We propose and study a renormalization group transformation that can be used also for models with strong quenched disorder, like spin glasses. The method is based on a mapping between disorder distributions, chosen such as to keep some physical properties (e.g., the ratio of correlations averaged over the ensemble) invariant under the transformation. We validate this ensemble renormalization group by applying it to the hierarchical model (both the diluted ferromagnetic version and the spin glass version), finding results in agreement with Monte Carlo simulations.
In this thesis we investigate the Renormalization Group (RG) approach in finite-dimensional glassy systems, whose critical features are still not well-established, or simply unknown. We focus on spin and structural-glass models built on hierarchical lattices, which are the simplest non-mean-field systems where the RG framework emerges in a natural way. The resulting critical properties shed light on the critical behavior of spin and structural glasses beyond mean field, and suggest future directions for understanding the criticality of more realistic glassy systems.
The Ising and BEG models critical behavior is analyzed in 2D and 3D by means of a renormalization group scheme on small clusters made of a few lattice cells. Different kinds of cells are proposed for both ordered and disordered model cases. In particular, cells preserving a possible antiferromagnetic ordering under decimation allow for the determination of the Néel critical point and its scaling indices. These also provide more reliable estimates of the Curie fixed point than those obtained using cells preserving only the ferromagnetic ordering. In all studied dimensions, the present procedure…
We develop a scaling theory and a renormalization technique in the context of the modern theory of polarization. The central idea is to use the characteristic function (also known as the polarization amplitude) in place of the free energy in the scaling theory and in place of the Boltzmann probability in a position-space renormalization scheme. We derive a scaling relation between critical exponents which we test in a variety of models in one and two dimensions. We then apply the renormalization to disordered systems. In one dimension the renormalized disorder strength tends to infinity indica…
Using the simple procedure, recently introduced, of dividing Gaussian matrices by a positive random variable, a family of random matrices is generated characterized by a behavior ruled by the generalized hyperbolic distribution. The spectral density evolves from the semi-circle law to a Gaussian-like behavior while concomitantly the local fluctuations show a transition from the Wigner-Dyson to the Poisson statistics. Long range statistics such as number variance exhibit large fluctuations typical of non-ergodic ensembles.
We consider bosonic atoms with a repulsive contact interaction in a trap potential for a Bose-Einstein condensation and additionally include a random potential. The ensemble averages for two models of static and dynamic disorder are performed and investigated in parallel. The bosonic many body systems of the two disorder models are represented by coherent state path integrals on the Keldysh time contour which allow exact ensemble averages for zero and finite temperatures. These ensemble averages of coherent state path integrals therefore present alternatives to replica field theories or supers…
We calculate the free energy of the disordered urn model using the law of large numbers. It is revealed that the saddle point equation obtained by the usage of the law of large numbers is the same as that obtained by the replica method. Hence, we conclude that the replica symmetric solution is adequate for the disordered urn model. Furthermore, we point out the mathematical similarity of free energies between the urn models and the Random Field Ising Model; this similarity gives an evidence that the replica symmetric solution of the urn models is exact.
The real-space renormalization group (RG) treatment of random transverse-field Ising spin chains by Fisher ({\it Phys. Rev. B{\bf 51}, 6411 (1995)}) has been extended into the strongly ordered and strongly disordered Griffiths phases and asymptotically exact results are obtained. In the non-critical region the asymmetry of the renormalization of the couplings and the transverse fields is related to a non-linear quantum control parameter, $Δ$, which is a natural measure of the distance from the quantum critical point. $Δ$, which is found to stay invariant along the RG trajectories and has been …
Renormalization group on hierarchical lattices is often considered a valuable tool to understand the critical behavior of more complicated statistical mechanical models. In presence of quenched disorder, however, in many model cases predictions obtained with the Migdal-Kadanoff bond removal approach fail to quantitatively and qualitatively reproduce critical properties obtained in the mean-field approximation or by numerical simulations in finite dimensions. In order to critically review this limitation we analyze the behavior of Ising and Blume-Emery-Griffiths models on more complicated hiera…
The real-space renormalization procedures on hierarchical lattices have been much studied for many disordered systems in the past at the level of their typical fluctuations. In the present paper, the goal is to analyze instead the renormalization flows for the tails of probability distributions in order to extract the scalings of their large deviations and the tails behaviors of the corresponding rate functions. We focus on the renormalization rule for the ground-state energy of the Directed Polymer model in a random medium, and study the various renormalization flows that can emerge for the t…
We develop a real space renormalisation group analysis of disordered models of glasses, in particular of the spin models at the origin of the Random First Order Transition theory. We find three fixed points respectively associated to the liquid state, to the critical behavior and to the glass state. The latter two are zero-temperature ones; this provides a natural explanation of the growth of effective activation energy scale and the concomitant huge increase of relaxation time approaching the glass transition. The lower critical dimension depends on the nature of the interacting degrees of fr…
Here is the first part of the summary of my work on random Ising model using real-space renormalization group (RSRG), also known as a Migdal-Kadanoff one. This approximate renormalization scheme was applied to the analysis thermodynamic properties of the model, and of probabilistic properties of a pair correlator, which is a fluctuating object in disordered systems. PACS numbers: 02.50.-r, 05.20.-y, 05.70.Fh, 64.60.ae, 75.10.-b, 75.10.Hk, 87.10.+e Keywords: statistical physics, magnetism, spin glass, neural networks
In these proceedings, we discuss why functional renormalization is an essential tool to treat strongly disordered systems. More specifically, we treat elastic manifolds in a disordered environment. These are governed by a disorder distribution, which after a finite renormalization becomes non-analytic, thus overcoming the predictions of the seemingly exact dimensional reduction. We discuss how a renormalizable field theory can be constructed even beyond 2-loop order. We then consider an elastic manifold embedded in N dimensions, and give the exact solution for N to infinity. This is compared t…
We give a pedagogical introduction into the functional renormalization group treatment of disordered systems. After a review of its phenomenology, we show why in the context of disordered systems a functional renormalization group treatment is necessary, contrary to pure systems, where renormalization of a single coupling constant is sufficient. This leads to a disorder distribution, which after a finite renormalization becomes non-analytic, thus overcoming the predictions of the seemingly exact dimensional reduction. We discuss, how the non-analyticity can be measured in a simulation or exper…
We propose a tensor network method for investigating strongly disordered systems that is based on an adaptation of entanglement renormalization [G. Vidal, Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 220405 (2007)]. This method makes use of the strong disorder renormalization group to determine the order in which lattice sites are coarse-grained, which sets the overall structure of the corresponding tensor network ansatz, before optimization using variational energy minimization. Benchmark results from the disordered XXZ model demonstrates that this approach accurately captures ground state entanglement in disordered…
We show that in the regime when strong disorder is more relevant than field quantization the superfluid--to--Bose-glass criticality of one-dimensional bosons is preceded by the prolonged logarithmically slow classical-field renormalization flow of the superfluid stiffness at mesoscopic scales. With the system compressibility remaining constant, the quantum nature of the system manifests itself only in the renormalization of dilute weak links. On the insulating side, the flow ultimately reaches a value of the Luttinger parameter at which the instanton--anti-instanton pairs start to proliferate,…
Strong Disorder Renormalization Group Method for Bond Disordered Antiferromagnetic Quantum Spin Chains with Long Range Interactions: Ground State Properties
The Ma-Dasgupta real-space renormalization methods allow to study disordered systems which are governed by strong disorder fixed points. After a general introduction to the qualitative ideas and to the quantitative renormalization rules, we describe the explicit exact results that can be obtained in various one-dimensional models, either classical or quantum, either for dynamics or statics. The main part of this dissertation is devoted to statistical physics models, with special attention to (i) the off-equilibrium dynamics of a particle diffusing in a Brownian potential or in a trap landscape…
The effect of quenched disorder on the low-energy properties of various antiferromagnetic spin ladder models is studied by a numerical strong disorder renormalization group method and by density matrix renormalization. For strong enough disorder the originally gapped phases with finite topological or dimer order become gapless. In these quantum Griffiths phases the scaling of the energy, as well as the singularities in the dynamical quantities are characterized by a finite dynamical exponent, z, which varies with the strength of disorder. At the phase boundaries, separating topologically disti…
We examine the stability of magnetic order in a classical Heisenberg model with quenched random exchange couplings. This system represents the spin degrees of freedom in high-$T_\textrm{c}$ compounds with immobile dopants. Starting from a replica representation of the nonlinear $σ$-model, we perform a renormalization-group analysis. The importance of cumulants of the disorder distribution to arbitrarily high orders necessitates a functional renormalization scheme. From the renormalization flow equations we determine the magnetic correlation length numerically as a function of the impurity conc…
In this article, we study an elastic manifold in quenched disorder in the limit of zero temperature. Naively it is equivalent to a free theory with elasticity in Fourier-space proportional to k^4 instead of k^2, i.e. a model without disorder in two space-dimensions less. This phenomenon, called dimensional reduction, is most elegantly obtained using supersymmetry. However, scaling arguments suggest, and functional renormalization shows that dimensional reduction breaks down beyond the Larkin length. Thus one equivalently expects a break-down of supersymmetry. Using methods of functional renorm…
We numerically investigate statistical ensembles for the occupations of eigenstates of an isolated quantum system emerging as a result of quantum quenches. The systems investigated are sparse random matrix Hamiltonians and disordered lattices. In the former case, the quench consists of sudden switching-on the off-diagonal elements of the Hamiltonian. In the latter case, it is sudden switching-on of the hopping between adjacent lattice sites. The quench-induced ensembles are compared with the so-called "quantum micro-canonical" (QMC) ensemble describing quantum superpositions with fixed energy …
An asymmetric variant of the contact process where the activity spreads with different and independent random rates to the left and to the right is introduced. A real space renormalization scheme is formulated for model by means of which it is shown that the local asymmetry of spreading is irrelevant on large scales if the model is globally (statistically) symmetric. Otherwise, in the presence of a global bias in either direction, the renormalization method predicts two distinct phase transitions, which are related to the spreading of activity in and against the direction of the bias. The latt…
Using the recently introduced adaptive density-matrix renormalization-group method, we study the many spin-spin correlations of the spin-$1/2$ antiferromagnetic Heisenberg chain with random coupling constants, namely, the mean value of the bulk and of the end-to-end correlations, the typical value of the bulk correlations, and the distribution of the bulk correlations. Our results are in striking agreement with the predictions of the strong-disorder renormalization group method. We do not find any hint of logarithmic corrections neither in the bulk average correlations, which were recently rep…
We study the disordered XYZ spin chain using the recently developed Spectrum Bifurcation Renormalization Group (SBRG) numerical method. With strong disorder, the phase diagram consists of three many body localized (MBL) spin glass phases. We argue that, with sufficiently strong disorder, these spin glass phases are separated by marginally many-body localized (MBL) critical lines. We examine the critical lines of this model by measuring the entanglement entropy and Edwards-Anderson spin glass order parameter, and find that the critical lines are characterized by an effective central charge c'=l…
To describe the equilibrium properties of disordered systems and the possible emergence of various 'phases' at low temperature, we adopt here the 'broken ergodicity' point of view advocated in particular by Palmer [Adv. Phys. 31, 669 (1982)] : the aim is then to construct the valleys of configurations that become separated by diverging barriers and to study their relative weights, as well as their internal properties. To characterize the slow non-equilibrium dynamics of disordered systems, we have recently introduced in [C. Monthus and T. Garel, J. Phys. A 41, 255002 (2008) and arxiv:0804.1847…
In the paper [Angelini M C, Parisi G, and Ricci-Tersenghi F, Ensemble renormalization group for disordered systems, Phys. Rev. B 87 134201 (2013)] we introduced a real-space renormalization group called Ensemble Renormalization Group (ERG) and we applied it to the Edwards-Anderson model, obtaining estimates for the critical exponents in good agreement with those from Monte Carlo simulations. Recently the paper [Castellana M, Real-space renormalization-group methods for hierarchical spin glasses, J. Phys. A: Math. Theor. 52 445002 (2019)] re-examined the ERG method from a different perspective,…
The Renormalization Group (RG) methods are still far from being completely understood in quenched disordered systems. In order to gain insight into the nature of the phase transition of these systems, it is common to investigate simple models. In this work we study a real-space RG transformation on the Dyson hierarchical lattice with a random field, which led to a reconstruction of the RG flow and to an evaluation of the critical exponents of the model at T = 0. We show that this method gives very accurate estimations of the critical exponents, by comparing our results with the ones obtained b…
We compute the distribution of the number of negative eigenvalues (the index) for an ensemble of Gaussian random matrices, by means of the replica method. This calculation has important applications in the context of statistical mechanics of disordered systems, where the second derivative of the potential energy (the Hessian) is a random matrix whose negative eigenvalues measure the degree of instability of the energy surface. An analysis of the probability distribution of the Hessian index is therefore relevant for a geometric characterization of the energy landscape in disordered systems. Th…
Strong Disorder Renormalization Group Method for Bond Disordered Antiferromagnetic Quantum Spin Chains with Long Range Interactions: Excited States and Finite Temperature Properties
Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems（马克斯·普朗克复杂系统物理研究所）；Constructor University（Constructor大学）
We develop a dynamical approach based on the Schwinger-Keldysh formalism to derive a field-theoretic description of disordered and interacting electron systems. We calculate within this formalism the perturbative RG equations for interacting electrons expanded around a diffusive Fermi liquid fixed point, as obtained originally by Finkelstein using replicas. The major simplifying feature of this approach, as compared to Finkelstein's is that instead of $N \to 0$ replicas, we only need to consider N=2 species. We compare the dynamical Schwinger-Keldysh approach and the replica methods, and we pr…
In contrast to standard critical phenomena, disordered systems need to be treated via the Functional Renormalization Group. The latter leads to a coarse grained disorder landscape, which after a finite renormalization becomes non-analytic, thus overcoming the predictions of the seemingly exact dimensional reduction. We review recent progress on how the non-analytic effective action can be measured both in simulations and experiments, and confront theory with numerical work.
The statistical properties of ensemble of disordered 1D steric spin-chains (SSC) of various length are investigated. Using 1D spin-glass type classical Hamiltonian, the recurrent trigonometrical equations for stationary points and corresponding conditions for the construction of stable 1D SSCs are found. The ideal ensemble of spin-chains is analyzed and the latent interconnections between random angles and interaction constants for each set of three nearest-neighboring spins are found. It is analytically proved and by numerical calculation is shown that the interaction constant satisfies Lévy'…
Recent renormalization group results predict non self averaging behaviour at criticality for relevant disorder. However, we find strong self averaging(SA) behaviour in the critical region of a quenched Ising model on an ensemble of small-world networks, despite the relevance of the random bonds at the pure critical point.
We derive a quantum master equation which describes the dynamics of the ensemble-averaged state of homogeneous disorder models at short times, and mediates a transition from coherent superpositions into classical mixtures. While each single realization follows unitary dynamics, this decoherencelike behavior arises as a consequence of the ensemble average. The master equation manifestly reflects the translational invariance of the disorder correlations and allows us to relate the disorder-induced dynamics to a collisional decoherence process, where the disorder correlations determine the spatia…
This is the first of a series of three articles that treats fracture localization as a critical phenomenon. This first article establishes a statistical mechanics based on ensemble averages when fluctuations through time play no role in defining the ensemble. Ensembles are obtained by dividing a huge rock sample into many mesoscopic volumes. Because rocks are a disordered collection of grains in cohesive contact, we expect that once shear strain is applied and cracks begin to arrive in the system, the mesoscopic volumes will have a wide distribution of different crack states. These mesoscopic …
Motivated by the compound ${\rm LiHo}_x{\rm Y}_{1-x}{\rm F}_4$, we consider the Ising chain with random couplings and in the presence of simultaneous random transverse and longitudinal fields, and study its low-energy properties at zero temperature by the strong disorder renormalization group approach. In the absence of longitudinal fields, the system exhibits a quantum-ordered and a quantum-disordered phase separated by a critical point of infinite disorder. When the longitudinal random field is switched on, the ordered phase vanishes and the trajectories of the renormalization group are attr…
We consider the non-equilibrium dynamics of disordered systems as defined by a master equation involving transition rates between configurations (detailed balance is not assumed). To compute the important dynamical time scales in finite-size systems without simulating the actual time evolution which can be extremely slow, we propose to focus on first-passage times that satisfy 'backward master equations'. Upon the iterative elimination of configurations, we obtain the exact renormalization rules that can be followed numerically. To test this approach, we study the statistics of some first-pass…
The ground state of interacting particles on a disordered one-dimensional host-lattice is studied by a direct numerical method. It is shown that if the concentration of particles is small, then even a weak disorder of the host-lattice breaks the long-range order of Generalized Wigner Crystal, replacing it by the sequence of blocks (domains) of particles with random lengths. The mean domains length as a function of the host-lattice disorder parameter is also found. It is shown that the domain structure can be detected by a weak random field, whose form is similar to that of the ground state but…
We study the wetting transition and the directed polymer delocalization transition on diamond hierarchical lattices.These two phase transitions with frozen disorder correspond to the critical points of quadratic renormalizations of the partition function.(These exact renormalizations on diamond lattices can also be considered as approximate Migdal-Kadanoff renormalizations for hypercubic lattices). In terms of the rescaled partition function $z=Z/Z_{typ}$,we find that the critical point corresponds to a fixed point distribution with a power-law tail $P_c(z) \sim Φ(\ln z)/z^{1+μ}$ as $z \to +\i…
We investigate S=1 antiferromagnetic quantum spin chain, whose exchange couplings are strongly disordered. By the real-space renomalization group method, introduced by Ma, Dasgupta, and Hu, the renormalization group flows are analyzed numerically in a plain of the anisotoropy of the exchange coupling vs. the staggered magnetic field. As the result, the Heisenberg point, which has a zero average of the exchange coupling anisotropy, is specified as the unstable fixed point against the anisotropy.
A renormalization group transformation suitable for spin glass models and, more generally, for disordered models, is presented. The procedure is non-standard in both the nature of the additional interactions and the coarse graining transformation, that is performed on the overlap probability measure (which is clearly non-Gibbsian). Universality classes are thus naturally defined on a large set of models, going from $\Z_2$ and Gaussian spin glasses to Ising and fully frustrated models, and others.
We employ the fermionic and bosonic replicated nonlinear sigma models to treat Ginibre unitary, symplectic, and orthogonal ensembles of non-Hermitian random matrix Hamiltonians. Using saddle point approach combined with Borel resummation procedure we derive the exact large-N results for microscopic density of states in all three ensembles. We also obtain tails of the density of states as well the two-point function for the unitary ensemble.
The infrared behaviour of a non-mean field spin-glass system is analysed, and the critical exponent related to the divergence of the correlation length is computed at two loops within the epsilon-expansion technique with two independent methods. Both methods yield the same result confirming that the infrared behaviour of the theory if well-defined and the underlying ideas of the Renormalization Group hold also in such non-mean field disordered model. By pushing such calculation to high orders in epsilon, a consistent and predictive non-mean field theory for such disordered system could be esta…
This brief review introduces the method and application of real-space renormalization group to strongly disordered quantum systems. The focus is on recent applications of the strong disorder renormalization group to the physics of disordered-boson systems and the superfluid-insulator transition in one dimension. The fact that there is also a well understood weak disorder theory for this problem allows to illustrate what aspects of the physics change at strong disorder. In particular the strong disorder RG analysis suggests that the transitions at weak disorder and strong disorder belong to dis…
We present an asymptotically exact renormalization-group theory of the superfluid--insulator transition in one-dimensional disordered systems, with emphasis on an accurate description of the interplay between the Giamarchi--Schulz (instanton--anti-instanton) and weak-link (scratched-XY) criticalities. Combining the theory with extensive quantum Monte Carlo simulations allows us to shed new light on the ground-state phase diagram of the one-dimensional disordered Bose-Hubbard model at unit filling.
We consider the effect of quenched spatial disorder on systems of interacting, pinned non-Abelian anyons as might arise in disordered Hall samples at filling fractions ν=5/2 or ν=12/5. In one spatial dimension, such disordered anyon models have previously been shown to exhibit a hierarchy of infinite randomness phases. Here, we address systems in two spatial dimensions and report on the behavior of Ising and Fibonacci anyons under the numerical strong-disorder renormalization group (SDRG). In order to manage the topology-dependent interactions generated during the flow, we introduce a planar a…
We extend the analysis of the conductance fluctuations in disordered metals by Altshuler, Kravtsov, and Lerner (AKL) to disordered superconductors with broken time-reversal symmetry in $d=(2+ε)$ dimensions (symmetry classes C and D of Altland and Zirnbauer). Using a perturbative renormalization group analysis of the corresponding non-linear sigma model (NL$σ$M) we compute the anomalous scaling dimensions of the dominant scalar operators with $2s$ gradients to one-loop order. We show that, in analogy with the result of AKL for ordinary, metallic systems (Wigner-Dyson classes), an infinite numbe…
We develop a supersymmetric virial expansion for two point correlation functions of almost diagonal Gaussian Random Matrix Ensembles (ADRMT) of the orthogonal symmetry. These ensembles have multiple applications in physics and can be used to study universal properties of time-reversal invariant disordered systems which are either insulators or close to the Anderson localization transition. We derive a two-level contribution to the correlation functions of the generic ADRMT and apply these results to the critical (multifractal) power law banded ADRMT. Analytical results are compared with numeri…
Random impedance networks are widely used as a model to describe plasmon resonances in disordered metal-dielectric and other two-component nanocomposites. In the present work, the spectral properties of resonances in random networks are studied within the framework of the random matrix theory. We have shown that the appropriate ensemble of random matrices for the considered problem is the Jacobi ensemble (the MANOVA ensemble). The obtained analytical expressions for the density of states in such resonant networks show a good agreement with the results of numerical simulations in a wide range o…
Our general interest is in self-consistent-field (scf) theories of disordered fermions. They generate physically relevant sub-ensembles ("scf-ensembles") within a given Altland-Zirnbauer class. We are motivated to investigate such ensembles (i) by the possibility to discover new fixed points due to (long-range) interactions; (ii) by analytical scf-theories that rely on partial self-consistency approximations awaiting a numerical validation; (iii) by the overall importance of scf-theories for the understanding of complex interaction-mediated phenomena in terms of effective single-particle pictu…
We investigate thermalization dynamics of a driven dipolar many-body quantum system through the stability of discrete time crystalline order. Using periodic driving of electronic spin impurities in diamond, we realize different types of interactions between spins and demonstrate experimentally that the interplay of disorder, driving and interactions leads to several qualitatively distinct regimes of thermalization. For short driving periods, the observed dynamics are well described by an effective Hamiltonian which sensitively depends on interaction details. For long driving periods, the syste…
We show that an appropriate description of the non-equilibrium dynamics of disordered systems is obtained through a strong disorder renormalization procedure in {\it configuration space}, that we define for any master equation with transitions rates $W ({\cal C} \to {\cal C}')$ between configurations. The idea is to eliminate iteratively the configuration with the highest exit rate $W_{out} ({\cal C})= \sum_{{\cal C}'} W ({\cal C} \to {\cal C}')$ to obtain renormalized transition rates between the remaining configurations. The multiplicative structure of the new generated transition rates sugg…
We provide and study complete sets of one-loop renormalization group equations of several Finkel'stein non-linear $σ$-models, the effective field theories describing the diffusive quantum fluctuations in correlated disordered systems. We consider different cases according to the presence of certain symmetries induced by the original random Hamiltonians, and we show that, for interacting systems, the Cartan's classification of symmetry classes is not enough to uniquely determine their scaling behaviors.
A field-theoretic description of the critical behavior of weakly disordered systems with a $p$-component order parameter is given. For systems of an arbitrary dimension in the range from three to four, a renormalization group analysis of the effective replica Hamiltonian of the model with an interaction potential without replica symmetry is given in the two-loop approximation. For the case of the one-step replica symmetry breaking, fixed points of the renormalization group equations are found using the Pade-Borel summing technique. For every value $p$, the threshold dimensions of the system th…
We study the level-statistics of a disordered system undergoing the Anderson type metal-insulator transition. The disordered Hamiltonian is a sparse random matrix in the site representation and the statistics is obtained by taking an ensemble of such matrices. It is shown that the transition of levels due to change of various parameters e.g. disorder, system size, hopping rate can be mapped to the perturbation driven evolution of the eigenvalues of an ensemble subjected to Wigner-Dyson type perturbation with an initial state given by a Poisson ensemble; the mapping is then used to obtain desir…
