Numerical properties of staggered overlap fermions
Philippe de Forcrand, Aleksi Kurkela, Marco Panero
备注：
7 pages, Contribution presented at The XXVIII International Symposium on Lattice Field Theory, Lattice2010, June 14-19, 2010, Villasimius, Italy; v2: added acknowledgement
We report the results of a numerical study of staggered overlap fermions, following the construction of Adams which reduces the number of tastes from 4 to 2 without fine-tuning. We study the sensitivity of the operator to the topology of the gauge field, its locality and its robustness to fluctuations of the gauge field. We make a first estimate of the computing cost of a quark propagator calculation, and compare with Neuberger's overlap.
We measure the low lying eigenmodes of an overlap Dirac operator on 2--flavor staggered configurations. By comparing the eigenmode distribution to the predictions of Random Matrix Theory we test to what accuracy staggered configurations describe continuum QCD. The agreement between the numerical data and RMT implies that at our quark mass values the lattice artifacts of the staggered configurations are comparable to overlap configurations. We identify the overlap valence mass that best matches the staggered sea quarks and predict the value of the infinite volume 2-flavor chiral condensate.
We investigate the validity of the square rooting procedure of the staggered determinant in the context of the Schwinger model. We find some evidence that at fixed physical quark mass the square root of the staggered determinant becomes proportional to the overlap determinant in the continuum limit. We also find that at fixed lattice spacing moderate smearing dramatically improves the chiral behavior of staggered fermions.
We perform a comparative study of the infrared properties of overlap and staggered fermions in QCD. We observe that the infrared spectrum of the APE/HYP improved staggered Dirac operator develops a four-fold near-degeneracy and is in quantitative agreement with the infrared spectrum of the overlap operator. The near-degeneracy allows us to identify the zero modes of the staggered operator and we find that the number of zero modes is in line with the topological index of the overlap operator.
We give an explicit proof for the locality of staggered overlap operators. The proof covers the original two flavor construction by Adams as well as a single flavor version. As in the case of Neuberger's operator, an admissibility condition for the gauge fields is required.
We present exploratory results for the hadron mass spectrum and pseudoscalar meson decay constants using mixed actions. We use improved staggered sea quarks and HYP-smeared overlap valence quarks. We obtain good signals on 10 configurations at one lattice spacing and two different sets of sea quark masses.
Evaluation of the continuum limit of the axial anomaly and index is sketched for the staggered overlap Dirac operator. There are new complications compared to the usual overlap case due to the distribution of the spin and flavor components around lattice hypercubes in the staggered formalism. The index is found to correctly reproduce the continuum index, but for the axial anomaly this is only true after averaging over the sites of a lattice hypercube.
We present a scaling analysis in the 1-flavor Schwinger model with the full overlap and the rooted staggered determinant. In the latter case the chiral and continuum limit of the scalar condensate do not commute, while for overlap fermions they do. For the topological susceptibility a universal continuum limit is suggested, as is for the partition function and the Leutwyler-Smilga sum rule. In the heavy-quark force no difference is visible even at finite coupling. Finally, a direct comparison between the complete overlap and the rooted staggered determinant yields evidence that their ratio is …
We study the scalar condensate and the topological susceptibility for a continuous range of quark masses in the Schwinger model with $N_f=0,1,2$ dynamical flavors, using both the overlap and the staggered discretization. At finite lattice spacing the differences between the two formulations become rather dramatic near the chiral limit, but they get severely reduced, at the coupling considered, after a few smearing steps.
The 2+1d Gross-Neveu model with finite density and finite temperature are studied by the staggered fermion discretization. The kinetic part of this staggered fermion in momentum space is used to build the relation between the staggered fermion and Wilson-like fermion. In the large Nf limit (the number Nf of staggered fermion flavors), the chiral condensate and fermion density are solved from the gap equation in momentum space, and thus the phase diagram of fermion coupling, temperature and chemical potential are obtained. Moreover, an analytic formula for the inverse of the staggered fermion m…
We investigate the continuum limit of the rooted staggered determinant in the 2-dimensional Schwinger model. We match both the unrooted and rooted staggered determinant with an overlap fermion determinant of two (one) flavors and a local pure gauge effective action by fitting the coefficients of the effective action and the mass of the overlap operator. The residue of this fit measures the difference of the staggered and overlap fermion actions. We show that this residue scales at least as O(a^2), implying that any difference, be it local or non-local, between the staggered and overlap actions…
We investigate the continuum limit of the rooted staggered action in the 2-dimensional Schwinger model. We match both the unrooted and rooted staggered determinants with an overlap fermion determinant of two (one) flavors and a local pure gauge effective action by fitting the coefficients of the effective action and the mass of the overlap operator. The residue of this fit measures the difference of the staggered and overlap fermion actions. We show that this residue scales at least as O(a^2), implying that any difference, be it local or non-local, between the staggered and overlap actions bec…
An explanation is proposed for the fact that Lepage--Mackenzie tadpole improvement does not work well for staggered fermions. The idea appears to work for all renormalization constants which appear in the staggered fermion self-energy. Wilson fermions are also discussed.
We discuss the behavior of free perfect staggered fermions and truncated versions thereof. The study includes flavor non-degenerate masses. We suggest a new blocking scheme, which provides excellent locality of the perfect lattice action. A truncation procedure adequate for the structure of staggered fermions is applied. We consider spectral and thermodynamic properties and compare truncated perfect actions, Symanzik improved and standard staggered fermions in two and four dimensions.
Lattice fermion actions are constructed with path integrals which are equivalent to the free one-flavour staggered fermion determinant. The Dirac operators used are local and have an identical spectrum of states to the staggered theory. Operators obeying a generalised Ginsparg-Wilson relation are developed.
We present results for the pion multiplet spectrum calculated using both unimproved staggered fermions and improved HYP-smeared staggered fermions. In the case of unimproved staggered fermions, we observe (consistent with previous work) that ${\cal O}(a^2)$ taste symmetry breaking effects are large and comparable to the $\approx {\cal O}(p^2)$ contributions to their masses. Higher order ${\cal O}(a^2 p^2)$ effects are also substantial enough to be seen. For HYP-smeared staggered fermions, we find that taste breaking is much reduced. The ${\cal O}(a^2)$ effects are observable, but are noticeabl…
We construct a perfect lattice action for staggered fermions by blocking from the continuum. The locality, spectrum and pressure of such perfect staggered fermions are discussed. We also derive a consistent fixed point action for free gauge fields and discuss its locality as well as the resulting static quark-antiquark potential. This provides a basis for the construction of (classically) perfect lattice actions for QCD using staggered fermions.
We discuss the construction of a chiral random matrix model for staggered fermions. This model includes $O(a^2)$ corrections to the continuum limit of staggered fermions and is related to the zero momentum limit of the Lee-Sharpe Lagrangian for staggered fermions. The naive construction based on a specific expansion in lattice spacing ($a$) of the Dirac matrix produces the term which gives the dominant contribution to the observed taste splitting in the pion masses. A more careful analysis can include extra terms which are also consistent with the symmetries of staggered fermions. Lastly I wil…
We extend the construction of the Symanzik effective action to include rooted staggered fermions, starting from a generalization of the renormalization-group approach to rooted staggered fermions. The Symanzik action, together with the usual construction of a partially quenched chiral effective theory from a local, partially quenched, fundamental theory, can then be used to derive the chiral effective theory. The latter reproduces rooted staggered chiral perturbation theory.
Staggered fermions with 4 tastes are expected to describe 4-flavor QCD in the continuum limit, therefore at finite lattice spacing the staggered determinant should be equivalent to an SU(4) flavor-symmetric system up to lattice artifacts. This equivalence is the starting point of the 4th root trick used to reduce the number of fermion flavors and provides the only consistent description of 2 or 1 flavor systems. In this paper we argue that the quark mass of the underlying flavor symmetric theory differs from the staggered mass by an additive term due to the taste breaking of the staggered acti…
It is conventional wisdom that staggered fermions do not feel gauge field topology. However, the response of staggered fermion eigenmodes to the topology of the gauge field can depend quite sensitively on the way in which the staggered fermion action is improved. We study this issue using a variety of improved staggered quark actions. We observe that the separation between the ``would be'' zero modes and the non-chiral modes increases with the level of improvement. This enables the ``zero modes'' to be identified unambiguously. The distribution of the remaining non-chiral modes is compared wit…
We study possibility of improving staggered fermions using various fat links in order to reduce perturbative corrections to the gauge-invariant staggered fermion operators. We prove five theorems on SU(3) projection, triviality in renormalization, multiple SU(3) projections, uniqueness and equivalence. As a result of these theorems, we show that, at one loop level, the renormalization of staggered fermion operators is identical between SU(3) projected Fat7 links and hypercubic links, as long as the action and operators are constructed by imposing the same perturbative improvement condition. In…
Expanding upon the arguments of Sharpe, we explicitly implement the Symanzik improvement program demonstrating the absence of order $a$ terms in the staggered fermion action. We propose a general program to improve fermion operators to remove $O(a)$ corrections from their matrix elements, and demonstrate this program for the examples of matrix elements of fermion bilinears and $B_K$. We also determine the additional operators which must be added to improve the staggered fermion currents.
We have studied $O(a^2)$ improved lattice QCD with the staggered fermion by using Symanzik's program. We find that there are 5 dimension-6 fermion bilinears and gauge operators. In addition, there are 10 four-fermion operators which are absent at the tree-level and tadpole-improved tree-level.
We present preliminary results for $ε'/ε$ calculated using HYP staggered fermions in the quenched approximation. We compare different choices of quenched penguin operators.
The topological susceptibility of the vacuum in quantum chromodynamics has been simulated numerically using the Asqtad improved staggered fermion formalism. At nonzero lattice spacing the residual fermion doublers (fermion ``tastes'') in the staggered fermion formalism give contributions to the susceptibility that deviate from conventional continuum chiral perturbation theory. In this brief report we estimate the taste-breaking artifact and compare it with results of recent simulations, finding that it accounts for roughly half of the scaling violation.
We present a chronological review of the progress in calculating weak matrix elements using staggered fermions. We review the perturbative calculation of one-loop matching formula including both current-current diagrams and penguin diagrams using improved staggered fermions. We also present preliminary results of weak matrix elements relevant to CP violation calculated using the improved (HYP (II)) staggered fermions. Since the complete set of matching coefficients at the one-loop level became available recently, we have constructed lattice operators with all the $g^2$ corrections included. Th…
We present a new formulation of the staggered fermion on the D-dimensional lattice based on the SO(2D) Clifford algebra, which is naturally present in the action. The action of the massless staggered fermion is invariant under the discrete rotation and the SO(2D) chiral and other discrete transformations. From transformation properties of the fermion, we find two local meson operators (one scalar and one pseudoscalar) in addition to two standard meson operators.
We discuss the Schrödinger functional in lattice QCD with staggered fermions including its order $O(a)$ boundary counterterms. We relate it, in the classical continuum limit, to the Schrödinger functional as obtained in the same limit with Wilson fermions. We compute the strong coupling constant defined via the Schrödinger functional with staggered fermions at one loop and show that it agrees with the continuum running coupling constant in the Schrödinger functional formalism.
Staggered fermions with smeared links can have greatly improved chiral properties. In a recent paper we introduced a simple and effective method to simulate four flavors of staggered smeared link fermions. In this work we extend the four flavor method to two flavors. We define the two flavor action by the square root of the four flavor fermionic determinant and show that by using a polynomial approximation the two flavor action can be evaluated with the necessary accuracy. We test this method by studying the finite temperature phase structure with hypercubic smeared (HYP) link staggered action…
The legality of the "rooting trick" in dynamical staggered fermion simulations is discussed, i.e. whether the theory with the Boltzmann weight $\det^{1/4}(D_\mathrm{st})$ yields the right continuum limit. Since the problem is unsolved, pieces of evidence in favor and against are collected and examined.
The variational method is used widely for determining eigenstates of the QCD hamiltonian for actions with a conventional transfer matrix, e.g., actions with improved Wilson fermions. An alternative lattice fermion formalism, staggered fermions, does not have a conventional single-time-step transfer matrix. Nonetheless, with a simple modification, the variational method can also be applied to that formalism. In some cases the method also provides a mechanism for separating the commonly paired parity-partner states. We discuss the extension to staggered fermions and illustrate it by applying it …
We construct domain wall fermions with a staggered kernel and investigate their spectral and chiral properties numerically in the Schwinger model. In some relevant cases we see an improvement of chirality by more than an order of magnitude as compared to usual domain wall fermions. Moreover, we present first results for four-dimensional quantum chromodynamics, where we also observe significant reductions of chiral symmetry violations for staggered domain wall fermions.
A new formulation of chiral fermions on the lattice is presented. It is a version of overlap fermions, but built from the computationally efficient staggered fermions rather than the previously used Wilson fermions. The construction reduces the four quark flavors described by the staggered fermion to two quark flavors; this pair can be taken as the up and down quarks in Lattice QCD. The exact flavored chiral symmetry of the staggered fermion gets converted into an unflavored Ginsparg-Wilson chiral symmetry of the new overlap fermion, which also has pairs of exact chiral zero-modes satisfying t…
We study strong-coupling lattice QCD with staggered-Wilson fermions, with emphasis on discrete symmetries and possibility of their spontaneous breaking. We perform hopping parameter expansion and effective potential analyses in the strong-coupling limit. From gap equations we find nonzero pion condensate in some range of a mass parameter, which indicates existence of the parity-broken phase in lattice QCD with staggered-Wilson fermions. We also find massless pions and PCAC relations around second-order phase boundary. These results suggest that we can take a chiral limit by tuning a mass param…
The spectral projectors method is a way to obtain a theoretically well posed definition of the topological susceptibility on the lattice. Up to now this method has been defined and applied only to Wilson fermions. The goal of this work is to extend the method to staggered fermions, giving a definition for the staggered topological susceptibility and testing it in the pure $SU(3)$ gauge theory. Besides, we also generalize the method to higher-order cumulants of the topological charge distribution.
Staggered Domain Wall Fermions (SDWF) combine the attractive chiral properties of staggered fermions with those of domain wall fermions. SDWF describe four flavors with exact U(1)xU(1) flavor chiral symmetry. An extra lattice dimension is introduced and the full SU(4)xSU(4) flavor chiral symmetry is recovered as its size is increased. Here, the free theory of SDWF is described and a preliminary discussion of the interacting case is presented. SDWF may be well suited for numerical simulation of lattice QCD thermodynamics.
We present a new method to introduce rotationally invariant terms in staggered fermions which is based on an $SO(2D)$ Clifford algebra formulation, where $D$ means the number of space-time dimensions. We have four candidates for improved mass terms that can split the degenerate mass of staggered fermions. Among them, we analyze three types of combinations and find only one case that can identify with the light single Dirac mode.
We present a new action for highly improved staggered fermions. We show that perturbative calculations for the new action are well-behaved where those of the conventional staggered action are badly behaved. We discuss the effects of the new terms in controlling flavor mixing, and discuss the design of operators for the action.
The phase diagram for staggered fermions is discussed in the context of the staggered chiral Lagrangian, extending previous work on the subject. When the discretization errors are significant, there may be an Aoki-like phase for staggered fermions, where the remnant SO(4) taste symmetry is broken down to SO(3). We solve explicitly for the mass spectrum in the 3-flavor degenerate mass case and discuss qualitatively the 2+1-flavor case. From numerical results we find that current simulations are outside the staggered Aoki phase. As for near-future simulations with more improved versions of the s…
We present results of the one-loop corrections originating from the penguin diagrams for the improved staggered fermion operators constructed using various fat links such as Fat7, Fat7+Lepage, $\bar{\rm Fat7}$, HYP (I) and HYP (II). The main results include the diagonal/off-diagonal mixing coefficients and the matching formula between the continuum and lattice operators.
The fourth root approximation in LQCD simulations with dynamical staggered fermions requires justification. We test its validity numerically in the interacting theory in a renormalization group framework.
We extend the spectral projectors method to staggered fermions. Applying the index theorem to the staggered Dirac operator it is possible to work out an expression for the topological susceptibility which depends only on the orthogonal projectors on quasi zero-modes, as it has already been done for Dirac-Wilson fermions. Besides, we generalize this method deriving analogous expressions for all higher-order coefficients in the $θ$-expansion of the vacuum energy.
We present results of the eigenvalue spectrum for the staggered Diräc operator obtained using a modified Lanczos algorithm. We identify zero modes and non-zero modes. We derive the chiral Ward identity derived from the conserved $U(1)_A$ symmetry, and check it numerically. This is the first step toward construction of an improved method to identify zero modes reliably with staggered fermions.
We discuss the impact of using one-loop matching on the calculation of $B_K$ using HYP-smeared improved staggered fermions. We give estimates of size of the truncation errors from the missing two-loop corrections.
We simulate $ SU(2) $ lattice gauge theory using dynamical reduced staggered fermions. The latter lead to two rather than four Dirac fermions in the continuum limit. We review the derivation and properties of reduced staggered fermions and show that in the case of fields in the fundamental representation of $SU(2)$ the theory does not exhibit a sign problem and can be simulated using the RHMC algorithm. We present results on lattices up to $16^4$ for a wide range of bare fermion masses. We find a single site condensate appears at strong coupling that spontaneously breaks the one global $U(1)$ …
One of the most serious problems of the staggered fermion lattice action is flavor symmetry violation. Smeared link staggered fermions can improve flavor symmetry by an order of magnitude relative to the standard thin link action. Over the last few years different smearing transformations have been proposed, both with perturbatively and non-perturbatively determined coefficients. What hindered the acceptance and more general use of smeared link fermions until now is the relative difficulty of dynamical simulations and the lack of perturbative calculations with these actions. In both areas ther…
We show how a strongly coupled lattice theory consisting of just fermions and gauge fields can exhibit a dynamical Higgs mechanism through the formation of a gauge invariant four fermion condensate. Furthermore, we argue that the resultant lattice Higgs phase may survive into the continuum limit.
At non-zero lattice spacing the flavor symmetry of staggered fermions is broken to a discrete subgroup. We show that in the chiral limit the flavor symmetry of the pion effective Lagrangian enlarges to an SO(4) subgroup of the continuum SU(4) symmetry. This provides an explanation for observed degeneracies in the pion spectrum.
The perfect action of free staggered fermions is calculated by blocking from the continuum for degenerate and non-degenerate flavor masses. The symmetry structure, connecting flavor transformations and translations, is explained directly from the blocking scheme. It is convenient to use a modified Fourier transformation, respecting this connection, to treat the spin-flavor structure of the blockspins. The perfect action remains local in the non-degenerate case; it is explicitly calculated in two dimensions. I finally comment on the relation of the blocking scheme to the transition from Dirac-K…
By using Symanzik's improvement program, we study on-shell improved lattice QCD with staggered fermions. We find that there are as many as 15 independent lattice operators of dimension of six~(including both gauge and fermion operators) which must be added to the unimproved action to form an $O(a^2)$ improved action. Among them, the total number of dimension-6 gauge operators and fermion bilinears is 5. The other 10 terms are four-fermion operators. At the tree-level and tadpole-improved tree-level, all the 10 four fermion operators are absent.
We address the locality problem arising in simulations, which take the square root of the staggered fermion determinant as a Boltzmann weight to reduce the number of dynamical quark tastes from four to two. We study analytically and numerically the square root of the staggered fermion operator as a candidate to define a two taste theory from first principles. Although it has the correct weight, this operator is non-local in the continuum limit. Our work serves as a warning that fundamental properties of field theories might be violated when employing blindly the square root trick. The question…
We present the first 2+1 flavour lattice QCD calculations of pseudoscalar flavour-singlet propagators using improved staggered fermions. We explore the relevant techniques and discuss prospects for the larger scale studies now in progress. The disconnected correlator is shown to have a highly non-Gaussian distribution and reliable estimates of the errors require care.
We introduce a class of improved actions for staggered fermions which to O(p^4) and O(p^6), respectively, lead to rotationally invariant propagators. We discuss the resulting reduction of flavour symmetry breaking in the meson spectrum and comment on the improvement in the calculation of thermodynamic observables.
