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Enrique Muñoz

Publications and source records attributed to Enrique Muñoz.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Disorder-tuned crossing of monopole and conventional pairing instabilities in multi-Weyl semimetals

We study how non-magnetic impurity scattering affects the emergence and possible coexistence of pairing instabilities in a two-node multi-Weyl semimetal. Within an explicitly specified projected impurity kernel---valley diagonal and momentum independent across each Fermi pocket, the leading behaviour of non-magnetic disorder in the small-pocket window $q^{\max}_{\rm intra}ξ_{\rm dis}\ll1\ll|2\mathbf Q|ξ_{\rm dis}$, treated at leading order in Born and Abrikosov--Gor'kov theory---quenched disorder tunes the leading pairing instability from a topologically nontrivial monopole channel to a conventional ($s$-wave) one, extending our earlier clean-system analysis into the disordered regime. A Born self-energy calculation in the chiral band basis then gives: (i) a band-isotropic conventional channel that is Anderson protected against intra-node scalar disorder ($η_s=1$), introduced phenomenologically at the projected-band level; solving the competition for arbitrary $η_s$ yields the crossing criterion $(1-η_s)/(1-η_m)<T_{c0}^{(s)}/T_{c0}^{(m)}$, so the mechanism tolerates substantial loss of conventional-channel protection; and (ii) a rank-one monopole sector fixing $f_m$ as the exact eigenfunction with $η_m(J)=1/(J+2)$, exact given that kernel. The crossing location in $Γ_N/T_{c0}^{(m)}$ is set by $η_m(J)$, $η_s$, and $r=T_{c0}^{(s)}/T_{c0}^{(m)}$. From the clean projected BdG Hamiltonian the pure monopole nodes carry Berry charge $\pm J$, distinct from the gapped conventional solution; the clean nodal thermodynamics is charge-dependent, $N_{\rm SC}(E)\propto E^{2/J}$ and $C\propto T^{1+2/J}$, and the residual density of states shows a threshold only for $J=1$. The crossing lies in the moderately metallic regime, $μ/Γ_N\simeq11$--$14$ for the illustrative $T_{c0}^{(m)}/μ=0.133$ used in the figures.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

Phonon-based determination of elastic coefficients in the Weyl semimetal TaAs

Reliable determination of elastic properties in topological semimetals is essential for understanding strain-related effects, but is often hindered by methodological and computational limitations. In this work, we combine first-principles phonon calculations with an elastic continuum model to determine the elastic properties of Weyl semimetal TaAs. The sound velocities extracted from the acoustic phonon branches are used to obtain the full set of elastic moduli, which show good agreement with previously reported values in the literature. From these results, we derive standard elastic parameters such as bulk, shear, and Young's moduli, and the Poisson ratio. This approach highlights a computationally efficient alternative to conventional strain-based methods, avoiding the need for large supercells when shear is applied, and thus possible strain-induced inconsistencies in the electronic basis, while providing a possibility to connect with experimental characterizations (e.g. Raman or Brillouin-Mandelstam scattering) of the lattice dynamics in Weyl semimetals.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

Critical Ripples and Dirac Fermions in Crystalline Membranes

Crystalline membranes hosting Dirac fermions, with graphene as the paradigmatic example, combine two low-energy sectors with sharply different dynamics: nonrelativistic flexural phonons and relativistic-like Dirac quasiparticles. We develop the low-energy field theory of this coupled system at charge neutrality and determine how this dynamical mismatch controls the coupling between the two sectors. In the long-wavelength flat phase, rotational symmetry ties the renormalization of the leading local scalar strain--density coupling to the scale-dependent bending rigidity, causing its dimensionless strength to decrease logarithmically. At the same time, flexural modes become parametrically slower than the Dirac fermions, so the resulting fermionic feedback vanishes as a power law.The flat phase is therefore stable against this perturbation. The physics changes when elastic interactions or electronic softening destabilize the membrane at a finite wavelength, selecting a ripple pattern formed by modes at $\pm\mathbf{Q}$. For an isolated pair of ordering wavevectors, provided that commensurability-induced phase pinning is irrelevant, the transition is governed by the bosonic Wilson--Fisher fixed point, while the Dirac fermions remain spectators. A genuinely hybrid electronic--structural critical point arises instead when symmetry permits a mass-type Dirac bilinear to share the ripple's momentum and quantum numbers, including horizontal-reflection parity. The transition is then described by the chiral-XY Gross--Neveu--Yukawa universality class. Using the known one-loop critical exponents, we characterize this transition, determine the induced secondary elastic distortion, and show that the fermionic and bosonic velocities lock in the isotropic continuum limit.

cond-mat.other↗

QED vertex and anomalous magnetic moment in the presence of a magnetic field

We compute the fermion-photon vertex in QED in the presence of a constant and uniform magnetic background up to one-loop order. We show that even at tree-level, the vertex is modified due to the loss of Lorentz invariance induced by the magnetic field, thus breaking into longitudinal and transverse pieces. Moreover, the radiative corrections induce the emergence of a rich tensor structure that includes the anomalous magnetic moments in the transverse, parallel, and mixed transverse/parallel directions. We concentrate on studying one of these anomalous magnetic moment components, the one in the purely transverse direction. We find the selection rules for transitions between a few low-lying Landau levels and show that the amplitudes for transitions from an initial to a final Landau level differ by a sign from the reverse process due to the loss of time reversal invariance induced by the presence of the field. Contrary to the vacuum case, the amplitudes are, in general, complex, and the phase factor can be interpreted in terms of a finite life-time of the decaying state. For the anomalous magnetic moment in the purely transverse direction, transitions between states occupying both the lowest Landau levels are forbidden. Moreover, for the computation of the allowed transitions, we find that it is not necessary to include a photon mass since the magnetic field acts as an infrared regulator.

hep-ph↗

Electric field fluctuations and renormalization group flows in a self-interacting scalar field theory

We consider a self interacting charged scalar field represented by the complex λϕ4 model, embedded in a background electric field exhibiting classical stochastic fluctuations. We studied the effects of the classical stochastic noise on the physical parameters of the scalar field theory, for both weak and ultra strong electric field regimes. The stochastic background electric field is included in the Schwinger propagator through the covariant derivative, and the generating functional of the theory is found by means of the replica trick in order to compute the statistical average over electric fluctuations. As a result of the averaging process, an effective interaction between charged currents emerges, with a coupling constant proportional to the magnitude of the auto-correlation function of the electric field fluctuations. We obtained the dressed propagators, the interaction vertices, and the renormalization group equations of the theory, along with the corresponding streamplots in the manifold of interaction couplings.

hep-th↗

Dilepton Production in a Rotating Thermal Medium: The Rigid Rotation Approximation

We investigate dilepton production in a thermalized quark--gluon plasma subject to global rotation, in the rigid rotating approximation. We consider a generic process involving quark-antiquark annihilation followed by the emission of a highly energetic virtual photon decaying into a dilepton pair. For this process, we compute the dilepton emission rate from the imaginary part of the photon polarization tensor, at finite temperature and vorticity. Our results show that vorticity induces characteristic modifications in the light dilepton channel, namely $e^-e^+$ production, where the emission spectrum exhibits a suppression at low transverse mass together with a mild shift of the production threshold. This behavior originates from the role of vorticity as an effective spin-dependent chemical potential that alters the available phase-space distribution for the emission process. In contrast, the $μ^-μ^+$ channel is {\color{red}more weakly affected by} the rotational background, thus remaining dominated by its intrinsic mass threshold. The resulting channel dependence highlights a potential phenomenological handle for disentangling rotational effects in heavy-ion collisions: while light dilepton spectra encode the imprints of vorticity in the infrared sector, the muon channel provides a comparatively robust baseline.

hep-ph↗

Electron-phonon interactions and instabilities in Weyl semimetals under magnetic fields and torsional strain

We study the presence of an external magnetic field, in combination with torsional strain, over the electron-phonon interactions in a type I Weyl semimetal. This particular superposition of field and strain, modeled in the continuum approximation by an effective gauge field, leads to an asymmetric pseudo-magnetic field at each Weyl node of opposite chirality. Therefore, we also studied the role of nodal asymmetry in the properties of the system by means of the Kadanoff-Wilson renormalization group and the corresponding flow equations. By solving those, we discuss the evolution of the coupling parameters of the theory, and analyze possible fixed points and lattice (Peierls) instabilities emerging from interactions between phonons with the chiral Landau level in the very strong pseudo-magnetic field regime.

cond-mat.str-el↗

Superconductivity in multi-Weyl semimetals: Conditions for the coexistence of topological and conventional phases

In this work, we explore the possible emergence of superconducting phases in a multi-Weyl semimetal. In particular, we show that the presence of a pair of Weyl nodes with chirality $|ν| \ge 1$ leads to an effective description of the intra-nodal pairings in terms of monopole harmonics, in contrast to inter-nodal pairings that preserve the angular dependence of conventional spherical harmonics. Therefore, we explore the conditions for the competition and/or coexistence between both types of superconducting phases, and we identify the presence of the so-called "topological repulsion" mechanism, which was previously reported in the context of simple Weyl semimetals. We identified the critical temperatures corresponding to the monopole and conventional superconducting phases, and calculated the specific heat as a function of temperature, thus showing that this thermodynamical parameter may provide an experimental probe to determine the chirality index $ν$ in the material.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

Very Special Relativity in Accelerated Frames: Non-relativistic Effects in Gravitational Spectroscopy of Ultracold Neutrons

In this paper, we investigate the phenomenology of fermionic systems in uniform gravitational fields within the framework of Very Special Relativity (VSR). We focus on the case of gravitational spectroscopy with ultracold neutrons, explored in experiments like \emph{q}\textsc{Bounce}. Calculating the leading ($c^0$) and next-to-leading ($c^{-1}$) order corrections to the non-relativistic Hamiltonian in an accelerated frame, we obtain the perturbed fermionic energy spectrum. At leading order, we do not find any modifications except for a trivial mass shift, thus preserving the equivalence between inertial and gravitational mass and particle-antiparticle sectors. The next-to-leading order corrections, instead, introduce time-dependent anisotropic contributions depending on the preferred spatial direction in VSR, and can then be used to probe novel Lorentz-violating signatures. Taking \emph{q}\textsc{Bounce} sensitivity as a benchmark, we derive a first rough constraint for the neutron VSR parameter. Finally, we suggest alternative spin-flipping setups to better probe VSR effects and foresee potential future research directions.

hep-ph↗

Anisotropic Photon and Dilepton Yield in a Thermalized Quark-Gluon Plasma under Magnetic Fluctuations

In this article, we analyze the effects of stochastic magnetic fluctuations with respect to an intense magnetic field background over the yields for photon and dilepton emission processes in a thermalized quark-gluon plasma phase. Such stochastic fluctuations model the effects of nearly random initial conditions for the nuclei participating in non-central heavy-ion collisions, which are the sources of the background magnetic field. Our theoretical results predict significant anisotropic effects due to stochastic magnetic noise over the angular distribution for photon and dilepton production rates in this scenario.

hep-th↗

Strongly interacting matter in extreme magnetic fields

Magnetic fields are ubiquitous across different physical systems of current interest; from the early Universe, compact astrophysical objects and heavy-ion collisions to condensed matter systems. A proper treatment of the effects produced by magnetic fields during the dynamical evolution of these systems, can help to understand observables that otherwise show a puzzling behavior. Furthermore, when these fields are comparable to or stronger than Λ_QCD, they serve as excellent probes to help elucidate the physics of strongly interacting matter under extreme conditions of temperature and density. In this work we provide a comprehensive review of recent developments on the description of QED and QCD systems where magnetic field driven effects are important. These include the modification of meson static properties such as masses and form factors, the chiral magnetic effect, the description of anomalous transport coefficients, superconductivity in extreme magnetic fields, the properties of neutron stars, the evolution of heavy-ion collisions, as well as effects on the QCD phase diagram. We describe recent theory and phenomenological developments using effective models as well as LQCD methods. The work represents a state-of-the-art review of the field, motivated by presentations and discussions during the "Workshop on Strongly Interacting Matter in Strong Electromagnetic Fields" that took place in the European Centre for Theoretical Studies in Nuclear Physics and Related Areas (ECT*) in the city of Trento, Italy, September 25-29, 2023.

nucl-th↗

Topological versus conventional superconductivity in a Weyl semimetal: A microscopic approach

Starting from a microscopic model for the particle-particle interactions in a Weyl semimetal, we analyzed the possibility for conventional as well as monopole Cooper pairing between quasiparticle excitations at the same (intra-nodal) or opposite (inter-nodal) Weyl nodes. We derived a coupled system of self-consistent BCS-like equations, where the angular dependence of the pairings is directly determined from the microscopic interaction symmetries. We studied the competition between conventional and monopole superconducting phases, thus obtaining explicitly the phase diagrams from the microscopic interaction model parameters. We determined the critical temperatures for both phases, and the low temperature critical behavior, including the specific heat, that we suggest as possible experimental probe for topological quantum criticality in Weyl semimetals.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

Fermion Self-Energy and Effective Mass in a Noisy Magnetic Background

In this article, we consider the propagation of QED fermions in the presence of a classical background magnetic field with white-noise stochastic fluctuations. The effects of the magnetic field fluctuations are incorporated into the fermion and photon propagators in a quasi-particle picture, which we developed in previous works using the {\it replica trick}. By considering the strong-field limit, here we explicitly calculate the fermion self-energy involving radiative contributions at first-order in $α_\text{em}$, in order to obtain the noise-averaged mass of the fermion propagating in the fluctuating magnetized medium. Our analytical results reveal a leading double-logarithmic contribution $\sim \left[\ln \left( |e B|/m^2 \right)\right]^2$ to the mass, with an imaginary part representing a spectral broadening proportional to the magnetic noise auto-correlation $Δ$. While a uniform magnetic field already breaks Lorentz invariance, inducing the usual separation into two orthogonal subspaces (perpendicular and parallel with respect to the field), the presence of magnetic noise further breaks the remaining symmetry, thus leading to distinct spectral widths associated with fermion and anti-fermion, and their spin projection in the quasi-particle picture.

hep-th↗

Exploring magnetic fluctuations effects in QED gauge fields: implications for mass generation

In this work, we calculate the one-loop contribution to the polarization tensor for photons (and gluons) in the presence of a classical background magnetic field with white-noise stochastic fluctuations. The magnetic field fluctuations are incorporated into the fermion propagator in a quasi-particle picture, which we developed in previous works using the {\it replica trick}. By focusing on the strong-field limit, here we explicitly calculate the polarization tensor. Our results reveal that it does not satisfy the transversality conditions outlined by the Ward identity, thus breaking the $U(1)$ symmetry. As a consequence, in the limit of vanishing photon four-momenta, the tensor coefficients indicate the emergence of an effective magnetic mass induced on photons (and gluons) by these stochastic fluctuations, leading to the interpretation of a dispersive medium with a noise-dependent index of refraction.

hep-th↗

Generation of phonon quantum states and quantum correlations among single photon emitters in hexagonal boron nitride

Hexagonal boron nitride exhibits two types of defects with great potential for quantum information technologies: single-photon emitters (SPEs) and one-dimensional grain boundaries hosting topologically-protected phonons, termed as {\it{topologically-protected phonon lines}} (TPL). Here, by means of a simple effective model and density functional theory calculations, we show that it is possible to use these phonons for the transmission of information. Particularly, a single SPE can be used to induce single-, two- and qubit-phonon states in the one dimensional channel, and \textit{(ii)} two distant SPEs can be coupled by the TPL that acts as a waveguide, thus exhibiting strong quantum correlations. We highlight the possibilities offered by this material-built-in nano-architecture as a phononic device for quantum information technologies.

quant-ph↗

Temperature fluctuations in a relativistic gas: Pressure corrections and possible consequences in the deconfinement transition

In this work, we study the effects of random temperature fluctuations on the equation of state of a non-interacting, relativistic fermion gas by means of the replica method. This picture provides a conceptual model for a non-equilibrium system, depicted as an ensemble of subsystems at different temperatures, randomly distributed with respect to a given mean value. We then assume the temperature displays stochastic fluctuations $T = T_0 + δT$ with respect to its ensemble average value $T_0$, with zero mean $\overline{δT} = 0$ and standard deviation $\overline{δT^2} = Δ$. By means of the replica method, we obtain the average grand canonical potential, leading to the equation of state of the fermion gas expressed in terms of the excess pressure caused by these fluctuations with respect to the ideal gas at uniform temperature. We further extend our results for the ideal Bose gas as well. Our findings reveal an increase in pressure as the system's ensemble average temperature $T_0$ rises, consistently exceeding the pressure observed in an equilibrium state. Finally, we explore the implications for the deconfinement transition in the context of the simple Bag model, where we show that the critical temperature decreases.

hep-th↗

Ultracold Neutrons in the Low Curvature Limit: Remarks on the post-Newtonian effects

Ultracold neutrons are great experimental tools to explore the gravitational interaction in the regime of quantized states. From a theoretical perspective, starting from a Dirac equation in curved spacetime, we applied a perturbative scheme to systematically derive the non-relativistic Schrödinger equation that governs the evolution of the neutron's wave function in the Earth's gravitational field. At the lowest order, this procedure reproduces a Schrödinger system affected by a linear Newtonian potential, but corrections due to both curvature and relativistic effects are present. Here, we argue that one should be very careful when going one step further in the perturbative expansion. Proceeding methodically with the help of the Foldy-Wouthuysen transformation and a formal post-Newtonian $c^{-2}-$expansion, we derive the non-relativistic Hamiltonian for a generic static spacetime. By employing Fermi coordinates within this framework, we calculate the next-to-leading order corrections to the neutron's energy spectrum. Finally, we evaluate them for typical experimental configurations, such as that of qBOUNCE, and note that, while the current precision for observations of ultracold neutrons may not yet enable to probe them, they could still be relevant in the future or in alternative circumstances.

gr-qc↗

Earthquake Quantization

In this homage to Einstein's 144th birthday we propose a novel quantization prescription, where the paths of a path-integral are not random, but rather solutions of a geodesic equation in a random background. We show that this change of perspective can be made mathematically equivalent to the usual formulations of non-relativistic quantum mechanics. To conclude, we comment on conceptual issues, such as quantum gravity coupled to matter and the quantum equivalence principle.

quant-ph↗