Semiclassical field theory approach to quantum chaos

We construct a field theory to describe energy averaged quantum statistical properties of systems which are chaotic in their classical limit. An expression for the generating function of general statistical correlators is presented in the form of a functional supermatrix non-linear σ-model where the effective action involves the evolution operator of the classical dynamics. Low-lying degrees of freedom of the field theory are shown to reflect the irreversible classical dynamics describing relaxation of phase space distributions. The validity of this approach is investigated over a wide range of energy scales. As well as recovering the universal long-time behavior characteristic of random matrix ensembles, this approach accounts correctly for the short-time limit yielding results which agree with the diagonal approximation of periodic orbit theory.     

Finite temperature theory of metastable anharmonic potentials

The decay rate for a particle in a metastable cubic potential is investigated in the quantum regime by the Euclidean path integral method in semiclassical approximation. The imaginary time formalism allows one to monitor the system as a function of temperature. The family of classical paths, saddle points for the action, is derived in terms of Jacobian elliptic functions whose periodicity sets the energy-temperature correspondence. The period of the classical oscillations varies monotonically with the energy up to the sphaleron, pointing to a smooth crossover from the quantum to the activated regime. The softening of the quantum fluctuation spectrum is evaluated analytically by the theory of the functional determinants and computed at low T up to the crossover. In particular, the negative eigenvalue, causing an imaginary contribution to the partition function, is studied in detail by solving the Lamè equation which governs the fluctuation spectrum. For a heavvy particle mass, the decay rate shows a remarkable temperature dependence mainly ascribable to a low lying soft mode and, approaching the crossover, it increases by a factor five over the predictions of the zero temperature theory. Just beyond the peak value, the classical Arrhenius behavior takes over. A similar trend is found studying the quartic metastable potential but the lifetime of the latter is longer by a factor ten than in a cubic potential with same parameters. Some formal analogies with noise-induced transitions in classically activated metastable systems are discussed.     

A thermodynamically consistent quasi-particle model without temperature-dependent infinity of the vacuum zero point energy

In this Letter, an improved quasi-particle model is presented. Unlike the previous approach of establishing quasi-particle model, we introduce a classical background field (it is allowed to depend on the temperature) to deal with the infinity of thermal vacuum energy which exists in previous quasi-particle models. After taking into account the effect of this classical background field, the partition function of quasi-particle system can be made well-defined. Based on this and following the standard ensemble theory, we construct a thermodynamically consistent quasi-particle model without the need of any reformulation of statistical mechanics or thermodynamical consistency relation. As an application of our model, we employ it to the case of (2+1)$(2+1)$ flavor QGP at zero chemical potential and finite temperature and obtain a good fit to the recent lattice simulation results of Borsányi et al. A comparison of the result of our model with early calculations using other models is also presented. It is shown that our method is general and can be generalized to the case where the effective mass depends not only on the temperature but also on the chemical potential.     

Steepest descent path for the microcanonical ensemble-resolution of an ambiguity

The microcanonical entropy plays an essential role in the equilibrium statistical mechanics of gravitating systems. A peculiar feature of many of these systems is the existence of stable thermodynamic equilibrium configurations with negative heat capacities. Different methods have been developed for calculating the microcanonical entropy involving multivariate integrals of constraints and functional integrations. An apparent ambiguity between an approach due to Hawking and Gibbons, based on an entropy definition involving an inverse Laplace transform of the partition function, which they developed to treat quantum systems with gravity, and a different approach developed by Horwitz and Katz defining the entropy as an equal weight sum over a constant energy surface developed originally to treat Newtonian and classical GR systems is shown here to be spurious, at least at the level of quadratic fluctuations of all variables about the extremal solutions. The two approaches involve distinct contours for different orders of integration, each of which is shown to be the appropriate steepest descent path corresponding to the given order of investigation. Up to quadratic fluctuations both methods yield identical results. However, they represent different perturbation expansions for the gravitational modes of freedom with different radii of convergence. The discussion is made in terms of a particular convenient model, a system of point particles interacting via Newtonian forces, confined to a sphere, but results are quite general.     

On the quasi-chemical theory of solutions

The classical canonical partition function for a one-dimensional, two-component system is examined for the case of nearest-neighbor interactions. The quasi-chemical model of solid solutions is found to be a natural consequence of the definition of the partition function when one replaces the normal configurational energy with a configurational free energy. Consequently, the quasi-chemical theory may be viewed as a consequence of the definition of the partition function and not as merely a physically pleasing model.     

Exact classical and quantum solutions for a covariant oscillator near the black hole horizon in Stueckelberg-Horwitz-Piron theory

We found exact solutions for canonical classical and quantum dynamics for general relativity in Horwitz general covariance theory. These solutions can be obtained by solving the generalized geodesic equation and Schrödinger-Stueckelberg-Horwitz-Piron (SHP) wave equation for a simple harmonic oscillator in the background of a two dimensional dilaton black hole spacetime metric. We proved the existence of an orthonormal basis of eigenfunctions for generalized wave equation. This basis functions form an orthogonal and normalized (orthonormal) basis for an appropriate Hilbert space. The energy spectrum has a mixed spectrum with one conserved momentum p according to a quantum number n. To find the ground state energy we used a variational method with appropriate boundary conditions. A set of mode decomposed wave functions and calculated for the Stueckelberg-Schrodinger equation on a general five dimensional blackhole spacetime in Hamilton gauge.     

The Source Galerkin method: fermionic formulation

We present a new deterministic, numerical method to solve fermion field theories. The Source Galerkin approach is based on finding solutions Z [ J] to the lattice functional equations for field theories in the presence of an external source J. Using Grassmann polynomial expansions for the generating functional Z, we calculate propagators for systems of interacting fermions. These calculations are straightforward to perform and are executed rapidly compared to Monte Carlo. The bulk of the computation involves a single matrix inversion. Because it is not based on a statistical technique, it does not have many of the difficulties often encountered when simulating fermions. Since no determinant is ever calculated, solutions to problems with dynamical fermions are handled more easily. This approach is very flexible, and can be tailored to specific problems based on convenience and computational constraints. We present simple examples to illustrate the method. More general schemes are desirable for more complicated systems.     

Contrasting Classical and Quantum Vacuum States in Non-inertial Frames

Classical electron theory with classical electromagnetic zero-point radiation (stochastic electrodynamics) is the classical theory which most closely approximates quantum electrodynamics. Indeed, in inertial frames, there is a general connection between classical field theories with classical zero-point radiation and quantum field theories. However, this connection does not extend to noninertial frames where the time parameter is not a geodesic coordinate. Quantum field theory applies the canonical quantization procedure (depending on the local time coordinate) to a mirror-walled box, and, in general, each non-inertial coordinate frame has its own vacuum state. In particular, there is a distinction between the “Minkowski vacuum” for a box at rest in an inertial frame and a “Rindler vacuum” for an accelerating box which has fixed spatial coordinates in an (accelerating) Rindler frame. In complete contrast, the spectrum of random classical zero-point radiation is based upon symmetry principles of relativistic spacetime; in empty space, the correlation functions depend upon only the geodesic separations (and their coordinate derivatives) between the spacetime points. The behavior of classical zero-point radiation in a noninertial frame is found by tensor transformations and still depends only upon the geodesic separations, now expressed in the non-inertial coordinates. It makes no difference whether a box of classical zero-point radiation is gradually or suddenly set into uniform acceleration; the radiation in the interior retains the same correlation function except for small end-point (Casimir) corrections. Thus in classical theory where zero-point radiation is defined in terms of geodesic separations, there is nothing physically comparable to the quantum distinction between the Minkowski and Rindler vacuum states. It is also noted that relativistic classical systems with internal potential energy must be spatially extended and can not be point systems. The classical analysis gives no grounds for the “heating effects of acceleration through the vacuum” which appear in the literature of quantum field theory. Thus this distinction provides (in principle) an experimental test to distinguish the two theories.     

The Wave Function Collapse as an Effect of Field Quantization

It is pointed out that ordinary quantum mechanics as a classical field theory cannot account for the wave function collapse if it is not seen within the framework of field quantization. That is needed to understand the particle structure of matter during wave function evolution and to explain the collapse as symmetry breakdown by detection. The decay of a two-particle bound s state and the Stern-Gerlach experiment serve as examples. The absence of the nonlocality problem in Bohm’s version of the EPR arrangement favours the approach described.     

Quantum decay rate of a nonlinear dissipative system with fission-like potential nearT c

We use a thermodynamic scheme (imaginary free energy method) in terms of the path integral technique to study the quantum decay rates of a metastable state system coupled to a heat bath in the crossover temperature (T _c) region. In this region the transition between thermally activated decay and tunneling occurs. A nonlinear coupling form factor is used to overcome the divergent integral in the partition function nearT _c. The decay rate formula based on the steepest descent approximation has been improved. A method is developed to calculate the real and imaginary parts of the partition function which combines a random walk method with fast-Fourier transform Monte-Carlo evaluation. For a nonlinear dissipative system with a damping correlation kernel of exponential form, the accurate numerical calculations are presented. The effects of nonlinear and frequency-dependent damping on the rate are shown.     

Self-consistent description of <Emphasis Type="Italic">EL</Emphasis> transitions between one-phonon states in magic nuclei

Transition probabilities between low-lying one-phonon states of magic nuclei are for the first time computed self-consistently within an approach to anharmonic effects based on the quantum theory of many-body systems. In the adopted approach, three-quasiparticle correlations in the ground state are taken into account, and the nuclear mean field is interrelated with the effective nucleon–nucleon interaction. These quantities are derived using the energy density functional method with known parameters of the Fayans functional. The E1 and E2 transitions in the ¹³²Sn and ²⁰⁸Pb nuclei are considered as an example, and a reasonably good agreement with the data on these nuclei is reached. Three-quasiparticle correlations in the ground state are shown to make a significant contribution to the probabilities of the discussed transitions.     

The classical field limit of scattering theory for non-relativistic many-boson systems. I

We study the classical field limit of non-relativistic many-boson theories in space dimensionn≧3. When ?→0, the correlation functions, which are the averages of products of bounded functions of field operators at different times taken in suitable states, converge to the corresponding functions of the appropriate solutions of the classical field equation, and the quantum fluctuations are described by the equation obtained by linearizing the field equation around the classical solution. These properties were proved by Hepp [6] for suitably regular potentials and in finite time intervals. Using a general theory of existence of global solutions and a general scattering theory for the classical equation, we extend these results in two directions: (1) we consider more singular potentials, (2) more important, we prove that for dispersive classical solutions, the ?→0 limit is uniform in time in an appropriate representation of the field operators. As a consequence we obtain the convergence of suitable matrix elements of the wave operators and, if asymptotic completeness holds, of theS-matrix.     

Asymptotic exactness of finite temperature Thomas-Fermi theory

By using entropy inequalities with coherent states we prove that for atoms and molecules the partition function of Thomas-Fermi theory becomes exact in the limit Z → ∞, in the appropriate scaling. Furthermore the Gibbs state over a suitable algebra converges to a pure state over classical densities in phase space.     

Computing numerically the functional derivative of an effective action

The functional derivative of the effective action with respect to an external field is part of the equation of motion of this field if one-loop effects induced by quantum fluctuations or thermal fluctuations are included in minimizing the action of this field. Examples occur in all field theories displaying classical solutions or 3 - as the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model 3 - selfconsistent field configurations. We describe here a numerical method for computing such functional derivatives; we use a fermion field with Yukawa interaction to an external field as an example which is sufficiently simple and sufficiently general. We compare the computed action to analytical estimates.     

Localization for Yang-Mills Theory on the Fuzzy Sphere

We present a new model for Yang-Mills theory on the fuzzy sphere in which the configuration space of gauge fields is given by a coadjoint orbit. In the classical limit it reduces to ordinary Yang-Mills theory on the sphere. We find all classical solutions of the gauge theory and use nonabelian localization techniques to write the partition function entirely as a sum over local contributions from critical points of the action, which are evaluated explicitly. The partition function of ordinary Yang-Mills theory on the sphere is recovered in the classical limit as a sum over instantons. We also apply abelian localization techniques and the geometry of symmetric spaces to derive an explicit combinatorial expression for the partition function, and compare the two approaches. These extend the standard techniques for solving gauge theory on the sphere to the fuzzy case in a rigorous framework.