The phase structure of Einstein–Cartan theory

In the Einstein–Cartan theory of torsion-free gravity coupling to massless fermions, the four-fermion interaction is induced and its strength is a function of the gravitational and gauge couplings, as well as the Immirzi parameter. We study the dynamics of the four-fermion interaction to determine whether effective bilinear terms of massive fermion fields are generated. Calculating one-particle-irreducible two-point functions of fermion fields, we identify three different phases and two critical points for phase transitions characterized by the strength of four-fermion interaction: (1) chiral symmetric phase for massive fermions in strong coupling regime; (2) chiral symmetric broken phase for massive fermions in intermediate coupling regime; (3) chiral symmetric phase for massless fermions in weak coupling regime. We discuss the scaling-invariant region for an effective theory of massive fermions coupled to torsion-free gravity in the low-energy limit.     

Unconventional interaction between vortices in a polarized Fermi gas

Recently, a homogeneous superfluid state with a single gapless Fermi surface was predicted to be the ground state of an ultracold Fermi gas with spin population imbalance in the regime of molecular Bose-Einstein condensation. We study vortices in this novel state using a symmetry-based effective field theory, which captures the low-energy physics of gapless fermions and superfluid phase fluctuations. This theory is applicable to all spin-imbalanced ultracold Fermi gases in the superfluid regime, regardless of whether the original fermion-pairing interaction is weak or strong. We find a remarkable, unconventional form of the interaction between vortices. The presence of gapless fermions gives rise to a spatially oscillating potential, akin to the RKKY indirect-exchange interaction in non-magnetic metals. We compare the parameters of the effective theory to the experimentally measurable quantities and further discuss the conditions for the verification of the predicted new feature. Our study opens up an interesting question as to the nature of the vortex lattice resulting from the competition between the usual repulsive logarithmic (2D Coulomb) and predominantly attractive fermion-induced interactions.     

Weak localization of Dirac fermions in HgTe quantum wells

Weak localization in a system of gapless two-dimensional Dirac fermions in HgTe quantum wells with thickness d = 6.6 nm, which corresponds to the transition from a normal to an inverted spectrum, has been investigated experimentally. A negative logarithmic correction to the conductivity of the system has been observed both at the Dirac point and in the vicinity of this point. The anomalous magnetoresistance of two-dimensional Dirac fermions is positive. This indicates that weak localization in the system of two-dimensional Dirac fermions occurs owing to localization and interaction effects in the presence of rapid spin relaxation.     

Phase Diagram and Phase Separation of a Trapped Interacting Bose-Fermi Gas Mixture

In six different regimes for a spatial phase diagram of a trapped interacting Bose-Fermi gas mixture at low temperatures, we present the conditions for the spatial demixing and separation of bosons and fermions. Starting from a semiclassically thermodynamic model for the local density functional of thermal bosons and fermions,the explicit analytical expressions for the fugacities of bosons and fermions are derived in different regimes by means of a first-order perturbation method in a local-density approximation. The critical values of the fermionboson interaction strength as a function of the fractional composition of fermions have a general feature: increase,extreme and decrease with increasing the fermionic composition slightly above Bose-Einstein critical temperature.     

Four-fermion interaction from torsion as dark energy

The observed small, positive cosmological constant may originate from a four-fermion interaction generated by the spin-torsion coupling in the Einstein–Cartan–Sciama–Kibble gravity if the fermions are condensing. In particular, such a condensation occurs for quark fields during the quark-gluon/hadron phase transition in the early Universe. We study how the torsion-induced four-fermion interaction is affected by adding two terms to the Dirac Lagrangian density: the parity-violating pseudoscalar density dual to the curvature tensor and a spinor-bilinear scalar density which measures the nonminimal coupling of fermions to torsion.     

Majorana fermions in equilibrium and in driven cold-atom quantum wires

We introduce a new approach to create and detect Majorana fermions using optically trapped 1D fermionic atoms. In our proposed setup, two internal states of the atoms couple via an optical Raman transition-simultaneously inducing an effective spin-orbit interaction and magnetic field-while a background molecular BEC cloud generates s-wave pairing for the atoms. The resulting cold-atom quantum wire supports Majorana fermions at phase boundaries between topologically trivial and nontrivial regions, as well as "Floquet Majorana fermions" when the system is periodically driven. We analyze experimental parameters, detection schemes, and various imperfections.     

Gapless Chiral Superconducting ( d + id )-Wave Phase in Strongly Correlated Layered Material with a Triangular Lattice

It is shown that interlayer electron tunneling in the quasi-two-dimensional ensemble of Hubbard fermions leads to the realization of the gapless superconducting phase with the chiral (d + id)-wave order parameter symmetry, not for a single value of sodium ion concentration, but in a wide range of concentrations. Precisely this situation corresponds to experimental data on the layered sodium cobaltite intercalated by water (NaxCoO2 ⋅ yH2O). Intra-atomic electron repulsion that determines the strong electron correlation regime leads to the representation of Hubbard fermions, the interaction of which ensures Cooper instability. Intersite intralayer interactions between fermions considerably affect the positions of nodal points of the chiral order parameter and change the critical concentration at which a topological transition occurs in the 2D system of Hubbard fermions.     

BKT phase in systems of spinless strongly interacting one-dimensional fermions

We present the ground-state wavefunctions for a system of spinless one-dimensional fermions in the limit of an infinitely strong interaction, and we demonstrate explicitly that the system symmetry is lower than the original symmetry of the Hamiltonian. As a result, the system in this limit undergoes a second-order phase transition into a phase with finite density of chiral pairs. The phase transforms continuously into a Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) phase if the interaction in the model decreases. Therefore, just the BKT phase is realized in nature. The temperature of the smearing phase transition is calculated. The text was submitted by the authors in English.     

Quantum criticality between topological and band insulators in 3+1 dimensions

Four-component massive and massless Dirac fermions in the presence of long range Coulomb interaction and chemical potential disorder exhibit striking fermionic quantum criticality. For an odd number of flavors of Dirac fermions, the sign of the Dirac mass distinguishes the topological and the trivial band insulator phases, and the gapless semimetallic phase corresponds to the quantum critical point that separates the two. Up to a critical strength of disorder, the semimetallic phase remains stable, and the universality class of the direct phase transition between two insulating phases is unchanged. Beyond the critical strength of disorder the semimetallic phase undergoes a phase transition into a disorder controlled diffusive metallic phase, and there is no longer a direct phase transition between the two types of insulating phases.     

Collective modes of type-ⅡWeyl fermions with repulsive S-wave interaction

Three-dimensional type-ⅡWeyl fermions possess overtilted cone-like low-energy band dispersion.Unlike the closed ellipsoidal Fermi surface for type-ⅠWeyl fermions,the Fermi surface is an open hyperboloid for type-ⅡWeyl fermions.We evaluate the spin and density susceptibility of type-ⅡWeyl fermions with repulsive S-wave interaction by means of Green’s functions.We obtain the particle–hole continuum along the tilted momentum direction and perpendicular to the tilted momentum direction respectively.We find the zero sound mode in some repulsive interaction strengths by numerically solving the pole equations of the susceptibility within the random-phase approximation.     

Excitation spectra of one-dimensional spin-1/2 Fermi gas with an attraction

Using an exact Bethe ansatz solution, we rigorously study excitation spectra of the spin-1/2 Fermi gas (called Yang–Gaudin model) with an attractive interaction. Elementary excitations of this model involve particle-hole excitation, hole excitation and adding particles in the Fermi seas of pairs and unpaired fermions. The gapped magnon excitations in the spin sector show a ferromagnetic coupling to the Fermi sea of the single fermions. By numerically and analytically solving the Bethe ansatz equations and the thermodynamic Bethe ansatz equations of this model, we obtain excitation energies for various polarizations in the phase of the Fulde–Ferrell–Larkin–Ovchinnikov-like state. For a small momentum (long-wavelength limit) and in the strong interaction regime, we analytically obtained their linear dispersions with curvature corrections, effective masses as well as velocities in particle-hole excitations of pairs and unpaired fermions. Such a type of particle-hole excitations display a novel separation of collective motions of bosonic modes within paired and unpaired fermions. Finally, we also discuss magnon excitations in the spin sector and the application of Bragg spectroscopy for testing such separated charge excitation modes of pairs and single fermions.     

Thermodynamics of the System of Massive Dirac Fermions in a Uniform Magnetic Field

We construct the grand partition function of the system of massive Dirac fermions in a uniform magnetic field from Landau levels,through which all thermodynamic quantities can be obtained.Making use of the Abel-Plana formula,these thermodynamic quantities can be expanded as power series with respect to the dimensionless variable b=2eB/T~2.The zero-field magnetic susceptibility is expanded at zero mass,and the leading order term is logarithmic.We also calculate scalar,vector current,axial vector current and energy-momentum tensor of the system through ensemble average approach.Mass correction to chiral separation effect is discussed.For massless chiral fermions,our results recover the chiral magnetic effect for right-and left-handed fermions,as well as chiral separation effect.     

Coulomb interaction and semimetal-insulator transition in graphene

The strong Coulomb interaction between massless Dirac fermions can drive a semimetal-insulator transition in single-layer graphene by dynamically generating an excitonic fermion gap. There is a critical interaction strength λc that separates the semimetal phase from the insulator phase. We calculate the specific heat and susceptibility of the system and show that they exhibit distinct behaviors in the semimetal and insulator phases.     

Global phase diagram of the fractional quantum Hall effect arising from repulsive three-body interactions

The model of fermions in a magnetic field interacting via a purely three-body repulsive interaction has attracted interest because it produces, in the limit of short range interaction, the Pfaffian state with non-Abelian excitations. We show that this is part of a rich phase diagram containing a host of fractional quantum Hall states, a composite fermion Fermi sea, and a pairing transition. This is entirely unexpected, because the appearance of composite fermions and fractional quantum Hall effect is ordinarily thought to be a result of strong two-body repulsion. Recent breakthroughs in ultracold atoms have facilitated the realization of such a system, where this physics can be tested.     

The Phase Structure of a Generalized Gross–Neveu Model in (2+1)-Dimensional Space–Time

The phase structure of a (2+1)-dimensional Gross–Neveu model with four different channels of fermion–antifermion interaction, and, correspondingly, four different coupling constants, is studied. It is shown that the model describes five different phases of the interaction of planar fermions in which either spatial parity or chiral symmetry can be broken. The existence of a phase that is characterized by simultaneous spontaneous breaking of both these symmetries that was not observed earlier in such models is demonstrated.     

On the calculation of the Berry phase in a solvable model

We study fermions defined on a one-dimensional interval, for which the interaction is given by a four-parameter family of boundary conditions. We compare the full solution to the adiabatic approximation and determine the Berry phase for a number of typical orbits in parameter space. We observe the occurrence of a non-trivial fundamental group and discuss the possibilities of avoided crossings and apparent crossings.     

Interface between topological and superconducting qubits

We propose and analyze an interface between a topological qubit and a superconducting flux qubit. In our scheme, the interaction between Majorana fermions in a topological insulator is coherently controlled by a superconducting phase that depends on the quantum state of the flux qubit. A controlled-phase gate, achieved by pulsing this interaction on and off, can transfer quantum information between the topological qubit and the superconducting qubit.     

Mixtures of correlated bosons and fermions: Dynamical mean‐field theory for normal and condensed phases

We derive a dynamical mean‐field theory for mixtures of interacting bosons and fermions on a lattice (BF‐DMFT). The BF‐DMFT is a comprehensive, thermodynamically consistent framework for the theoretical investigation of Bose‐Fermi mixtures and is applicable for arbitrary values of the coupling parameters and temperatures. It becomes exact in the limit of high spatial dimensions d or coordination number Z of the lattice. In particular, the BF‐DMFT treats normal and condensed bosons on equal footing and thus includes the effects caused by their dynamic coupling. Using the BF‐DMFT we investigate two different interaction models of correlated lattice bosons and fermions, one where all particles are spinless (model I) and one where fermions carry a spin one‐half (model II). In model I the local, repulsive interaction between bosons and fermions can give rise to an attractive effective interaction between the bosons. In model II it can also lead to an attraction between the fermions.     

Renormalization group approach to a p-wave superconducting model

We present in this work an exact renormalization group (RG) treatment of a one-dimensional p-wave superconductor. The model proposed by Kitaev consists of a chain of spinless fermions with a p-wave gap. It is a paradigmatic model of great actual interest since it presents a weak pairing superconducting phase that has Majorana fermions at the ends of the chain. Those are predicted to be useful for quantum computation. The RG allows to obtain the phase diagram of the model and to study the quantum phase transition from the weak to the strong pairing phase. It yields the attractors of these phases and the critical exponents of the weak to strong pairing transition. We show that the weak pairing phase of the model is governed by a chaotic attractor being non-trivial from both its topological and RG properties. In the strong pairing phase the RG flow is towards a conventional strong coupling fixed point. Finally, we propose an alternative way for obtaining p-wave superconductivity in a one-dimensional system without spin–orbit interaction.     

Interaction versus dimerization in one-dimensional Fermi systems

In order to study the effect of interaction and lattice distortion on quantum coherence in one-dimensional Fermi systems, we calculate the ground state energy and the phase sensitivity of a ring of interacting spinless fermions on a dimerized lattice. Our numerical DMRG studies, in which we keep up to 1000 states for systems of about 100 sites, are supplemented by analytical considerations using bosonization techniques. We find a delocalized phase for an attractive interaction, which differs from that obtained for random lattice distortions. The extension of this delocalized phase depends strongly on the dimerization induced modification of the interaction. Taking into account the harmonic lattice energy, we find a dimerized ground state for a repulsive interaction only. The dimerization is suppressed at half filling, when the correlation gap becomes large. Received: 11 February 1998 / Revised: 1st April 1998 / Accepted: 30 April 1998