Engineering Surface Critical Behavior of (2+1)-Dimensional O(3) Quantum Critical Points

Surface critical behavior (SCB) refers to the singularities of physical quantities on the surface at the bulk phase transition. It is closely related to and even richer than the bulk critical behavior. In this work, we show that three types of SCB universality are realized in the dimerized Heisenberg models at the (2+1)-dimensional O(3) quantum critical points by engineering the surface configurations. The ordinary transition happens if the surface is gapped in the bulk disordered phase, while the gapless surface state generally leads to the multicritical special transition, even though the latter is precluded in classical phase transitions because the surface is in the lower critical dimension. An extraordinary transition is induced by the ferrimagnetic order on the surface of the staggered Heisenberg model, in which the surface critical exponents violate the results of the scaling theory and thus seriously challenge our current understanding of extraordinary transitions.Comment: v2: slightly revised, published versio

A New Approach to Solving Singularly Perturbed NLS at Local Potential Maxima

This paper presents a new approach for addressing the singularly perturbed nonlinear Schr\"odinger (NLS) equation: \begin{equation} -\varepsilon^2\Delta v + V(x) v =f(v),\ v>0,\ \lim_{|x|\to \infty} v(x)=0, \end{equation} where $V$ possesses a local maximum point and $f$ satisfies the Berestycki-Lions conditions.The key to our approach is the derivation of a refined lower bound on the gradient norm

Finite-Size Scaling Theory at a Self-Dual Quantum Critical Point

The nondivergence of the generalized Gr\"uneisen ratio (GR) at a quantum critical point (QCP) has been proposed to be a universal thermodynamic signature of self-duality. In this work, we study how the Kramers-Wannier-type self-duality manifests itself in the finite-size scaling behavior of thermodynamic quantities in the quantum critical regime. While the self-duality cannot be realized as a unitary transformation in the total Hilbert space for the Hamiltonian with the periodic boundary condition, it can be implemented in certain symmetry sectors with proper boundary conditions. Therefore, the GR and the transverse magnetization of the one-dimensional transverse-field Ising model exhibit different finite-size scaling behaviors in different sectors. This implies that the numerical diagnosis of self-dual QCP requires identifying the proper symmetry sectors.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Sublattice extraordinary-log phase and new special point of the antiferromagnetic Potts model

We study the surface criticality of a three-dimensional classical antiferromagnetic Potts model, whose bulk critical behaviors belongs to the XY model because of emergent O(2) symmetry. We find that the surface antiferromagnetic next-nearest neighboring interactions can drive the extraordinary-log phase to the ordinary phase, the transition between the two phases belongs to the universality class of the well-known special transition of the XY model. Further strengthening the surface next-nearest neighboring interactions, the extraordinary-log phase reappears, but the main critical behaviors are dominated on the sublattices of the model; the special point between the ordinary phase and the sublattice extraordinary-log phase belongs to a new universality class.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figure

Special Transition and Extraordinary Phase on the Surface of a Two-Dimensional Quantum Heisenberg Antiferromagnet

Continuous phase transitions exhibit richer critical phenomena on the surface than in the bulk, because distinct surface universality classes can be realized at the same bulk critical point by tuning the surface interactions. The exploration of surface critical behavior provides a window looking into higher-dimensional boundary conformal field theories. In this work, we study the surface critical behavior of a two-dimensional (2D) quantum critical Heisenberg model by tuning the surface coupling strength, and discover a direct special transition on the surface from the ordinary phase into an extraordinary phase. The extraordinary phase has a long-range antiferromagnetic order on the surface, in sharp contrast to the logarithmically decaying spin correlations in the 3D classical O(3) model. The special transition point has a new set of critical exponents, $y_{s}=0.86(4)$ and $\eta_{\parallel}=-0.32(1)$, which are distinct from the special transition of the classical O(3) model and indicate a new surface universality class of the 3D O(3) Wilson-Fisher theory.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures; v2: substantially revised, new fitting form in extraordinary phas