. On the quantum field theory side, the monotonic increase confirms the connection between the relative entropy and the c-theorem. For the neural networks, the asymptotic behavior may have implications for various information maximization methods in machine learning, as well as for disentangling compactness and generalizability. Furthermore, while both the two-dimensional Ising model and the random neural networks we consider exhibit non-trivial critical points, the relative entropy appears insensitive to the phase structure of either system. In this sense, more refined probes are required in order to fully elucidate the flow of information in these models.

  17 citations

• Liberating confinement from Lagrangians: 1-form symmetries and lines in 4d N=1 from 6d N=(2,0)

  Lakshya Bhardwaj, Max Hübner, Sakura Schäfer-Nameki

  SciPost Phys. 12, 040 (2022) · published 26 January 2022 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study confinement in 4d N=1 theories obtained by deforming 4d N=2 theories of Class S. We argue that confinement in a vacuum of the N=1 theory is encoded in the 1-cycles of the associated N=1 curve. This curve is the spectral cover associated to a generalized Hitchin system describing the profiles of two Higgs fields over the Riemann surface upon which the 6d (2,0) theory is compactified. Using our method, we reproduce the expected properties of confinement in various classic examples, such as 4d N=1 pure Super-Yang-Mills theory and the Cachazo-Seiberg-Witten setup. More generally, this work can be viewed as providing tools for probing confinement in non-Lagrangian N=1 theories, which we illustrate by constructing an infinite class of non-Lagrangian N=1 theories that contain confining vacua. The simplest model in this class is an N=1 deformation of the N=2 theory obtained by gauging $SU(3)^3$ flavor symmetry of the $E_6$ Minahan-Nemeschansky theory.

  25 citations