arXiv subjects

Menghan Song

Publications and source records attributed to Menghan Song.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Unraveling the Kagome Antiferromagnetic $3J$ Model and Its Materials: An Integrated Approach

We investigate the ground-state and finite-temperature properties of the kagome antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model with three inequivalent couplings, dubbed the 3J model, which is designed for the candidate Dirac quantum spin liquid (QSL) material YCu$_3$(OH)$_6$Br$_2$[Br$_{1-x}$(OH)$_x$] (see, e.g., Zeng et al., 2024). Employing large-scale density-matrix renormalization group (DMRG) supplemented by neural quantum states (NQS) simulations, we identify an intermediate QSL phase between two magnetically ordered phases. We also find that this QSL is separated from the kagome spin liquid ground state at the isotropic limit. To establish a direct comparison with experiments, we compute the specific heat of the model by means of advanced exponential (XTRG) and tangent-space (tanTRG) thermal tensor-network methods. In the magnetically ordered phase, the specific heat over temperature exhibits a shoulder at a temperature that is a fraction of the coupling strength $J_{hex}$, which disappears in the QSL phase. These universal behaviors are consistent with the experimentally observed specific heat in 3J materials for both ordered and QSL candidate samples. Our work thus connects microscopic models with experimentally measurable signatures, exemplifying an integrated approach (see Meng et al., 2026) to understanding QSL phenomena in frustrated quantum magnets, with 3J materials serving as a representative case and providing a foundation for future studies.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2026

Quantum Fisher Information as a Probe of Critical Scaling in Frustrated Magnets: Signatures from Kagome Quantum Spin Liquid

Quantum Fisher information (QFI) is a measure of multipartite quantum entanglement that can be obtained from inelastic neutron scattering data on quantum magnets. In this work, we demonstrate that the QFI can distinguish an unconventional quantum critical point (QCP) with fractionalization and emergent gauge structure from conventional ones within the Landau paradigm. We compute the QFI, via large-scale quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) simulations and exact diagonalization, in a kagome lattice quantum spin liquid (QSL) model with an XY and a cluster-Ising interactions. When the XY interaction is ferromagetic, the QFI obtained by QMC reveals a large anomalous dimension, which is a fingerprint of the (2+1)d XY$^\ast$ universality class for the transition from the ferromagnetic phase to the $\mathbb{Z}_2$ QSL. The investigation of thermal and dynamical properties of QFI is further extended to the case of antiferromagnetic XY interaction via exact diagonalization. In this regime, a transition to a possibly distinct QSL phase is suggested via both entanglement-based probes, such as QFI and genuine multipartite negativity, and analyses of the energy spectrum and structure factors. These results not only demonstrate the versatility of QFI in identifying QSL states and unconventional QCPs but also provide useful guidance for future theoretical and experimental studies of frustrated magnets.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2026

T-linear specific heat in pressurized and magnetized Shastry-Sutherland Mott insulator SrCu2(BO3)2

The pressurized Shastry-Sutherland Mott insulator SrCu2(BO3)2 has been found to host a plaquette-singlet phase and an antiferromagnetic phase that break different symmetries spontaneously.The recent experiment showed that their transition is of a first order nature, which seems against the pursuit of exotic and deconfined degrees of freedom in this famous frustrated quantum magnet. We found a new direction in this study. By applying a magnetic field to the material, we discover that SrCu2(BO3)2 exhibits a universal and metallic T-linear specific heat behavior in a large magnetitic field range close to the pressure of zero-field first order transition between plaquette-singlet and antiferromagnetic phases. Such an unexpected gapless response from an electronically gapped Mott insulator could be attributed to magnetized Dirac spinons liberated by the combined effect of magnetic field and pressure, consistently seen from our quantum many-body thermal tensor network computation of the Shastry-Sutherland model under magnetic field. Such a robust and universal T-linear specific heat phase points out the richness of the phase diagram of the material expanded by the axes of pressure and magnetic field and is calling for new theoretical frameworks to its full explanation.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2026

Thermodynamics of Shastry-Sutherland Model under Magnetic Field

Motivated by the recent experimental discovery of the $T$-linear specific heat in pressurized and magnetized Shastry-Sutherland Mott insulator SrCu$_2$(BO$_3$)$_2$, we perform the state-of-the-art thermal tensor-network computation on the Shastry-Sutherland model under a magnetic field. Our simulation results suggest the existence of a symmetric intermediate phase with $T$-linear specific heat at low temperature, occupying a large parameter space and between the plaquette-singlet phase and antiferromagnetic phase at low fields and other symmetry-breaking phases at high fields before the system is fully polarized. Such an unexpected novel state bears an astonishing similarity to the experimental findings in the material. It opens the door to further investigations of the possible liberation of deconfined magnetized Dirac spinons by the competing interactions in this highly frustrated quantum magnet model, and by the combined effects of magnetic field and pressure in the associated Shastry-Sutherland Mott insulator SrCu$_2$(BO$_3$)$_2$.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2025

Entanglement architecture of beyond-Landau quantum criticality

Quantum critical points beyond the Landau paradigm exhibit fractionalized excitations and emergent gauge fields. Here, we use entanglement microscopy--full tomography of the reduced density matrix of small subregions and subsequent extraction of their quantum correlations--to resolve the entanglement architecture near such exotic critical points. We focus on genuine multipartite entanglement (GME). Through unbiased quantum Monte Carlo sampling of RDMs across conventional O(2)/O(3) Wilson-Fisher transitions, and unconventional XY$^*$, and N\'eel-VBS transitions in (2+1)d, we discover a dichotomy: Landau criticality amplifies GME within compact subregions, while non-Landau criticality redistributes entanglement into larger, loopy configurations. Key signatures at non-Landau criticality include the absence of three-spin GME, and the loss of non-loopy entanglement in unicursal regions. Similar results in a critical resonating valence bond wavefunction confirm this multipartite entanglement structure as a common feature of emergent gauge theories. Our findings reveal a distinct entanglement architecture in beyond-Landau quantum critical theories.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2024

Multiparty Entanglement Microscopy of Quantum Ising models in 1d, 2d and 3d

Entanglement microscopy reveals the true quantum correlations among the microscopic building blocks of many-body systems [Nat. Commun. 16, 96 (2025)]. Using this approach, we study the multipartite entanglement of the quantum Ising model in 1d, 2d, and 3d. We first obtain the full reduced density matrix (tomography) of subregions that have at most 4 sites via quantum Monte Carlo, exact diagonalization, and the exact solution in 1d. We then analyze both bipartite and genuine multipartite entanglement (GME) among the sites in the subregion. To do so, we use a variety of measures including the negativity, as well as a true measure of GME: the genuinely multipartite concurrence (or GME concurrence), and its computationally cheaper lower bound, $I_2$. We provide a complete proof that $I_2$ bounds the GME concurrence, and show how the symmetries of the state simplify its evaluation. For adjacent sites, we find 3- and 4-spin GME present across large portions of the phase diagram, reaching maximum near the quantum critical point. In 1d, we identify the singular scaling of the derivative $dI_2/dh$ approaching the critical point. We observe a sharp decrease of GME with increasing dimensionality, coherent with the monogamous nature of entanglement. Furthermore, we find that GME disappears for subregions consisting of non-adjacent sites in both 2d and 3d, offering a stark illustration of the short-ranged nature of entanglement in equilibrium quantum matter arXiv:2402.06677. Finally, we analyze the most collective form of entanglement by evaluating the GME concurrence among all spins in the lattice, which can be obtained from a simple observable: the single-site transverse magnetization. This global concurrence is larger in 1d compared to 2d/3d, but it is relatively less robust against perturbations such as local measurements.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2024

Spin excitations arising from anisotropic Dirac spinons in YCu$_3$(OD)$_6$Br$_2$[Br$_{0.33}$(OD)$_{0.67}$]

A Dirac quantum spin liquid hosts Dirac spinons, which are low-energy fractionalized neutral quasiparticles with spin 1/2 that obey the Dirac equation. Recent inelastic neutron scattering studies have revealed a cone spin continuum in YCu$_3$(OD)$_6$Br$_2$[Br$_{x}$(OD)$_{1-x}$], consistent with the convolution of two Dirac spinons. In this work, we further studied spin excitations using the inelastic neutron scattering technique. The width of low-energy spin excitations shows a linear temperature dependence, which can be explained by spinon-spinon interactions with a Dirac dispersion. Polarized neutron scattering measurements reveal that in-plane magnetic fluctuations are about 1.5 times stronger than the out-of-plane ones, suggesting the presence of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction and consistent with our theoretical modeling and simulations. Moreover, the high-energy spin excitations around 14 meV agree with the one-pair spinon-antispinon excitations in Raman studies. The real part of the dynamical susceptibility derived from the Kramers-Kronig relationship also agrees with the Knight shift measured by nuclear magnetic resonance, clearly demonstrating the negligible effects of magnetic impurities on static susceptibility. These results provide a rare example in studying quantum-spin-liquid materials where different experimental techniques can be directly compared, and they give further insights for the possible Dirac quantum spin liquid in this system.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2024

Monte Carlo Simulation of Operator Dynamics and Entanglement in Dual-Unitary Circuits

We investigate operator dynamics and entanglement growth in dual-unitary circuits, a class of locally scrambled quantum systems that enables efficient simulation beyond the exponential complexity of the Hilbert space. By mapping the operator evolution to a classical Markov process,we perform Monte Carlo simulations to access the time evolution of local operator density and entanglement with polynomial computational cost. Our results reveal that the operator density converges exponentially to a steady-state value, with analytical bounds that match our simulations. Additionally, we observe a volume-law scaling of operator entanglement across different subregions,and identify a critical transition from maximal to sub-maximal entanglement growth, governed by the circuit's gate parameter. This transition, confirmed by both mean-field theory and Monte Carlo simulations, provides new insights into operator entanglement dynamics in quantum many-body systems. Our work offers a scalable computational framework for studying long-time operator evolution and entanglement, paving the way for deeper exploration of quantum information dynamics.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2024

An analog of topological entanglement entropy for mixed states

We propose the convex-roof extension of quantum conditional mutual information ("co(QCMI)") as a diagnostic of topological order in a mixed state. We focus primarily on topological states subjected to local decoherence, and employ the Levin-Wen scheme to define co(QCMI), so that for a pure state, co(QCMI) equals topological entanglement entropy (TEE). By construction, co(QCMI) is zero if and only if a mixed state can be decomposed as a convex sum of pure states with zero TEE. We show that co(QCMI) is non-increasing with increasing decoherence when Kraus operators are proportional to the product of onsite unitaries. This implies that unlike a pure state transition between a topologically trivial and a non-trivial phase, the long-range entanglement at a decoherence-induced topological phase transition as quantified by co(QCMI) is less than or equal to that in the proximate topological phase. For the 2d toric code decohered by onsite bit/phase-flip noise, we show that co(QCMI) is non-zero below the error-recovery threshold and zero above it. Relatedly, the decohered state cannot be written as a convex sum of short-range entangled pure states below the threshold. We conjecture and provide evidence that in this example, co(QCMI) equals TEE of a recently introduced pure state. In particular, we develop a tensor-assisted Monte Carlo (TMC) computation method to efficiently evaluate the R\'enyi TEE for the aforementioned pure state and provide non-trivial consistency checks for our conjecture. We use TMC to also calculate the universal scaling dimension of the anyon-condensation order parameter at this transition.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2024

Extracting Universal Corner Entanglement Entropy during the Quantum Monte Carlo Simulation

The subleading corner logarithmic corrections in entanglement entropy (EE) are crucial for revealing universal characteristics of the quantum critical points (QCPs), but they are challenging to detect. Motivated by recent developments in the stable computation of EE in (2+1)D quantum many-body systems, we have developed a new method for directly measuring the corner contribution in EE with less computational cost. The cornerstone of our approach is to measure the subtracted corner entanglement entropy (SCEE) defined as the difference between the EEs of subregions with the same boundary length for smooth and cornered boundaries during the sign-problem free quantum Monte Carlo simulation. Our improved method inherently eliminates not only the area law term of EE but also the subleading log-corrections arising from Goldstone modes, leaving the universal corner contribution as the leading term of SCEE with greatly improved data quality. Utilizing this advanced approach, we calculate the SCEE of the bilayer Heisenberg model on both square and honeycomb lattices across their (2+1)D O(3) QCPs with different opening angles on entanglement boundary, and obtain the accurate values of the corresponding universal corner log-coefficients. These findings will encourage further theoretical investigations to access controlled universal information for interacting CFTs at (2+1)D.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2024

Entanglement Microscopy: Tomography and Entanglement Measures via Quantum Monte Carlo

We employ a protocol, dubbed entanglement microscopy, to reveal the multipartite entanglement encoded in the full reduced density matrix of microscopic subregion both in spin and fermionic many-body systems. We exemplify our method by studying the phase diagram near quantum critical points (QCP) in 2 spatial dimensions: the transverse field Ising model and a Gross-Neveu-Yukawa transition of Dirac fermions. Our main results are: i) the Ising QCP exhibits short-range entanglement with a finite sudden death of the LN both in space and temperature; ii) the Gross-Neveu QCP has a power-law decaying fermionic LN consistent with conformal field theory (CFT) exponents; iii) going beyond bipartite entanglement, we find no detectable 3-party entanglement with our two witnesses in a large parameter window near the Ising QCP in 2d, in contrast to 1d. We further establish the singular scaling of general multipartite entanglement measures at criticality, and present an explicit analysis in the tripartite case. We also analytically obtain the large-temperature power-law scaling of the fermionic LN for general interacting systems. Entanglement microscopy opens a rich window into quantum matter, with countless systems waiting to be explored.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Extracting subleading corrections in entanglement entropy at quantum phase transitions

We systematically investigate the finite size scaling behavior of the R\'enyi entanglement entropy (EE) of several representative 2d quantum many-body systems between a subregion and its complement, with smooth boundaries as well as boundaries with corners. In order to reveal the subleading correction, we investigate the quantity ``subtracted EE" $S^s(l) = S(2l) - 2S(l)$ for each model, which is designed to cancel out the leading perimeter law. We find that $\mathbf{(1)}$ for a spin-1/2 model on a 2d square lattice whose ground state is the Neel order, the coefficient of the logarithmic correction to the perimeter law is consistent with the prediction based on the Goldstone modes; $\mathbf{(2)}$ for the $(2+1)d$ O(3) Wilson-Fisher quantum critical point (QCP), realized with the bilayer antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model, a logarithmic subleading correction exists when there is sharp corner of the subregion, but for subregion with a smooth boundary our data suggests the absence of the logarithmic correction to the best of our efforts; $\mathbf{(3)}$ for the $(2+1)d$ SU(2) J-Q$_2$ and J-Q$_3$ model for the deconfined quantum critical point (DQCP), we find a logarithmic correction for the EE even with smooth boundary.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Resummation-based Quantum Monte Carlo for Entanglement Entropy Computation

Based on the recently developed resummation-based quantum Monte Carlo method for the SU($N$) spin and loop-gas models, we develop a new algorithm, dubbed ResumEE, to compute the entanglement entropy (EE) with greatly enhanced efficiency. Our ResumEE exponentially speeds up the computation of the exponentially small value of the $\langle e^{-S^{(2)}}\rangle$, where $S^{(2)}$ is the 2nd order R\'enyi EE, such that the $S^{(2)}$ for a generic 2D quantum SU($N$) spin models can be readily computed with high accuracy. We benchmark our algorithm with the previously proposed estimators of $S^{(2)}$ on 1D and 2D SU($2$) Heisenberg spin systems to reveal its superior performance and then use it to detect the entanglement scaling data of the N\'eel-to-VBS transition on 2D SU($N$) Heisenberg model with continuously varying $N$. Our ResumEE algorithm is efficient for precisely evaluating the entanglement entropy of SU($N$) spin models with continuous $N$ and reliable access to the conformal field theory data for the highly entangled quantum matter.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Disorder Operator and R\'enyi Entanglement Entropy of Symmetric Mass Generation

In recent years a consensus has gradually been reached that the previously proposed deconfined quantum critical point (DQCP) for spin-1/2 systems, an archetypal example of quantum phase transition beyond the classic Landau's paradigm, actually does not correspond to a true unitary conformal field theory (CFT). In this work we carefully investigate another type of quantum phase transition supposedly beyond the similar classic paradigm, the so called ``symmetric mass generation" (SMG) transition proposed in recent years. We employ the sharp diagnosis including the scaling of disorder operator and R\'enyi entanglement entropy in large-scale lattice model quantum Monte Carlo simulations. Our results strongly suggest that the SMG transition is indeed an unconventional quantum phase transition and it should correspond to a true $(2+1)d$ unitary CFT.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Evolution of entanglement entropy at SU($N$) deconfined quantum critical points

Over the past two decades, the enigma of the deconfined quantum critical point (DQCP) has attracted broad attention across the condensed matter, quantum field theory, and high-energy physics communities, as it is expected to offer a new paradigm in theory, experiment, and numerical simulations that goes beyond the Landau-Ginzburg-Wilson framework of symmetry breaking and phase transitions. However, the nature of DQCP has been controversial. For instance, in the square-lattice spin-1/2 $J$-$Q$ model, believed to realize the DQCP between N\'eel and valence bond solid states, conflicting results, such as first-order versus continuous transition, and critical exponents incompatible with conformal bootstrap bounds, have been reported. The enigma of DQCP is exemplified in its anomalous logarithmic subleading contribution in its entanglement entropy (EE), which was discussed in recent studies. In the current work, we demonstrate that similar anomalous logarithmic behavior persists in a class of models analogous to the DQCP. We systematically study the quantum EE of square-lattice SU($N$) DQCP spin models. Based on large-scale quantum Monte Carlo computation of the EE, we show that for a series of $N$ smaller than a critical value, the anomalous logarithmic behavior always exists in the EE, which implies that the previously determined DQCPs in these models do not belong to conformal fixed points. In contrast, when $N\ge N_c$ with a finite $N_c$ that we evaluate to lie between $7$ and $8$, the DQCPs are consistent with conformal fixed points that can be understood within the Abelian Higgs field theory with $N$ complex components.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Quantum criticality and entanglement for two dimensional long-range Heisenberg bilayer

The study of quantum criticality and entanglement in systems with long-range (LR) interactions is still in its early stages, with many open questions remaining. In this work, we investigate critical exponents and scaling of entanglement entropies (EE) in the LR bilayer Heisenberg model using large-scale quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) simulations and the recently developed nonequilibrium increment algorithm for measuring EE. By applying modified (standard) finite-size scaling (FSS) above (below) the upper critical dimension and field theory analysis, we obtain precise critical exponents in three regimes: the LR Gaussian regime with a Gaussian fixed point, the short-range (SR) regime with Wilson-Fisher (WF) exponents, and a LR non-Gaussian regime where the critical exponents vary continuously from LR Gaussian to SR values. We compute the R\'enyi EE both along the critical line and in the N\'eel phase and observe that as the LR interaction is enhanced, the area-law contribution in EE gradually vanishes both at quantum critical points (QCPs) and in the N\'eel phase. The log-correction in EE arising from sharp corners at the QCPs also decays to zero as LR interaction grows, whereas the log-correction for N\'eel states, caused by the interplay of Goldstone modes and restoration of the symmetry in a finite system, is enhanced as LR interaction becomes stronger. We also discuss relevant experimental settings to detect these nontrivial properties in critical behavior and entanglement information for quantum many-body systems with LR interactions.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Finite-temperature critical behaviors in 2D long-range quantum Heisenberg model

The Mermin-Wagner theorem states that spontaneous continuous symmetry breaking is prohibited in systems with short-range interactions at spatial dimension $D\le 2$. For long-range interactions with a power-law form ($1/r^{\alpha}$), the theorem further forbids ferromagnetic or antiferromagnetic order at finite temperature when $\alpha\ge 2D$. However, the situation for $\alpha \in (2,4)$ at $D=2$ is not covered by the theorem. To address this, we conduct large-scale quantum Monte Carlo simulations and field theoretical analysis. Our findings show spontaneous breaking of $SU(2)$ symmetry in the ferromagnetic Heisenberg model with $1/r^{\alpha}$-form long-range interactions at $D=2$. We determine critical exponents through finite-size analysis for $\alpha<3$ (above the upper critical dimension with Gaussian fixed point) and $3\le\alpha<4$ (below the upper critical dimension with non-Gaussian fixed point). These results reveal new critical behaviors in 2D long-range Heisenberg models, encouraging further experimental studies of quantum materials with long-range interactions beyond the Mermin-Wagner theorem's scope.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2023

Dynamical properties of quantum many-body systems with long range interactions

Employing large-scale quantum Monte Carlo simulations, we systematically compute the energy spectra of the 2D spin-1/2 Heisenberg model with long-range interactions. With the $1/r^{\alpha}$ ferromagnetic and staggered antiferromagnetic interactions, we find the explicit range in $\alpha$ for {\color{black} the short-range Goldstone-type (gapless), anomalous Goldstone-type (gapless) and Higgs-type (gapped) spectra. Accompanied by the spin wave analysis, our numerical results vividly reveal how the long-range interactions alter the usual linear and quadratic magnon dispersions in 2D quantum magnets and give rise to anomalous dynamical exponents. Moreover, we find explicit case where the gapped excitation exists even when the Hamiltonian is extensive. This work provides the first set of unbiased dynamical data} of long-range quantum many-body systems and suggests that many universally accepted low-energy customs for short-range systems need to be substantially modified for long-range ones which are of immediate relevance to the ongoing experimental efforts from quantum simulators to 2D quantum moir\'e materials.

cond-mat.str-el↗