arXiv subjects

Didier Poilblanc

Publications and source records attributed to Didier Poilblanc.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2022

Real-time dynamics of a critical Resonating Valence Bond spin liquid

Implementation of the hardcore-dimer Hilbert space in cold Rydberg-atom simulators opens a new route of investigating real-time dynamics of dimer liquids under Hamiltonian quench. Here, we consider an initial Resonating Valence Bond (RVB) state on the square lattice realizing a critical Coulomb phase with algebraic and dipolar correlations. Using its representation as a special point of a broad manifold of SU($2$)-symmetric, translationnally invariant, Projected Entangled Pair States (PEPS), we compute its non-equilibrium dynamics upon turning on inter-site Heisenberg interactions. We show that projecting the time-evolution onto the PEPS manifold remains accurate at small time scales. We also find that the state evolves within a PEPS sub-manifold characterized by a U($1$) gauge symmetry, suggesting that the Coulomb phase is stable under such unitary evolution.

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arXiv2021

The emergence of gapless quantum spin liquid from deconfined quantum critical point

A quantum spin liquid (QSL) is a novel phase of matter with long-range entanglement where localized spins are highly correlated with the vanishing of magnetic order. Such exotic quantum states provide the opportunities to develop new theoretical frameworks for many-body physics and have the potential application in realizing robust quantum computations. Here we show that a gapless QSL can naturally emerge from a deconfined quantum critical point (DQCP), which is originally proposed to describe Landau forbidden continuous phase transition between antiferromagnetic (AFM) and valence-bond solid (VBS) phases. Via large-scale tensor network simulations of a square-lattice spin-1/2 frustrated Heisenberg model, both QSL state and DQCP-type AFM-VBS transition are observed. With tuning coupling constants, the AFM-VBS transition vanishes and instead, a gapless QSL phase gradually develops in between. Remarkably, along the phase boundaries of AFM-QSL and QSL-VBS transitions, we always observe the same correlation length exponents $ν\approx 1.0$, which is intrinsically different from the one of the DQCP-type transition, indicating new types of universality classes. Our results explicitly demonstrate a new scenario for understanding the emergence of gapless QSL from an underlying DQCP. The discovered QSL phase survives in a large region of tuning parameters and we expect its experimental realizations in solid state materials or quantum simulators.

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arXiv2021

Gapless quantum spin liquid and global phase diagram of the spin-1/2 $J_1$-$J_2$ square antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model

The nature of the zero-temperature phase diagram of the spin-$1/2$ $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg model on a square lattice has been debated in the past three decades, which may hold the key to understand high temperature superconductivity. By using the state-of-the-art tensor network method, specifically, the finite projected entangled pair state (PEPS) algorithm, to simulate the global phase diagram the $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg model up to $24\times 24$ sites, we provide very solid evidences to show that the nature of the intermediate nonmagnetic phase is a gapless quantum spin liquid (QSL), whose spin-spin and dimer-dimer correlations both decay with a power law behavior. There also exists a valence-bond solid (VBS) phase in a very narrow region $0.56\lesssim J_2/J_1\leq0.61$ before the system enters the well known collinear antiferromagnetic phase. The physical nature of the discovered gapless QSL and potential experimental implications are also addressed. We stress that we make the first detailed comparison between the results of PEPS and the well-established density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method through one-to-one direct benchmark for small system sizes, and thus give rise to a very solid PEPS calculation beyond DMRG. Our numerical evidences explicitly demonstrate the huge power of PEPS for precisely capturing long-range physcis for highly frustrated systems, and also demonstrate the finite PEPS method is a very powerful approach to study strongly corrleated quantum many-body problems.

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arXiv2021

Abelian SU$(N)_1$ Chiral Spin Liquids on the Square Lattice

In the physics of the Fractional Quantum Hall (FQH) effect, a zoo of Abelian topological phases can be obtained by varying the magnetic field. Aiming to reach the same phenomenology in spin-like systems, we propose a family of SU($N$)-symmetric models in the fundamental representation, on the square lattice with short-range interactions restricted to triangular units, a natural generalization for arbitrary $N$ of an SU($3$) model studied previously where time-reversal symmetry is broken explicitly. Guided by the recent discovery of SU($2$)$_1$ and SU($3$)$_1$ chiral spin liquids (CSL) on similar models we search for topological SU($N$)$_1$ CSL in some range of the Hamiltonian parameters via a combination of complementary numerical methods such as exact diagonalizations (ED), infinite density matrix renormalization group (iDMRG) and infinite Projected Entangled Pair State (iPEPS). Extensive ED on small (periodic and open) clusters up to $N=10$ and an innovative SU($N$)-symmetric version of iDMRG to compute entanglement spectra on (infinitely-long) cylinders in all topological sectors provide unambiguous signatures of the SU($N$)$_1$ character of the chiral liquids. An SU($4$)-symmetric chiral PEPS, constructed in a manner similar to its SU($2$) and SU($3$) analogs, is shown to give a good variational ansatz of the $N=4$ ground state, with chiral edge modes originating from the PEPS holographic bulk-edge correspondence. Finally, we discuss the possible observation of such Abelian CSL in ultracold atom setups where the possibility of varying $N$ provides a tuning parameter similar to the magnetic field in the physics of the FQH effect.

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arXiv2021

Gutzwiller-projected states for the $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg model on the kagome lattice: achievements and pitfalls

We assess the ground-state phase diagram of the $J_1$-$J_2$ Heisenberg model on the kagome lattice by employing Gutzwiller-projected fermionic wave functions. Within this framework, different states can be represented, defined by distinct unprojected fermionic Hamiltonians that include hopping and pairing terms, as well as a coupling to local Zeeman fields to generate magnetic order. For $J_2=0$, the so-called U(1) Dirac state, in which only hopping is present (such as to generate a $π$-flux in the hexagons), has been shown to accurately describe the exact ground state [Y. Iqbal, F. Becca, S. Sorella, and D. Poilblanc, Phys. Rev. B 87, 060405 (2013); Y.-C. He, M. P. Zaletel, M. Oshikawa, and F. Pollmann, Phys. Rev. X 7, 031020 (2017)]. Here, we show that its accuracy improves in presence of a small antiferromagnetic super-exchange $J_2$, leading to a finite region where the gapless spin liquid is stable; then, for $J_2/J_1=0.11(1)$, a first-order transition to a magnetic phase with pitch vector ${\bf q}=(0,0)$ is detected, by allowing magnetic order within the fermionic Hamiltonian. Instead, for small ferromagnetic values of $|J_2|/J_1$, the situation is more contradictory. While the U(1) Dirac state remains stable against several perturbations in the fermionic part (i.e., dimerization patterns or chiral terms), its accuracy clearly deteriorates on small systems, most notably on $36$ sites where exact diagonalization is possible. Then, upon increasing the ratio $|J_2|/J_1$, a magnetically ordered state with $\sqrt{3} \times \sqrt{3}$ periodicity eventually overcomes the U(1) Dirac spin liquid. Within the ferromagnetic $J_{2}$ regime, evidence is shown in favor of a first-order transition at $J_2/J_1=-0.065(5)$.

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arXiv2020

Spin-$\frac{1}{2}$ kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet with strong breathing anisotropy

We study the zero-temperature phase diagram of the spin-$\frac{1}{2}$ Heisenberg model with breathing anisotropy (i.e., with different coupling strength on the upward and downward triangles) on the kagome lattice. Our study relies on large scale tensor network simulations based on infinite projected entangled-pair state and infinite projected entangled-simplex state methods adapted to the kagome lattice. Our energy analysis suggests that the U(1) algebraic quantum spin-liquid (QSL) ground-state of the isotropic Heisenberg model is stable up to very large breathing anisotropy until it breaks down to a critical lattice-nematic phase that breaks rotational symmetry in real space through a first-order quantum phase transition. Our results also provide further insight into the recent experiment on vanadium oxyfluoride compounds which has been shown to be relevant platforms for realizing QSL in the presence of breathing anisotropy.

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arXiv2020

Finite-temperature symmetric tensor network for spin-1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnets on the square lattice

Within the tensor network framework, the (positive) thermal density operator can be approximated by a double layer of infinite Projected Entangled Pair Operator (iPEPO) coupled via ancilla degrees of freedom. To investigate the thermal properties of the spin-1/2 Heisenberg model on the square lattice, we introduce a family of fully spin-$SU(2)$ and lattice-$C_{4v}$ symmetric on-site tensors (of bond dimensions $D=4$ or $D=7$) and a plaquette-based Trotter-Suzuki decomposition of the imaginary-time evolution operator. A variational optimization is performed on the plaquettes, using a full (for $D=4$) or simple (for $D=7$) environment obtained from the single-site Corner Transfer Matrix Renormalization Group fixed point. The method is benchmarked by a comparison to quantum Monte Carlo in the thermodynamic limit. Although the iPEPO spin correlation length starts to deviate from the exact exponential growth for inverse-temperature $β\gtrsim 2$, the behavior of various observables turns out to be quite accurate once plotted w.r.t the inverse correlation length. We also find that a direct $T=0$ variational energy optimization provides results in full agreement with the $β\rightarrow\infty$ limit of finite-temperature data, hence validating the imaginary-time evolution procedure. Extension of the method to frustrated models is described and preliminary results are shown.

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arXiv2020

Quantum spin liquid phases in the bilinear-biquadratic two-SU(4)-fermion Hamiltonian on the square lattice

We consider the phase diagram of the most general SU(4)-symmetric two-site Hamiltonian for a system of two fermions per site (ie self-conjugate $\bf 6$ representation) on the square lattice. It is known that this model hosts magnetic phases breaking SU(4) symmetry and quantum disordered dimer-like phases breaking lattice translation symmetry. Motivated by a previous work [O. Gauthé, S. Capponi and D. Poilblanc, Phys. Rev. B $\textbf{99}$, 241112(R) (2019)], we investigate the possibility of the existence of SU(4) quantum spin liquid phases in this model, using SU(4)-symmetric Projected Entangled Pair States (PEPS) of small bond dimensions, which can be classified according to point group and charge (C) symmetries. Among several (disconnected) families of SU(4)-symmetric PEPS, breaking or not C-symmetry, we identify critical or topological spin liquids which may be stable in some regions of the phase diagram. These results are confronted to exact diagonalisation (ED) and density matrix renormalisation group (DMRG) calculations.

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arXiv2020

Ground-state properties of the one-dimensional Hubbard model with pairing potential

We consider a modification of the one-dimensional Hubbard model by including an external pairing potential. Guided by analytic bosonization results, we quantitatively determine the grand-canonical zero-temperature phase diagram using both finite and infinite density matrix renormalization group algorithm based on the formalism of matrix product states and matrix product operator, respectively. By computing various local quantities as well as the half-system entanglement, we are able to distinguish between Mott, metallic and superconducting phases. We point out the compressible nature of the Mott phase and the fully gapped nature of the many-body spectrum of the superconducting phase, in the presence of explicit U(1)-charge symmetry breaking.

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arXiv2020

Investigation of the Néel phase of the frustrated Heisenberg antiferromagnet by differentiable symmetric tensor networks

The recent progress in the optimization of two-dimensional tensor networks [H.-J. Liao, J.-G. Liu, L. Wang, and T. Xiang, Phys. Rev. X ${\bf 9}$, 031041 (2019)] based on automatic differentiation opened the way towards precise and fast optimization of such states and, in particular, infinite projected entangled-pair states (iPEPS) that constitute a generic-purpose ${\it Ansatz}$ for lattice problems governed by local Hamiltonians. In this work, we perform an extensive study of a paradigmatic model of frustrated magnetism, the $J_1-J_2$ Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the square lattice. By using advances in both optimization and subsequent data analysis, through finite correlation-length scaling, we report accurate estimations of the magnetization curve in the Néel phase for $J_2/J_1 \le 0.45$. The unrestricted iPEPS simulations reveal an $U(1)$ symmetric structure, which we identify and impose on tensors, resulting in a clean and consistent picture of antiferromagnetic order vanishing at the phase transition with a quantum paramagnet at $J_2/J_1 \approx 0.46(1)$. The present methodology can be extended beyond this model to study generic order-to-disorder transitions in magnetic systems.

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arXiv2020

SU$(3)_1$ Chiral Spin Liquid on the Square Lattice: a View from Symmetric PEPS

Quantum spin liquids can be faithfully represented and efficiently characterized within the framework of Projected Entangled Pair States (PEPS). Guided by extensive exact diagonalization and density matrix renormalization group calculations, we construct an optimized symmetric PEPS for a SU$(3)_1$ chiral spin liquid on the square lattice. Characteristic features are revealed by the entanglement spectrum (ES) on an infinitely long cylinder. In all three $\mathbb{Z}_3$ sectors, the level counting of the linear dispersing modes is in full agreement with SU$(3)_1$ Wess-Zumino-Witten conformal field theory prediction. Special features in the ES are shown to be in correspondence with bulk anyonic correlations, indicating a fine structure in the holographic bulk-edge correspondence. Possible universal properties of topological SU$(N)_k$ chiral PEPS are discussed.

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arXiv2019

Competing orders in the Hofstadter t-J model

The Hofstadter model describes non-interacting fermions on a lattice in the presence of an external magnetic field. Motivated by the plethora of solid-state phases emerging from electron interactions, we consider an interacting version of the Hofstadter model including a Hubbard repulsion U. We investigate this model in the large-U limit corresponding to a t-J Hamiltonian with an external (orbital) magnetic field. By using renormalized mean field theory supplemented by exact diagonalization calculations of small clusters, we find evidence for competing symmetry-breaking phases, exhibiting (possibly co-existing) charge, bond and superconducting orders. Topological properties of the states are also investigated and some of our results are compared to related experiments involving ultra-cold atoms loaded on optical lattices in the presence of a synthetic gauge field.

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arXiv2019

Gapped $Z_2$ spin liquid in the breathing kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet

We investigate the spin-1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet on the kagome lattice with breathing anisotropy (i.e. with weak and strong triangular units), constructing an improved simplex Resonating Valence Bond (RVB) ansatz by successive applications (up to three times) of local quantum gates which implement a filtering operation on the bare nearest-neighbor RVB state. The resulting Projected Entangled Pair State involves a small number of variational parameters (only one at each level of application) and preserves full lattice and spin-rotation symmetries. Despite its simple analytic form, the simplex RVB provides very good variational energies at strong and even intermediate breathing anisotropy. We show that it carries $Z_2$ topological order which does not fade away under the first few applications of the quantum gates, suggesting that the RVB topological spin liquid becomes a competing ground state candidate for the kagome antiferromagnet at large breathing anisotropy.

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arXiv2019

Critical colored-RVB states in the frustrated quantum Heisenberg model on the square lattice

We consider a family of SU(2)-symmetric Projected Entangled Paired States (PEPS) on the square lattice, defining colored-Resonating Valence Bond (RVB) states, to describe the quantum disordered phase of the $J_1-J_2$ frustrated Heisenberg model.For $J_2/J_1\sim 0.55$ we show the emergence of critical (algebraic) dimer-dimer correlations -- typical of Rokhsar-Kivelson (RK) points of quantum dimer models on bipartite lattices -- while, simultaneously, the spin-spin correlation length remains short. Our findings are consistent with a spin liquid or a weak Valence Bond Crystal in the neighborhood of an RK point.

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arXiv2019

Novel families of ${\rm SU}(N)$ AKLT states with arbitrary self-conjugate edge states

Using the Matrix Product State framework, we generalize the Affleck-Kennedy-Lieb-Tasaki (AKLT) construction to one-dimensional spin liquids with global color ${\rm SU}(N)$ symmetry, finite correlation lengths, and edge states that can belong to any self-conjugate irreducible representation (irrep) of ${\rm SU}(N)$. In particular, ${\rm SU}(2)$ spin-$1$ AKLT states with edge states of arbitrary spin $s=1/2,1,3/2,\cdots$ are constructed, and a general formula for their correlation length is given. Furthermore, we show how to construct local parent Hamiltonians for which these AKLT states are unique ground states. This enables us to study the stability of the edge states by interpolating between exact AKLT Hamiltonians. As an example, in the case of spin-$1$ physical degrees of freedom, it is shown that a quantum phase transition of central charge $c = 1$ separates the Symmetry Protected Topological (SPT) phase with spin-$1/2$ edge states from a topologically trivial phase with spin-$1$ edge states. We also address some specificities of the generalization to ${\rm SU}(N)$ with $N>2$, in particular regarding the construction of parent Hamiltonians. For the AKLT state of the ${\rm SU}(3)$ model with the $3$-box symmetric representation, we prove that the edge states are in the $8$-dimensional adjoint irrep, and for the ${\rm SU}(3)$ model with adjoint irrep at each site, we are able to construct two different reflection-symmetric AKLT Hamiltonians, each with a unique ground state which is either even or odd under reflection symmetry and with edge states in the adjoint irrep. Finally, examples of two-column and adjoint physical irreps for ${\rm SU}(N)$ with $N$ even and with edge states living in the antisymmetric irrep with $N/2$ boxes are given, with a conjecture about the general formula for their correlation lengths.

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arXiv2019

SU(4) topological RVB spin liquid on the square lattice

We generalize the construction of the spin-1/2 SU(2) Resonating Valence Bond (RVB) state to the case of the self-conjugate $\bf 6$-representation of SU(4). As for the case of SU(2) [J-Y. Chen and D. Poilblanc, Phys. Rev. B $\textbf{97}$, 161107(R) (2018)], we use the Projected Entangled Pair State (PEPS) formalism to derive a simple (two-dimensional) family of generalized SU(4) RVB states on the square lattice. We show that, when longer-range SU(4)-singlet bonds are included, a local gauge symmetry is broken down from U(1) to $\mathbb{Z}_2$, leading to the emergence of a short-range spin liquid. Evidence for the topological nature of this spin liquid is provided by the investigation of the Renyi entanglement entropy of infinitely-long cylinders and of the modular matrices. Relevance to microscopic models and experiments of ultracold atoms is discussed.

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arXiv2018

Non-Abelian chiral spin liquid in a quantum antiferromagnet revealed by an iPEPS study

Abelian and non-Abelian topological phases exhibiting protected chiral edge modes are ubiquitous in the realm of the Fractional Quantum Hall (FQH) effect. Here, we investigate a spin-1 Hamiltonian on the square lattice which could, potentially, host the spin liquid analog of the (bosonic) non-Abelian Moore-Read FQH state, as suggested by Exact Diagonalisation of small clusters. Using families of fully SU(2)-spin symmetric and translationally invariant chiral Projected Entangled Pair States (PEPS), variational energy optimization is performed using infinite-PEPS methods, providing good agreement with Density Matrix Renormalisation Group (DMRG) results. A careful analysis of the bulk spin-spin and dimer-dimer correlation functions in the optimized spin liquid suggests that they exhibit long-range "gossamer tails". We argue these tails are finite-$D$ artifacts of the chiral PEPS, which become irrelevant when the PEPS bond dimension $D$ is increased. From the investigation of the entanglement spectrum, we observe sharply defined chiral edge modes following the prediction of the SU(2)$_2$ Wess-Zumino-Witten theory and exhibiting a conformal field theory (CFT) central charge $c=3/2$, as expected for a Moore-Read chiral spin liquid. We conclude that the PEPS formalism offers an unbiased and efficient method to investigate non-Abelian chiral spin liquids in quantum antiferromagnets.

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arXiv2018

Discrete lattice symmetry breaking in a two-dimensional frustrated spin-1 Heisenberg model

Spontaneous discrete symmetry breaking can be described in the framework of Projected Entangled Pair States (PEPS) by linearly superposing local tensors belonging to two (or more) symmetry classes of tensors. This is illustrated in the case of a frustrated spin-1 Heisenberg model on the square lattice, which hosts a nematic spin liquid spontaneously breaking lattice $π/2$-rotation symmetry. A superposition of SU(2)-symmetric PEPS tensors belonging to two irreducible representations of the lattice point group is shown to capture accurately the properties of the nematic phase, as shown from a comparison to Exact Diagonalisations and Density Matrix Renormalization Group results.

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