arXiv subjects

Dénes Sexty

Publications and source records attributed to Dénes Sexty.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Lattice field theories with a sign problem

The sign problem obstructs the determination of the QCD phase diagram in the temperature-baryon chemical potential plane using lattice QCD. We review the sign problem in QCD and related field theories, including applications to real-time dynamics. We focus on approaches where the sign problem can potentially be solved or controlled, irrespective of its severeness. These include holomorphic extensions -- Lefschetz thimbles, holomorphic flow, contour deformations, and complex Langevin dynamics --, and the introduction of new degrees of freedom -- dual variables and the tensor renormalisation group. We also highlight directions in which machine learning approaches have shown promise. Since many methods are first tested in simpler models, we provide an outlook on their feasibility for lattice systems.

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arXiv2026

Finite-density equation of state of hot QCD using the complex Langevin equation

We present the results of continuum-extrapolated lattice simulations of quantum chromodynamics (QCD) above the crossover temperature and for unprecedentedly high baryon densities at the physical point, employing the complex Langevin equation. In particular, we determine the QCD equation of state by computing the baryon density as well as the pressure as functions of the baryon chemical potential and the temperature. Potential issues with wrong convergence of complex Langevin dynamics are under control and we indeed find agreement with previous lattice studies working at smaller chemical potentials, as well as with perturbative hard-thermal-loop calculations at high temperatures.

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arXiv2025

Complex Langevin simulations with a kernel

We discuss recent developments regarding the use of kernels in complex Langevin simulations. In particular, we outline how a kernel can be used to solve the problem of wrong convergence in a simple toy model. Since conventional correctness criteria for complex Langevin results are only necessary but not sufficient, the correct convergence of complex Langevin simulations is not always straightforward to assess. Hence, we furthermore discuss a condition for correctness that we have recently derived, which is both necessary and sufficient. Finally, we outline a machine-learning approach for finding suitable kernels in lattice gauge theories and present preliminary results of its application to the heavy-dense limit of QCD.

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arXiv2025

Necessary and sufficient conditions for correctness of complex Langevin

We derive a family of correctness conditions for complex Langevin simulations. In particular, we show that if in a given theory the expectation values of all observables within a particular space satisfy the theory's Schwinger-Dyson equations as well as certain bounds, then these expectation values are necessarily correct. In fact, these findings are not only valid in the context of complex Langevin simulations, but they also hold for general probability densities on complex manifolds, given an initial complex density on a real manifold. We stress that, while the proposed conditions are necessary and sufficient in a mathematical sense, their practical use is not to prove the correctness of obtained simulation results. Rather, they are mainly useful for detecting incorrect convergence. In particular, we test these criteria in a few simple one- and two-dimensional toy models and find that they are indeed capable of ruling out incorrect results without the need of exact solutions.

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arXiv2025

The Role of Integration Cycles in Complex Langevin Simulations

Complex Langevin simulations are an attempt to solve the sign (or complex-action) problem encountered in various physical systems of interest. The method is based on a complexification of the underlying degrees of freedom and an evolution in an auxiliary time dimension. The complexification, however, does not come without drawbacks, the most severe of which is the infamous 'wrong convergence' problem, stating that complex Langevin simulations sometimes fail to produce correct answers despite their apparent convergence. It has long been realized that wrong convergence may - in principle - be fixed by the introduction of a suitable kernel into the complex Langevin equation, such that the conventional correctness criteria are met. However, as we discuss in this work, complex Langevin results may - especially in the presence of a kernel - still be affected by unwanted so-called integration cycles of the theory spoiling them. Indeed, we confirm numerically that in the absence of boundary terms the complex Langevin results are given by a linear combination of such integration cycles, as put forward by Salcedo & Seiler. In particular, we shed light on the way different choices of kernel affect which integration cycles are being sampled in a simulation and how this knowledge can be used to ensure correct convergence in simple toy models.

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arXiv2025

Real time simulations of scalar fields with kernelled complex Langevin equation

Real time evolution of a scalar field theory is investigated. The severe sign problem is circumvented using the Complex Langevin equation. The naive application of the method breaks down for extended real times due to the appearance of boundary terms. We use the kernel freedom of the complex Langevin equation to push the breakdown to larger real-times. We search for the optimal kernel using machine learning methods. Thus, we extend the available range for 1+1d scalar simulations beyond the state of the art simulations.

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arXiv2024

Kernels and integration cycles in complex Langevin simulations

The method of complex Langevin simulations is a tool that can be used to tackle the complex-action problem encountered, for instance, in finite-density lattice quantum chromodynamics or real-time lattice field theories. The method is based on a stochastic evolution of the dynamical degrees of freedom via (complex) Langevin equations, which, however, sometimes converge to the wrong equilibrium distributions. While the convergence properties of the evolution can to some extent be assessed by studying so-called boundary terms, we demonstrate in this contribution that boundary terms on their own are not sufficient as a correctness criterion. Indeed, in their absence complex Langevin simulation results might still be spoiled by unwanted so-called integration cycles. In particular, we elaborate on how the introduction of a kernel into the complex Langevin equation can - in principle - be used to control which integration cycles are sampled in a simulation such that correct convergence is restored.

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arXiv2024

Testing dynamical stabilization of Complex Langevin simulations of QCD

We study complex Langevin simulations of a toy model as well as QCD, supplemented with a dynamical stabilization (DS) term, which was proposed to regularize the complexified process at lower temperatures. We compare the results to reweghting from zero chemical potential to measure the bias that the inclusion of the stabilization term causes, depending on its strength. At high temperatures the stabilization term is not needed. At low temperatures (below deconfinement transition) the DS term has a beneficial stabilizing effect, but too strong DS term causes phase quenching on the system. We observed that the bias of the dynamical stabilization can be to a good accuracy removed by extrapolating to zero dynamical stabilization force using a sigmoid fit.

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arXiv2023

Highly anisotropic lattices for Yang-Mills theory

In this conference proceeding, we investigate the physical anisotropy in terms of the temporal and spatial lattice spacings in relation to the bare parameters of SU(2) pure gauge theory using Wilson gradient flow. Anisotropic lattices have a wide range of applications, from thermodynamic calculations in QCD to very recent real-time simulations using the complex Langevin method. We find an almost linear relationship between the bare and renormalized anisotropy. Using a parametrization that includes nonlinear effects and was earlier proposed for SU(3) theory, we obtain a good description of the coupling dependence of the anisotropy with only two fitting parameters. Our observation of an approximately linear relationship and this parametrization should strongly reduce the computational effort of anisotropic lattice calculations in the future.

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arXiv2023

Complex Langevin: Correctness criteria, boundary terms and spectrum

The Complex Langevin (CL) method to simulate `complex probabilities', ideally produces expectation values for the observables that converge to a limit equal to the expectation values obtained with the original complex `probability' measure. The situation may be spoiled in two ways: failure to converge and convergence to the wrong limit. It was found long ago that `wrong convergence' is caused by boundary terms; non-convergence may arise from bad spectral properties of the various evolution operators related to the CL process. Here we propose a class of criteria which allow to rule out boundary terms and at the same time bad spectrum. Ruling out boundary terms in the equilibrium distribution arising from a CL simulation implies that the so-called convergence conditions are fulfilled. This in turn has been shown to guarantee that the expectation values of holomorphic observables are given by complex linear combinations of $\exp(-S)$ over various integration cycles. If the spectrum is pathological, however, the CL simulation in general does not reproduce the integral over the desired real cycle.

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arXiv2023

Lattice real-time simulations with learned optimal kernels

We present a simulation strategy for the real-time dynamics of quantum fields, inspired by reinforcement learning. It builds on the complex Langevin approach, which it amends with system specific prior information, a necessary prerequisite to overcome this exceptionally severe sign problem. The optimization process underlying our machine learning approach is made possible by deploying inherently stable solvers of the complex Langevin stochastic process and a novel optimality criterion derived from insight into so-called boundary terms. This conceptual and technical progress allows us to both significantly extend the range of real-time simulations in 1+1d scalar field theory beyond the state-of-the-art and to avoid discretization artifacts that plagued previous real-time field theory simulations. Limitations of and promising future directions are discussed.

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arXiv2023

Real time evolution of scalar fields with kernelled Complex Langevin equation

The real time evolution of a scalar field in 0+1 dimensions is investigated on a complex time contour. The path integral formulation of the system has a sign problem, which is circumvented using the Complex Langevin equation. Measurement of the boundary terms allow for the detection of correct results (for contours with small real time extents) or incorrect results (at large real time extents), as confirmed by comparison to exact results calculated using diagonalization of the Hamiltonian. We introduce a constant matrix kernel in the Complex Langevin equation, which is optimized with the requirement that distributions of the fields on the complexified manifold remain close to the real manifold. We observe that reachable real times are roughly twice as large with the optimal kernel. We also investigate field dependent kernels represented by a neural network for a toy model as well as for the scalar field, providing promising first results.

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arXiv2023

Complex Langevin boundary terms in full QCD

Lattice simulations of non-zero density QCD introduce the so-called sign problem (complex or negative probabilities), which invalidates importance sampling methods. To circumvent this, we use the Complex Langevin Equation (CLE), to measure the boundary terms and then compare these results with the ones gotten from reweighting, confirming the expectations from previous studies. We also investigate boundary terms in simulations using CLE with dynamic stabilization and compare this, to results calculated with reweighting.

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arXiv2021

Complex Langevin boundary terms in lattice models

In complex Langevin simulations, the insufficient decay of the probability density near infinity leads to boundary terms that spoil the formal argument for correctness. We present a formulation of this term that is cheaply measurable in lattice models, and in principle allows also the direct estimation of the systematic error of the CL method. Results for a toy model, 3d XY model and HDQCD are presented.

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arXiv2021

Topological susceptibility of pure gauge theory using Density of States

The topological susceptibility of the SU(3) pure gauge theory is calculated in the deconfined phase at temperatures up to $10T_c$. At such large temperatures the susceptibility is suppressed, topologically non-trivial configurations are extremely rare. Thus, direct lattice simulations are not feasible. The density of states (DoS) method is designed to simulate rare events, we present an application of the DoS method to the problem of high temperature topological susceptibility. We reconstruct the histogram of the charge sectors that one could have obtained in a naive importance sampling. Our findings are perfectly consistent with a free instanton gas.

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arXiv2019

Calculating the EoS of the dense quark-gluon plasma using the Complex Langevin equation

The pressure and energy density of the quark-gluon plasma at finite baryon chemical potential are calculated using the Complex Langevin equation. The stout smearing procedure is generalized for the SL(3,$\mathcal{C}$) manifold allowing the usage of an improved action in the Complex Langevin setup. Four degenerate flavors of staggered quarks with $m_π=500-700$ MeV are used with a tree-level Symanzik improved gauge action on $16^3 \times 8 $ lattices. Results are compared to the Taylor expansion and good agreement is found for small chemical potentials.

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arXiv2019

Complex Langevin and boundary terms

As is well known the Complex Langevin (CL) method sometimes fails to converge or converges to the wrong limit. We identified one reason for this long ago: insufficient decay of the probability density either near infinity or near poles of the drift, leading to boundary terms that spoil the formal argument for correctness. To gain a deeper understanding of this phenomenon, we analyze the emergence of such boundary terms thoroughly in a simple model, where analytic results can be compared with numerics. We also show how some simple modification stabilizes the CL process in such a way that it can produce results agreeing with direct integration. Besides explicitly demonstrating the connection between boundary terms and correct convergence our analysis also suggests a correctness criterion which could be applied in realistic lattice simulations.

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arXiv2018

Complex Langevin: Boundary terms and application to QCD

We employ the Complex Langevin method for simulation of complex-valued actions. First, we show how to test for convergence of the method by explicitely computing boundary terms and demonstrate this in a model. Then we investigate the deconfinement phase transition of QCD with $N_f=2$ Wilson-fermions using the Complex Langevin Method and. We give preliminary results for the transition temperatures up to $μ/T_c(μ=0)\approx 5$ and compute the curvature coefficient $κ_2$.

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