arXiv subjects

Christoph Minz

Publications and source records attributed to Christoph Minz.

10 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Bounds on relative modular Hamiltonians in general QFT

The relative entropy between two states is a key concept in quantum information theory and quantum field theory. In the setting of quantum field theory, its computation requires the handling of relative modular Hamiltonians, which are typically very difficult to compute explicitly. In this paper, we exploit locality properties of general algebraic QFTs to estimate relative modular Hamiltonians between two states, $\omega$ and $\tilde{\omega}$, and hence also their relative entropy, in terms of the modular Hamiltonian of a reference state $\hat{\omega}$, which might be better understood. For suitable pairs of states we can estimate the relative modular Hamiltonian for the algebra of a region $V_2$ from above, resp. from below, in terms of the modular Hamiltonian of $\hat{\omega}$ on a larger region $V_3$, resp. a smaller region $V_1$. Pairs of states and choices of regions which are susceptible to our scheme are related to the presence of superluminal signalling in the sense of Sorkin's paradox. If $\omega=\hat{\omega}$, then there exists a unitary that maps $\omega$ to $\tilde{\omega}$ on $V_3$ and that does not allow superluminal signalling from the spacelike complement $V_3'$ to $V_2$, resp. from $V_1$ to $V_2'$, if our upper, resp. lower, bound applies. To investigate the strength of our estimates we consider coherent states for CCR systems, focussing particularly on free scalar fields. Our estimates apply even if the relative modular Hamiltonian cannot be computed exactly. For sufficiently regular excitations we recover an exact result by squeezing. Our method thus yields an independent proof for the relative entropy formula in cases where the relative modular Hamiltonian cannot be computed exactly. For massless fields we establish the analogous result also for double cone regions. These results indicate that our estimates do not lose too much information.

math-ph↗

arXiv2026

Numerical approach to the modular operator for fermionic systems

We numerically approximate the Tomita-Takesaki modular operator for local subalgebras of the 1+1-dimensional massive Majorana field. Our method works at the one-particle level with a discretisation of time-0 data in position space. The local subspaces we consider are associated with one double cone and with the disjoint union of two double cones. In order to avoid boundary effects, we primarily choose the overall spacetime to be a cylinder; different choices of boundary conditions (antiperiodic and periodic) are considered. We compare our numerical results to known analytic expressions in the massless case. It turns out that the modular operator has a non-trivial dependence on the mass. In the case of two double cones, the modular generator does not only have ''local'' contributions (supported on the diagonal in configuration space) but also ''bilocal'' terms (connecting the two double cone regions); we find the latter to be less prominent at higher masses, in line with expectations.

math-ph↗

arXiv2025

Modular Hamiltonian of the massive scalar field on the half line: A numerical approach

We study the modular Hamiltonian of an interval for the ground state of a massive free scalar field on the half line with Robin boundary conditions, by employing a numerical method. When the interval is adjacent to the boundary, we find numerical evidence that the modular Hamiltonian is non-local, except for the limiting cases of the massless scalar satisfying either Dirichlet or Neumann boundary conditions. When the interval is separated from the boundary, the numerical analysis indicates that the modular Hamiltonian is non-local for all these boundary conditions and any value of the mass.

hep-th↗

arXiv2024

Do causal sets have symmetries?

Causal sets are locally finite, partially ordered sets (posets), which are considered as discrete models of spacetimes. On the one hand, causal sets corresponding to a spacetime manifold are commonly generated with a random process called sprinkling. This process keeps only a discrete set of points of the manifold and their causal relations (loosing the spacetime symmetries in each sprinkle). On the other hand, the main conjecture of causal set theory is that given an ensemble of causal sets there is a corresponding spacetime manifold and the continuum symmetries of it are like all manifold properties "reconstructable" from the partial orders of all the causal sets in the ensemble. But most generic finite posets have very few layers ("instances of time") in contrast to sprinkles with many layers in a sufficiently large spacetime region. In a recent project, I investigated the automorphism groups of (finite) posets in order to identify and classify their symmetries systematically. The comparison of local symmetries of generic posets (including Kleitmann-Rothschild orders) with sprinkled causal sets may help us to find those posets that can serve as discrete spacetime models in causal set theory.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2024

Quantization, dequantization, and distinguished states

Geometric quantization is a natural way to construct quantum models starting from classical data. In this work, we start from a symplectic vector space with an inner product and -- using techniques of geometric quantization -- construct the quantum algebra and equip it with a distinguished state. We compare our result with the construction due to Sorkin -- which starts from the same input data -- and show that our distinguished state coincides with the Sorkin-Johnson state. Sorkin's construction was originally applied to the free scalar field over a causal set (locally finite, partially ordered set). Our perspective suggests a natural generalization to less linear examples, such as an interacting field.

math-ph↗

arXiv2024

Local symmetries in partially ordered sets

Partially ordered sets (posets) play a universal role as an abstract structure in many areas of mathematics. For finite posets, an explicit enumeration of distinct partial orders on a set of unlabelled elements is known only up to a cardinality of 16 (listed as sequence A000112 in the OEIS), but closed expressions are unknown. By considering the automorphisms of (finite) posets, I introduce a formulation of local symmetries. These symmetries give rise to a division operation on the set of posets and lead to the construction of symmetry classes that are easier to characterise and enumerate. Furthermore, we consider polynomial expressions that count certain subsets of posets with a large number of layers (a large height). As an application in physics, local symmetries or rather their absence helps to distinguish causal sets (locally finite posets) that serve as discrete spacetime models from generic causal sets.

math.CO↗

arXiv2023

Modular Hamiltonian for fermions of small mass

We consider the algebra of massive fermions restricted to a diamond in two-dimensional Minkowski spacetime, and in the Minkowski vacuum state. While the massless modular Hamiltonian is known for this setting, the derivation of the massive one is an open problem. We compute the small-mass corrections to the modular Hamiltonian in a perturbative approach, finding some terms which were previously overlooked. Our approach can in principle be extended to all orders in the mass, even though it becomes computationally challenging.

hep-th↗

arXiv2023

On the mass dependence of the modular operator for a double cone

We present a numerical approximation scheme for the Tomita-Takesaki modular operator of local subalgebras in linear quantum fields, working at one-particle level. This is applied to the local subspaces for double cones in the vacuum sector of a massive scalar free field in (1 + 1)- and (3 + 1)-dimensional Minkowski spacetime, using a discretization of time-0 data in position space. In the case of a wedge region, one component of the modular generator is well-known to be a mass-independent multiplication operator; our results strongly suggest that for the double cone, the corresponding component is still at least close to a multiplication operator, but that it is dependent on mass and angular momentum.

math-ph↗

arXiv2021

Local Structure of Sprinkled Causal Sets

We describe numerical and analytical investigations of causal sets sprinkled into spacetime manifolds. The first part of the paper is a numerical study of finite causal sets sprinkled into Alexandrov subsets of Minkowski spacetime of dimensions $1 + 1$, $1 + 2$ and $1 + 3$. In particular we consider the rank 2 past of sprinkled causet events, which is the set of events that are two links to the past. Assigning one of the rank 2 past events as `preferred past' for each event yields a `preferred past structure', which was recently proposed as the basis for a causal set d'Alembertian. We test six criteria for selecting rank 2 past subsets. One criterion performs particularly well at uniquely selecting -- with very high probability -- a preferred past satisfying desirable properties. The second part of the paper concerns (infinite) sprinkled causal sets for general spacetime manifolds. After reviewing the construction of the sprinkling process with the Poisson measure, we consider various specific applications. Among other things, we compute the probability of obtaining a sprinkled causal set of a given isomorphism class by combinatorial means, using a correspondence between causal sets in Alexandrov subsets of $1 + 1$ dimensional Minkowski spacetime and 2D-orders. These methods are also used to compute the expected size of the past infinity as a proportion of the total size of a sprinkled causal set.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2015

Shock Wave Polarizations and Optical Metrics in the Born and the Born-Infeld Electrodynamics

We analyze the behavior of shock waves in nonlinear theories of electrodynamics. For this, by use of generalized Hadamard step functions of increasing order, the electromagnetic potential is developed in a series expansion near the shock wave front. This brings about a corresponding expansion of the respective electromagnetic field equations which allows for deriving relations that determine the jump coefficients in the expansion series of the potential. We compute the components of a suitable gauge-normalized version of the jump coefficients given for a prescribed tetrad compatible with the shock front foliation. The solution of the first-order jump relations shows that, in contrast to linear Maxwell's electrodynamics, in general the propagation of shock waves in nonlinear theories is governed by optical metrics and polarization conditions describing the propagation of two differently polarized waves (leading to a possible appearance of birefringence). In detail, shock waves are analyzed in the Born and Born-Infeld theories verifying that the Born-Infeld model exhibits no birefringence and the Born model does. The obtained results are compared to those ones found in literature. New results for the polarization of the two different waves are derived for Born-type electrodynamics.

math-ph↗