We study the nature of the essential spectrum of the Dirichlet Laplacian in tubes about infinite curves embedded in Euclidean spaces. Under suitable assumptions about the decay of curvatures at infinity, we prove the absence of singular continuous spectrum and state properties of possible embedded eigenvalues. The argument is based on Mourre conjugate operator method developed for acoustic multistratified domains by Benbernou and Dermenjian et al. As a technical preliminary, we carry out a spectral analysis for Schrodinger-type operators in straight Dirichlet tubes. We also apply the result to the strips embedded in abstract surfaces.
The spectrum of the Laplace operator in a curved strip of constant width built along an infinite plane curve, subject to three different types of boundary conditions (Dirichlet, Neumann and a combination of these ones, respectively), is investigated. We prove that the essential spectrum as a set is stable under any curvature of the reference curve which vanishes at infinity and find various sufficient conditions which guarantee the existence of geometrically induced discrete spectrum. Furthermore, we derive a lower bound on the distance between the essential spectrum and the spectral threshold…
In this paper we study the influence of an electric field on a two dimen-sional waveguide. We show that bound states that occur under a geometrical deformation of the guide turn into resonances when we apply an electric field of small intensity having a nonzero component on the longitudinal direction of the system. MSC-2010 number: 35B34,35P25, 81Q10, 82D77.
We consider the negative Dirichlet Laplacian on an infinite waveguide embedded in $\RR^2$, and finite segments thereof. The waveguide is a perturbation of a periodic strip in terms of a sequence of independent identically distributed random variables which influence the curvature. We derive explicit lower bounds on the first eigenvalue of finite segments of the randomly curved waveguide in the small coupling (i.e. weak disorder) regime. This allows us to estimate the probability of low lying eigenvalues, a tool which is relevant in the context of Anderson localization for random Schrödinger op…
The interplay among the spectrum, geometry and magnetic field in tubular neighbourhoods of curves in Euclidean spaces is investigated in the limit when the cross section shrinks to a point. Proving a norm resolvent convergence, we derive effective, lower-dimensional models which depend on the intensity of the magnetic field and curvatures. The results are used to establish complete asymptotic expansions for eigenvalues. Spectral stability properties based on Hardy-type inequalities induced by magnetic fields are also analysed.
The Dirichlet Laplacian in a curved three-dimensional tube built along a spatial (bounded or unbounded) curve is investigated in the limit when the uniform cross-section of the tube diminishes. Both deformations due to bending and twisting of the tube are considered. We show that the Laplacian converges in a norm-resolvent sense to the well known one-dimensional Schroedinger operator whose potential is expressed in terms of the curvature of the reference curve, the twisting angle and a constant measuring the asymmetry of the cross-section. Contrary to previous results, we allow the reference c…
We consider the Dirichlet Laplacian with uniform magnetic field on a curved strip in two dimensions. We give a sufficient condition ensuring the existence of the discrete spectrum in the strong magnetic field limit.
We investigate the influence of an electric field on trapped modes arising in a two-dimensional curved quantum waveguide ${\bf Ω}$ i.e. bound states of the corresponding Laplace operator $-Δ\_{\bf Ω}$. Here the curvature of the guide is supposed to satisfy some assumptions of analyticity, and decays as $O(|s|^{-\varepsilon}), \varepsilon > 3$ at infinity. We show that under conditions on the electric field $ \bf F$, ${\bf H}(F):= -Δ\_{\bf Ω} + {\bf F}. {\bf x} $ has resonances near the discrete eigenvalues of $-Δ\_{\bf Ω}$.
We investigate properties of a particle confined to a hard-wall spiral-shaped region. As a case study we analyze in detail the Archimedean spiral for which the spectrum above the continuum threshold is absolutely continuous away from the thresholds. The subtle difference between the radial and perpendicular width implies, however, that in contrast to `less curved' waveguides, the discrete spectrum is empty in this case. We also discuss modifications such a multi-arm Archimedean spirals and spiral waveguides with a central cavity; in the latter case bound state already exist if the cavity excee…
We consider the waveguide modelled by a $n$-dimensional infinite tube. The operator we study is the Dirichlet Laplacian perturbed by two distant perturbations. The perturbations are described by arbitrary abstract operators ''localized'' in a certain sense, and the distance between their ''supports'' tends to infinity. We study the asymptotic behaviour of the discrete spectrum of such system. The main results are a convergence theorem and the asymptotics expansions for the eigenvalues. The asymptotic behaviour of the associated eigenfunctions is described as well. We also provide some particul…
We study the essential spectra of formally self-adjoint elliptic systems on doubly periodic planar domains perturbed by a semi-infinite periodic row of foreign inclusions. We show that the essential spectrum of the problem consists of the essential spectrum of the purely periodic problem and another component, which is the union of the discrete spectra of model problems in the infinite perturbation strip; these model problems arise by an application of the partial Floquet-Bloch-Gelfand transform.
We consider the Dirichlet Laplacian in tubular neighbourhoods of complete non-compact Riemannian manifolds immersed in the Euclidean space. We show that the essential spectrum coincides with the spectrum of a planar tube provided that the second fundamental form of the manifold vanishes at infinity and the transport of the cross-section along the manifold is asymptotically parallel. For low dimensions and codimensions, the result applies to the location of propagating states in nanostructures under physically natural conditions.
We develop an abstract method to identify spectral points of definite type in the spectrum of the operator $T_1\otimes I_2 + I_1\otimes T_2$. The method is applicable in particular for non-self-adjoint waveguide type operators with symmetries. Using the remarkable properties of the spectral points of definite type, we obtain new results on realness of weakly coupled bound states and of low lying essential spectrum in the $\mathcal{P}\mathcal{T}$-symmetric waveguide. Moreover, we show that the pseudospectrum has a normal tame behavior near the low lying essential spectrum and exclude the accumu…
We consider the Laplacian in a curved two-dimensional strip of constant width squeezed between two curves, subject to Dirichlet boundary conditions on one of the curves and variable Robin boundary conditions on the other. We prove that, for certain types of Robin boundary conditions, the spectral threshold of the Laplacian is estimated from below by the lowest eigenvalue of the Laplacian in a Dirichlet-Robin annulus determined by the geometry of the strip. Moreover, we show that an appropriate combination of the geometric setting and boundary conditions leads to a Hardy-type inequality in infi…
We consider a planar waveguide with combined Dirichlet and Neumann conditions imposed in a "twisted" way. We study the discrete spectrum and describe it dependence on the configuration of the boundary conditions. In particular, we show that in certain cases the model can have discrete eigenvalues emerging from the threshold of the essential spectrum. We give a criterium for their existence and construct them as convergent holomorphic series.
We consider the Laplacian in a tubular neighbourhood of a hyperplane subjected to non-self-adjoint $\mathcal{PT}$-symmetric Robin boundary conditions. Its spectrum is found to be purely essential and real for constant boundary conditions. The influence of the perturbation in the boundary conditions on the threshold of the essential spectrum is studied using the Birman-Schwinger principle. Our aim is to derive a sufficient condition for existence, uniqueness and reality of discrete eigenvalues. We show that discrete spectrum exists when the perturbation acts in the mean against the unperturbed …
We introduce a planar waveguide of constant width with non-Hermitian PT-symmetric Robin boundary conditions. We study the spectrum of this system in the regime when the boundary coupling function is a compactly supported perturbation of a homogeneous coupling. We prove that the essential spectrum is positive and independent of such perturbation, and that the residual spectrum is empty. Assuming that the perturbation is small in the supremum norm, we show that it gives rise to real weakly-coupled eigenvalues converging to the threshold of the essential spectrum. We derive sufficient conditions …
We consider the spectrum of a Schroedinger operator in a multi-dimensional cylinder perturbed by a shrinking potential. We study the phenomenon of a new eigenvalue emerging from the threshold of the essential spectrum and give the sufficient conditions for such eigenvalues to emerge. If such eigenvalues exist, we construct their asymptotic expansions.
We investigate whether a second order Wick polynomial T of a free scalar field, including derivatives, is essentially self-adjoint on the natural (Wightman) domain in a quasi-free (i.e. Fock space) Hadamard representation. We restrict our attention to the case where T is smeared with a test-function from a particular class S, namely the class of sums of squares of testfunctions. This class of smearing functions is smaller than the class of all non-negative testfunctions -- a fact which follows from Hilbert's Theorem. Exploiting the microlocal spectrum condition we prove that T is essentially s…
The Laplace operator in infinite quantum waveguides (e.g., a bent strip or a twisted tube) often has a point-like eigenvalue below the essential spectrum that corresponds to a trapped eigenmode of finite L2 norm. We revisit this statement for resonators with long but finite branches that we call "finite waveguides". Although now there is no essential spectrum and all eigenfunctions have finite L2 norm, the trapping can be understood as an exponential decay of the eigenfunction inside the branches. We describe a general variational formalism for detecting trapped modes in such resonators. For f…
Motivated by the theory of quantum waveguides, we investigate the spectrum of the Laplacian, subject to Dirichlet boundary conditions, in a curved strip of constant width that is defined as a tubular neighbourhood of an infinite curve in a two-dimensional Riemannian manifold. Under the assumption that the strip is asymptotically straight in a suitable sense, we localise the essential spectrum and find sufficient conditions which guarantee the existence of geometrically induced bound states. In particular, the discrete spectrum exists for non-negatively curved strips which are studied in detail…
We investigate the discrete spectrum of the Hamiltonian describing a quantum particle living in the two-dimensional curved strip. We impose the Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions on opposite sides of the strip. The existence of the discrete eigenvalue below the essential spectrum threshold depends on the sign of the total bending angle for the asymptotically straight strips.
We consider the Dirichlet Laplacian in a straight three dimensional waveguide with non-rotationally invariant cross section, perturbed by a twisting of small amplitude. It is well known that such a perturbation does not create eigenvalues below the essential spectrum. However, around the bottom of the spectrum, we provide a meromorphic extension of the weighted resolvent of the perturbed operator, and show the existence of exactly one resonance near this point. Moreover, we obtain the asymptotic behavior of this resonance as the size of the twisting goes to 0. We also extend the analysis to th…
The Dirichlet Laplacian in curved tubes of arbitrary cross-section rotating with respect to the Tang frame along infinite curves in Euclidean spaces of arbitrary dimension is investigated. If the reference curve is not straight and its curvatures vanish at infinity, we prove that the essential spectrum as a set coincides with the spectrum of the straight tube of the same cross-section and that the discrete spectrum is not empty.
We show that twisting of an infinite straight three-dimensional tube with non-circular cross-section gives rise to a Hardy-type inequality for the associated Dirichlet Laplacian. As an application we prove certain stability of the spectrum of the Dirichlet Laplacian in locally and mildly bent tubes. Namely, it is known that any local bending, no matter how small, generates eigenvalues below the essential spectrum of the Laplacian in the tubes with arbitrary cross-sections rotated along a reference curve in an appropriate way. In the present paper we show that for any other rotation some critic…
We develop a general method to compute correlation functions of fractional quantum Hall (FQH) states on a curved space. In a curved space, local transformation properties of FQH states are examined through local geometric variations, which are essentially governed by the gravitational anomaly. Furthermore, we show that the electromagnetic response of FQH states is related to the gravitational response (a response to curvature). Thus, the gravitational anomaly is also seen in the structure factor and the Hall conductance in flat space. The method is based on iteration of a Ward identity obtaine…
We investigate spectral properties of a quantum particle confined to an infinite straight planar strip by imposing Robin boundary conditions with variable coupling. Assuming that the coupling function tends to a constant at infinity, we localize the essential spectrum and derive a sufficient condition which guarantees the existence of bound states. Further properties of the associated eigenvalues and eigenfunctions are studied numerically by the mode-matching technique.
We study measure perturbations of the Laplacian in $L^2(\R^2)$ supported by an infinite curve $Γ$ in the plane which is asymptotically straight in a suitable sense. We show that if $Γ$ is not a straight line, such a ``leaky quantum wire'' has at least one bound state below the threshold of the essential spectrum.
The split property expresses a strong form of independence of spacelike separated regions in algebraic quantum field theory. In Minkowski spacetime, it can be proved under hypotheses of nuclearity. An expository account is given of nuclearity and the split property, and connections are drawn to the theory of quantum energy inequalities. In addition, a recent proof of the split property for quantum field theory in curved spacetimes is outlined, emphasising the essential ideas.
We consider the two-dimensional Dirac operator with infinite mass boundary conditions posed in a tubular neighborhood of a $C^4$-planar curve. Under generic assumptions on its curvature $κ$, we prove that in the thin-width regime the splitting of the eigenvalues is driven by the one dimensional Schrödinger operator on $L^2(\mathbb R)$ \[ \mathcal{L}_e := -\frac{d^2}{ds^2} - \frac{κ^2}{π^2} \] with a geometrically induced potential. The eigenvalues are shown to be at distance of order $\varepsilon$ from the essential spectrum, where $2\varepsilon$ is the width of the waveguide. This is in contr…
We consider the magnetic Schrodinger operator in a two-dimensional strip. On the boundary of the strip the Dirichlet boundary condition is imposed except for a fixed segment (window), where it switches to magnetic Neumann boundary condition (see Section 2, Eq. (2.2) for the definition of this boundary condition}. We deal with a smooth compactly supported field as well as with the Aharonov-Bohm field. We give an estimate on the maximal length of the window, for which the discrete spectrum of the considered operator will be empty. In the case of a compactly supported field we also give a suffici…
We establish the existence of local, covariant time ordered products of local Wick polynomials for a free scalar field in curved spacetime. Our time ordered products satisfy all of the hypotheses of our previous uniqueness theorem, so our construction essentially completes the analysis of the existence, uniqueness and renormalizability of the perturbative expansion for nonlinear quantum field theories in curved spacetime. As a byproduct of our analysis, we derive a scaling expansion of the time ordered products about the total diagonal that expresses them as a sum of products of polynomials in…
In the paper we study the discrete spectrum of a pair of quantum two-dimensional waveguides having common boundary in which a window of finite length is cut out. We study the phenomenon of new eigenvalues emerging from the threshold of the essential spectrum when the length of window passes through critical values. We construct the asymptotics expansions for the emerging eigenvalues with respect to small parameter which is the difference between current length of the window and the nearest critical value. We also study the behaviour of the spectrum when the length of the window increases unbou…
