Weak ferromagnetism and spiral spin structures in honeycomb Hubbard planes

Within the Hartree Fock- RPA analysis, we derive the spin wave spectrum for the weak ferromagnetic phase of the Hubbard model on the honeycomb lattice. Assuming a uniform magnetization, the polar (optical) and acoustic branches of the spin wave excitations are determined. The bipartite lattice geometry produces a q-dependent phase difference between the spin wave amplitudes on the two sub-lattices. We also find an instability of the uniform weakly magnetized configuration to a weak antiferromagnetic spiraling spin structure, in the lattice plane, with wave vector Q along the Gamma-K direction, for electron densities n>0.6. We discuss the effect of diagonal disorder on both the creation of electron bound states, enhancement of the density of states, and the possible relevance of these effects to disorder induced ferromagnetism, as observed in proton irradiated graphite.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figure

Complete light absorption in graphene-metamaterial corrugated structures

We show that surface-plasmon polaritons excited in negative permittivity metamaterials having shallow periodic surface corrugation profiles can be explored to push the absorption of single and continuous sheets of graphene up to 100%. In the relaxation regime, the position of the plasmonic resonances of the hybrid system is determined by the plasma frequency of the metamaterial, allowing the frequency range for enhanced absorption to be set without the need of engineering graphene.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures; published version: text revised and references adde

Infinite matrices may violate the associative law

The momentum operator for a particle in a box is represented by an infinite order Hermitian matrix $P$. Its square $P^2$ is well defined (and diagonal), but its cube $P^3$ is ill defined, because $P P^2\neq P^2 P$. Truncating these matrices to a finite order restores the associative law, but leads to other curious results.Comment: final version in J. Phys. A28 (1995) 1765-177

Solution of the quantum harmonic oscillator plus a delta-function potential at the origin: The oddness of its even-parity solutions

We derive the energy levels associated with the even-parity wave functions of the harmonic oscillator with an additional delta-function potential at the origin. Our results bring to the attention of students a non-trivial and analytical example of a modification of the usual harmonic oscillator potential, with emphasis on the modification of the boundary conditions at the origin. This problem calls the attention of the students to an inaccurate statement in quantum mechanics textbooks often found in the context of solution of the harmonic oscillator problem.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figure

Charge and Spin Transport in the One-dimensional Hubbard Model

In this paper we study the charge and spin currents transported by the elementary excitations of the one-dimensional Hubbard model. The corresponding current spectra are obtained by both analytic methods and numerical solution of the Bethe-ansatz equations. For the case of half-filling, we find that the spin-triplet excitations carry spin but no charge, while charge $\eta$-spin triplet excitations carry charge but no spin, and both spin-singlet and charge $\eta$-spin-singlet excitations carry neither spin nor charge currents.Comment: 24 pages, 14 figure

Nonlinear quantum state transformation of spin-1/2

A non-linear quantum state transformation is presented. The transformation, which operates on pairs of spin-1/2, can be used to distinguish optimally between two non-orthogonal states. Similar transformations applied locally on each component of an entangled pair of spin-1/2 can be used to transform a mixed nonlocal state into a quasi-pure maximally entangled singlet state. In both cases the transformation makes use of the basic building block of the quantum computer, namely the quantum-XOR gate.Comment: 12 pages, LaTeX, amssym, epsfig (2 figures included

Wigner's little group and Berry's phase for massless particles

The ``little group'' for massless particles (namely, the Lorentz transformations $\Lambda$ that leave a null vector invariant) is isomorphic to the Euclidean group E2: translations and rotations in a plane. We show how to obtain explicitly the rotation angle of E2 as a function of $\Lambda$ and we relate that angle to Berry's topological phase. Some particles admit both signs of helicity, and it is then possible to define a reduced density matrix for their polarization. However, that density matrix is physically meaningless, because it has no transformation law under the Lorentz group, even under ordinary rotations.Comment: 4 pages revte

Dynamical polarizability of graphene beyond the Dirac cone approximation

We compute the dynamical polarizability of graphene beyond the usual Dirac cone approximation, integrating over the full Brillouin zone. We find deviations at $\hbar\omega=2t$ ($t$ the hopping parameter) which amount to a logarithmic singularity due to the van Hove singularity and derive an approximate analytical expression. Also at low energies, we find deviations from the results obtained from the Dirac cone approximation which manifest themselves in a peak spitting at arbitrary direction of the incoming wave vector \q. Consequences for the plasmon spectrum are discussed.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figure

Nonlocal effects in Fock space

If a physical system contains a single particle, and if two distant detectors test the presence of linear superpositions of one-particle and vacuum states, a violation of classical locality can occur. It is due to the creation of a two-particle component by the detecting process itself.Comment: final version in PRL 74 (1995) 4571; 76 (1996) 2205 (erratum

Confined magneto-optical waves in graphene

The electromagnetic mode spectrum of single-layer graphene subjected to a quantizing magnetic field is computed taking into account intraband and interband contributions to the magneto-optical conductivity. We find that a sequence of weakly decaying quasi-transverse-electric modes, separated by magnetoplasmon polariton modes, emerge due to the quantizing magnetic field. The characteristics of these modes are tuneable, by changing the magnetic field or the Fermi energy.Comment: 9 pages, 7 figures. published version: text and figures revised and updated + new references and one figure adde