Classical and Quantum Behavior in Mean-Field Glassy Systems

In this talk I review some recent developments which shed light on the main connections between structural glasses and mean-field spin glass models with a discontinuous transition. I also discuss the role of quantum fluctuations on the dynamical instability found in mean-field spin glasses with a discontinuous transition. In mean-field models with pairwise interactions in a transverse field it is shown, in the framework of the static approximation, that such instability is suppressed at zero temperature.Comment: 9 Pages (including 5 Figures), Revtex, Proceedings of the XIV Sitges Conference, June 1996 (Barcelona) Spai

Quantum critical effects in mean-field glassy systems

We consider the effects of quantum fluctuations in mean-field quantum spin-glass models with pairwise interactions. We examine the nature of the quantum glass transition at zero temperature in a transverse field. In models (such as the random orthogonal model) where the classical phase transition is discontinuous an analysis using the static approximation reveals that the transition becomes continuous at zero temperature