arXiv subjects

Giovanna Marcelli

Publications and source records attributed to Giovanna Marcelli.

15 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

The conductivity matrix at the topological phase transition

For a general class of two-dimensional non-interacting semi-metallic electron systems on a lattice, we derive an explicit formula for the whole conductivity matrix, by using Euclidean many-body formalism. The semi-metallic phase takes place whenever two Bloch bands touch at the Fermi energy with conical intersections and generally occurs at the transition between distinct integer quantum Hall phases. Unlike the longitudinal conductivity (which depends solely on the shape of the cones at the Fermi level), the transverse conductivity is remarkably determined both by the conical structures of the bands and by the nature of the two nearby topological phases. Generically, in the semi-metallic state, neither the longitudinal nor the transverse conductivities are quantized in integer multiples of a universal conductivity quantum; however, universality of the conductivity matrix is restored under the assumption of emergent rotational symmetry of the linearized Hamiltonian at the Fermi points. Using our formula, we compute the conductivity matrix for several physically relevant models of quantum Hall fluids at the topological phase transition, exhibiting cases where the transverse conductivity is quantized in half-integer multiples of $e^2/h$ and cases where it depends continuously on an external strain parameter, thus shedding light on its universality or non-universality features.

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arXiv2026

The Colored Hofstadter Butterfly as a Many-Body Quantum Hall Phase Diagram

We prove that the colored Hofstadter butterfly has a many-body interpretation for a broad class of weakly interacting lattice fermion systems. Starting from a spectral gap of a Hofstadter-like one-particle Hamiltonian at arbitrary magnetic flux $b$, we construct an open region in the three-dimensional parameter space $(b,μ,λ)$ of magnetic field, chemical potential, and interaction strength on which the infinite-volume interacting system has locally unique gapped ground states. The construction combines quasi-adiabatic continuation in the interaction strength with denominator-independent magnetic perturbation estimates, and therefore covers both commensurate and incommensurate fluxes, where no finite magnetic unit cell exists. On connected uniformly gapped regions meeting the non-interacting plane $λ=0$, we prove a many-body gap-labeling theorem: the Hall conductivity appearing in the macroscopic Ohm's law is constant and quantized, satisfying $2πσ^{\mathrm{H}}\in\mathbb{Z}$. Thus the integer colors of the non-interacting Hofstadter butterfly persist as Hall-conductivity labels of interacting quantum Hall phases.

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arXiv2026

Longitudinal conductivity at integer quantum Hall transitions

We consider a class of two-dimensional tight binding models displaying conical intersections of the Bloch bands at the Fermi level. The setting includes the case of generic transitions between quantum Hall phases. We consider the longitudinal conductivity, as given by Kubo formula, describing the variation of the current after introducing a space-homogeneous electric field, in an adiabatic way. We obtain an explicit expression for the longitudinal conductivity, completely determined by the number of conical intersections and by the shape of the cones. In particular, the formula reproduces the known quantized values found for graphene and for the critical Haldane model. Furthermore, we discuss the validity of Kubo formula in presence of conical intersections in the spectrum, starting from the time-dependent Schrödinger equation. For electric fields which are weak and slowly varying in space and in time, we prove the validity of linear response from quantum dynamics.

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arXiv2026

Spectral and dynamical results related to certain non-integer base expansions on the unit interval

We consider certain non-integer base $β$-expansions of Parry's type and we study various properties of the transfer (Perron-Frobenius) operator $\mathcal{P}:L^p([0,1])\mapsto L^p([0,1])$ with $p\geq 1$ and its associated composition (Koopman) operator, which are induced by a discrete dynamical system on the unit interval related to these $β$-expansions. We show that if $f$ is Lipschitz, then the iterated sequence $\{\mathcal{P}^N f\}_{N\geq 1}$ converges exponentially fast (in the $L^1$ norm) to an invariant state corresponding to the eigenvalue $1$ of $\mathcal{P}$. This "attracting" eigenvalue is not isolated: for $1\leq p\leq 2$ we show that the point spectrum of $\mathcal{P}$ also contains the whole open complex unit disk and we explicitly construct some corresponding eigenfunctions.

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arXiv2026

Spin transport and lack of quantisation for time-reversal symmetric insulators on the honeycomb structure

We investigate spin transport in a class of time-reversal symmetric insulators on the honeycomb structure, the Kane--Mele model being an emblematic example in this class. We derive the spin conductivity by the linear response à la Kubo and show that it is well-defined and independent of the choice of the spin current. For models that do not conserve the spin, we demonstrate that the deviation of the spin conductivity from the quantised value is, at worst, quadratic in the spin-non-conserving terms, thus improving previous results. Additionally, we show that the leading-order corrections are actually quadratic for some models in the class, demonstrating that the spin conductivity is not universally quantised. Consequently, our results show that, in general, there is no direct connection between the spin conductivity and the Fu--Kane--Mele index.

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arXiv2025

Near linearity of the macroscopic Hall current response in infinitely extended gapped fermion systems

We consider an infinitely extended system of fermions on a $d$-dimensional lattice with (magnetic) translation-invariant short-range interactions. We further assume that the system has a locally unique gapped ground state. Physically, this is a model for the bulk of a generic topological insulator at zero temperature, and we are interested in the current response of such a system to a constant external electric field. Using the non-equilibrium almost-stationary states approach, we prove that the longitudinal current density induced by a constant electric field of strength $\varepsilon$ is of order $\mathcal{O}(\varepsilon^\infty)$, i.e. the system is an insulator in the usual sense. For the Hall current density we show instead that it is linear in $\varepsilon$ up to terms of order $\mathcal{O}(\varepsilon^\infty)$. The proportionality factor $σ_\mathrm{H}$ is by definition the Hall conductivity, and we show that it is given by a generalization of the well known double commutator formula to interacting systems. As a by-product of our results, we find that the Hall conductivity is constant within gapped phases, and that for $d=2$ the relevant observable that "measures" the Hall conductivity in experiments, the Hall conductance, not only agrees with $σ_{\mathrm{H}}$ in expectation up to $\mathcal{O}(\varepsilon^\infty)$, but also has vanishing variance. A notable difference to several existing results on the current response in interacting fermion systems is that we consider a macroscopic system exposed to a small constant electric field, rather than to a small voltage drop.

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arXiv2024

On the self-consistent Landauer-Büttiker formalism

We provide sufficient conditions such that the time evolution of a mesoscopic tight-binding open system with a local Hartree-Fock non-linearity converges to a self-consistent non-equilibrium steady state, which is independent of the initial condition from the "small sample". We also show that the steady charge current intensities are given by Landauer-Büttiker-like formulas, and make the connection with the case of weakly self-interacting many-body systems.

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arXiv2023

Adiabatic Evolution of Low-Temperature Many-Body Systems

We consider finite-range, many-body fermionic lattice models and we study the evolution of their thermal equilibrium state after introducing a weak and slowly varying time-dependent perturbation. Under suitable assumptions on the external driving, we derive a representation for the average of the evolution of local observables via a convergent expansion in the perturbation, for small enough temperatures. Convergence holds for a range of parameters that is uniform in the size of the system. Under a spectral gap assumption on the unperturbed Hamiltonian, convergence is also uniform in temperature. As an application, our expansion allows us to prove closeness of the time-evolved state to the instantaneous Gibbs state of the perturbed system, in the sense of expectation of local observables, at zero and at small temperatures. As a corollary, we also establish the validity of linear response. Our strategy is based on a rigorous version of the Wick rotation, which allows us to represent the Duhamel expansion for the real-time dynamics in terms of Euclidean correlation functions, for which precise decay estimates are proved using fermionic cluster expansion.

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arXiv2023

Localization of generalized Wannier bases implies Chern triviality in non-periodic insulators

We investigate the relation between the localization of generalized Wannier bases and the topological properties of two-dimensional gapped quantum systems of independent electrons in a disordered background, including magnetic fields, as in the case of Chern insulators and quantum Hall systems. We prove that the existence of a well-localized generalized Wannier basis for the Fermi projection implies the vanishing of the Chern character, which is proportional to the Hall conductivity in the linear response regime. Moreover, we state a localization dichotomy conjecture for general non-periodic gapped quantum systems.

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arXiv2022

From charge to spin: analogies and differences in quantum transport coefficients

We review some recent results from the mathematical theory of transport of charge and spin in gapped crystalline quantum systems. The emphasis will be in transport coefficients like conductivities and conductances. As for the former, those are computed as appropriate expectations of current operators in a non-equilibrium almost-stationary state (NEASS), which arises from the perturbation of an equilibrium state by an external electric field. While for charge transport the usual double-commutator Kubo formula is recovered (also beyond linear response), we obtain formulas for appropriately-defined spin conductivities which are still explicit but more involved. Certain "Kubo-like" terms in these formulas are also shown to agree with corresponding contributions to the spin conductance. In addition to that, we employ similar techniques to show a new result, namely that even in systems with non-conserved spin there is no generation of spin torque, that is the spin torque operator has an expectation in the NEASS which vanishes faster than any power of the intensity of the perturbing field.

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arXiv2022

Improved energy estimates for a class of time-dependent perturbed Hamiltonians

We consider time-dependent perturbations which are relatively bounded with respect to the square root of an unperturbed Hamiltonian operator, and whose commutator with the latter is controlled by the full perturbed Hamiltonian. The perturbation is modulated by two auxiliary parameters, one regulates its intensity as a prefactor and the other one controls its time-scale via a regular function, whose derivative is compactly supported in a finite interval. We introduce a natural generalization of energy conservation in the case of time-dependent Hamiltonians: the boundedness of the two-parameter unitary propagator for the physical evolution with respect to the $n/2$-th power energy norm for all $n\in\mathbb{Z}$. We provide bounds of the $n/2$-th power energy norms, uniformly in time and in the time-scale parameter, for the unitary propagators, generated by the time-dependent perturbed Hamiltonian and by the unperturbed Hamiltonian in the interaction picture. The physically interesting model of Landau-type Hamiltonians with an additional weak and time-slowly-varying electric potential of unit drop is included in this framework.

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arXiv2021

Purely linear response of the quantum Hall current to space-adiabatic perturbations

Using recently developed tools from space-adiabatic perturbation theory, in particular the construction of a non-equilibrium almost stationary state, we give a new proof that the Kubo formula for the Hall conductivity remains valid beyond the linear response regime. In particular, we prove that, in quantum Hall systems and Chern insulators, the transverse response current is quantized up to any order in the strength of the inducing electric field. The latter is introduced as a perturbation to a periodic, spectrally gapped equilibrium Hamiltonian by means of a linear potential; existing proofs of the exactness of Kubo formula rely instead on a time-dependent magnetic potential. The result applies to both continuum and discrete crystalline systems modelling the quantum (anomalous) Hall effect.

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arXiv2020

A new approach to transport coefficients in the quantum spin Hall effect

We investigate some foundational issues in the quantum theory of spin transport, in the general case when the unperturbed Hamiltonian operator $H_0$ does not commute with the spin operator in view of Rashba interactions, as in the typical models for the Quantum Spin Hall effect. A gapped periodic one-particle Hamiltonian $H_0$ is perturbed by adding a constant electric field of intensity $\varepsilon \ll 1$ in the $j$-th direction, and the linear response in terms of a $S$-current in the $i$-th direction is computed, where $S$ is a generalized spin operator. We derive a general formula for the spin conductivity that covers both the choice of the conventional and of the proper spin current operator. We investigate the independence of the spin conductivity from the choice of the fundamental cell (Unit Cell Consistency), and we isolate a subclass of discrete periodic models where the conventional and the proper $S$-conductivity agree, thus showing that the controversy about the choice of the spin current operator is immaterial as far as models in this class are concerned. As a consequence of the general theory, we obtain that whenever the spin is (almost) conserved, the spin conductivity is (approximately) equal to the spin-Chern number. The method relies on the characterization of a non-equilibrium almost-stationary state (NEASS), which well approximates the physical state of the system (in the sense of space-adiabatic perturbation theory) and allows moreover to compute the response of the adiabatic $S$-current as the trace per unit volume of the $S$-current operator times the NEASS. This technique can be applied in a general framework, which includes both discrete and continuum models.

math-ph↗

arXiv2019

The Haldane model and its localization dichotomy

Gapped periodic quantum systems exhibit an interesting Localization Dichotomy, which emerges when one looks at the localization of the optimally localized Wannier functions associated to the Bloch bands below the gap. As recently proved, either these Wannier functions are exponentially localized, as it happens whenever the Hamiltonian operator is time-reversal symmetric, or they are delocalized in the sense that the expectation value of $|\mathbf{x}|^2$ diverges. Intermediate regimes are forbidden. Following the lesson of our Maestro, to whom this contribution is gratefully dedicated, we find useful to explain this subtle mathematical phenomenon in the simplest possible model, namely the discrete model proposed by Haldane (Phys. Rev. Lett. 61, 2017 (1988)). We include a pedagogical introduction to the model and we explain its Localization Dichotomy by explicit analytical arguments. We then introduce the reader to the more general, model-independent version of the dichotomy proved in (Commun. Math. Phys. 359, 61-100 (2018)), and finally we announce further generalizations to non-periodic models.

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arXiv2018

Spin Conductance and Spin Conductivity in Topological Insulators: Analysis of Kubo-like terms

We investigate spin transport in 2-dimensional insulators, with the long-term goal of establishing whether any of the transport coefficients corresponds to the Fu-Kane-Mele index which characterizes 2d time-reversal-symmetric topological insulators. Inspired by the Kubo theory of charge transport, and by using a proper definition of the spin current operator, we define the Kubo-like spin conductance $G_K^{s_z}$ and spin conductivity $σ_K^{s_z}$. We prove that for any gapped, periodic, near-sighted discrete Hamiltonian, the above quantities are mathematically well-defined and the equality $G_K^{s_z} = σ_K^{s_z}$ holds true. Moreover, we argue that the physically relevant condition to obtain the equality above is the vanishing of the mesoscopic average of the spin-torque response, which holds true under our hypotheses on the Hamiltonian operator. This vanishing condition might be relevant in view of further extensions of the result, e.g. to ergodic random discrete Hamiltonians or to Schrödinger operators on the continuum. A central role in the proof is played by the trace per unit volume and by two generalizations of the trace, the principal value trace and it directional version.

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