Search

The perturbative calculation of the effect of fluctuations in the nonzero frequency modes of a weakly interacting Bose gas on the condensation temperature is reviewed. These dynamic modes, discarded in most of the recent studies, have a temperature-induced energy gap that allows for a perturbative approach. The simple, yet powerful algorithm used to calculate the effect in a high-temperature expansion in conjunction with zeta function regularization of infrared divergences is explained in detail. The algorithm is shown to be reliable by demonstrating that it reproduces known results for a series of examples. With two-loop contributions properly included, the dynamic modes are seen not to lead to a shift in the condensation temperature, thus revising our earlier finding obtained at one loop., Comment: 17 pages, no figures Updated version includes two-loop contributions

The critical behavior of the Ginzburg-Landau model is described in a manifestly gauge-invariant manner. The gauge-invariant correlation-function exponent is computed to first order in the $4-d$ and $1/n$-expansion, and found to agree with the ordinary exponent obtained in the covariant gauge, with the parameter $\alpha=1-d$ in the gauge-fixing term $(\partial_\mu A_\mu)^2 /2 \alpha$., Comment: 4 pages, no figures

Superfluid phase transitions are discussed from a geometrical perspective as envisaged by Onsager. The approach focuses on vortex loops which close to the critical temperature form a fluctuating vortex tangle. As the transition is approached, vortex lines proliferate and thereby disorder the superfluid state, so that the system reverts to the normal state. It is shown in detail that loop proliferation can be described in exactly the same way as cluster percolation. Picturing vortex loops as worldlines of bosons, with one of the spatial coordinates interpreted as the time coordinate, a quantitative description of vortex loops can be given. Applying a rotation (to superfluids) or a magnetic field (to superconductors), which suppresses the formation of vortex loops and instead can lead to open vortex lines along the field direction, is shown to be equivalent to taking the nonrelativistic limit. The nonrelativistic theory is the one often used to study vortex lattice melting and to describe the resulting entangled vortex liquid., Comment: 24 pages, 14 figures, write-up of lectures presented at the Kevo Winter School, Kevo, Finland, 20-26 April 2002

It is argued that the presence of a nonanalytic term in the effective potential of the Ginzburg-Landau model is immaterial as far as the order of the superconductor-normal phase transition is concerned. To achieve agreement with the renormalization group, the effective potential has to be extended to include derivative terms, which provide the theory with a low momentum scale which can be varied to probe the (possible) fixed point., Comment: 6 pages, contribution to the Festschrift dedicated to Professor Kleinert on the occasion of his 60th birthday

Two- and three-dimensional electron gases with a uniform neutralizing background are studied at negative compressibility. Parametrized expressions for the dielectric function are used to access this strong-coupling regime, where the screened Coulomb potential becomes overall attractive for like charges. Closely examining these expressions reveals that the ground state with a periodic modulation of the charge density, albeit exponentially damped, replaces the homogeneous one at positive compressibility. The wavevector characterizing the new ground state depends on the density and is complex, having a positive imaginary part, as does the homogeneous ground state, and real part, as does the genuine charge density wave., Comment: 6 double-column pages, 2 figures. 2nd version is an extension of the 1st one, giving more details

In these lectures, superconductivity in impure thin films close to the absolute zero of temperature is discussed. The behavior as function of the applied magnetic field and the amount of impurities suggests the presence of a superconductor-insulator transition at zero temperature. The theory of superconductivity in the limit where all the electrons become tightly bound in pairs is used to explain the main characteristics of the transition. In that limit, where the theory becomes equivalent to a phase-only theory, electron pairs exist on either side of the transition. The presentation is pedagogical in nature and includes exercises as a learning aid for those new to the field., Comment: 36 pages, lectures presented at the XL Cracow School of Theoretical Physics, Zakopane, Poland, June 3-11, 2000, to appear in the proceedings as a special issue of Acta Physica Polonica B, see http://th-www.if.uj.edu.pl/acta/

The close analogy between cluster percolation and string proliferation in the context of critical phenomena is studied. Like clusters in percolation theory, closed strings, which can be either finite-temperature worldlines or topological line defects, are described by a distribution parametrized by only two exponents. On approaching the critical point, the string tension vanishes, and the loops proliferate thereby signalling the onset of Bose-Einstein condensation (in case of worldlines) or the disordering of the ordered state (in case of vortices). The ideal Bose gas with modified energy spectrum is used as a stepping stone to derive general expressions for the critical exponents in terms of the two exponents parameterizing the loop distribution near criticality., Comment: 12 pages, 3x2 figures

A stack of tensionless membranes with nonlinear curvature energy and vertical harmonic interaction is studied. At low temperatures, the system forms a lamellar phase. At a critical temperature, the stack disorders vertically in a melting-like transition., Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures

It is pointed out that first, contrary to the claim by Baym et al.[Phys. Rev. Lett 83, 1703 (1999)], the shift in the transition temperature of a weakly interacting Bose gas can be calculated perturbatively. And second, that the regime considered by Huang [Phys. Rev. Lett 83, 3770 (1999)] while addressing the same issue does not describe the Bose-Einstein condensed phase., Comment: One page comment

It is argued that close to a Coulomb interacting quantum critical point, the interaction between two vortices in a disordered superconducting thin film separated by a distance $r$ changes from logarithmic in the mean-field region to $1/r$ in the region dominated by quantum critical fluctuations. This gives support to the charge-vortex duality picture of the observed reflection symmetry in the current-voltage characteristics on both sides of the transition., Comment: 4 pages, no figures, 2nd version: title (slightly) changed and text accordingly

This short essay discusses the application of Bogoliubov's theory of superfluidity in the context of quantum phase transitions., Comment: 13 pages, contribution to special issue of Journal of Physical Studies commemorating Bogoliubov's 90s birthday

The effect of quantum fluctuations on a nearly flat, nonrelativistic two-dimensional membrane with extrinsic curvature stiffness and tension is investigated. The renormalization group analysis is carried out in first-order perturbative theory. In contrast to thermal fluctuations, which soften the membrane at large scales and turn it into a crumpled surface, quantum fluctuations are found to {\em stiffen} the membrane, so that it exhibits a Hausdorff dimension equal to two. The large-scale behavior of the membrane is further studied at finite temperature, where a nontrivial fixed point is found, signaling a crumpling transition., Comment: RevTex, 9 pages, 1 figure

A nonrelativistic Bose gas is represented as a grand-canonical ensemble of fluctuating closed spacetime strings of arbitrary shape and length. The loops are characterized by their string tension and the number of times they wind around the imaginary time axis. At the temperature where Bose-Einstein condensation sets in, the string tension, being determined by the chemical potential, vanishes, the system becomes critical, and the strings proliferate. A comparison with Feynman's description in terms of rings of cyclicly permuted bosons shows that the winding number of a loop corresponds to the number of particles contained in a ring., Comment: 13 pages, 6 figures; references added

In the first part of this review paper, the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau theory is derived starting from the microscopic BCS model with the help of a derivative expansion. Special attention is paid to two space dimensions, where the entire crossover from the weak-coupling BCS limit to the strong-coupling BEC limit of tightly bound fermion pairs is accessible analytically. The second part deals with the dual approach to the time-independent Ginzburg-Landau theory in three space dimensions. In this approach, the magnetic vortices of a superconductor play the central role, and the superconductor-to-normal phase transition is understood as a proliferation of these vortices., Comment: 16 pages, 1 figure. Lectures presented at the NATO Winter School and European Science Foundation (ESF) Workshop Topological Defects and the Non-Equilibrium Dynamics of Symmetry Breaking Phase Transitions, Les Houches, February 16-26, 1999, in Topological Defects in Cosmology and Condensed Matter Physics, edited by Yu. Bunkov and H. Godfrin (Kluwer, Dordrecht, 2000)

These lectures provide a pedagogical introduction to the theory of continuous quantum phase transitions. Various two-dimensional condensed matter systems, such as a superconducting film, a quantum Hall liquid, and an array of Josephson junctions, undergo such a phase transition at the absolute zero of temperature. The universality classes defined by repulsively interacting bosons with and without disorder are shown to play a central role in understanding these systems., Comment: 78 pages, 12 figures. Lectures presented at the 1st Pamporovo Winter Workshop, 7th--15th March, 1998, Pamporovo, Bulgaria. To be published in "Correlations, Coherence, And Order", edited by D. V. Shopova and D. I. Uzunov (Plenum Press, London--New York, 1999)

The dynamics of vortices in a superfluid film at the absolute zero of temperature is studied. The quantum-mechanical, i.e., ``first-quantized'' description is compared to a recently proposed quantum-field-theoretic, i.e., ``second-quantized'' description. The theory, consisting of the nonrelativistic effective action of phonons linearly coupled to a Chern-Simons term, is used to calculate the one-loop amplitude for the elastic scattering of phonons from a vortex., Comment: 29 pages, 13 figures

With help of a derivative expansion, the one-loop corrections to the energy functional of a nearly flat, stiff membrane with tension due to thermal fluctuations are calculated in the Monge parametrization. Contrary to previous studies, an arbitrary tilt of the surface is allowed to exhibit the nontrivial relations between the different, highly nonlinear terms accompanying the ultraviolet divergences. These terms are shown to have precisely the same form as those in the original energy functional, as necessary for renormalizability. Also infrared divergences arise. These, however, are shown to cancel in a nontrivial way., Comment: 6 pages, REVTeX, no figures

Effective theories of quantum liquids (superconductors and superfluids of various types) are derived starting from microscopic models at the absolute zero of temperature. Special care is taken to assure Galilei invariance. The effective theories are employed to investigate the quantum numbers carried by the topological defects present in the phases with spontaneously broken symmetries. Due to topological terms induced by quantum fluctuations, these numbers are sometimes found to be fractional. The zero-temperature effective theories are further used to study the quantum critical behavior of the liquid-to-insulator transition which these systems undergo as the applied magnetic field, the amount of impurities, or the charge carrier density varies. The classical, finite-temperature phase transitions to the normal state are discussed from the point of view of dual theories, where the defects of the original formulation become the elementary excitations. A connection with bosonization is pointed out., Comment: 149 pages, Latex; epsf, fancyhdr, and times style files

A quantum field theory, consisting of the effective action of sound waves linearly coupled to a Chern-Simons term, is proposed to describe the dynamics of vortices in a superfluid film at the absolute zero of temperature., Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures, to appear in Phys. Lett. A

A recent paper by Herbut in J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. {\bf 29}, 1 (1996) is shown to contain an internal inconsistency which invalidates the principal conclusion of the paper that the magnetic penetration depth diverges with an XY-exponent rather than a mean-field exponent, as predicted some time ago by Kiometzis, Kleinert, and Schakel (KKS)., Comment: Author Information under http://www.physik.fu-berlin.de/~kleinert/institution.html . Paper also at http://www.physik.fu-berlin.de/~kleinert/kleiner_re254/preprint.html

Starting from a standard description of an ideal, isentropic fluid, we derive the effective theory governing a gapless non-relativistic mode---the sound mode. The theory, which is dictated by the requirement of Galilei invariance, entails the entire set of hydrodynamic equations. The gaplessness of the sound mode is explained by identifying it as the Goldstone mode associated with the spontaneous breakdown of Galilei invariance. Differences with a superfluid are pointed out., Comment: 17 pages, REVTeX

The quantum critical behavior of an interacting, non-relativistic Bose theory with quenched disorder randomly distributed in space is investigated. The renormalization group is carried out in a double $\epsilon$ expansion, where one $\epsilon$ is the deviation of the effective space-time dimensionality from 4, while the other denotes the number of time dimensions. The disordered theory, which displays localization in the superfluid state, is shown to possess an infrared stable fixed point., Comment: REVTEX, 5 pages

The dual approach to the Ginzburg-Landau theory of a Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer superconductor is reviewed. The dual theory describes a grand canonical ensemble of fluctuating closed magnetic vortices, of arbitrary length and shape, which interact with a massive vector field representing the local magnetic induction. When the critical temperature is approached from below, the magnetic vortices proliferate. This is signaled by the disorder field, which describes the loop gas, developing a non-zero expectation value in the normal conducting phase. It thereby breaks a {\it global} U(1) symmetry. The ensuing Goldstone field is the magnetic scalar potential. The superconducting-to-normal phase transition is studied by applying renormalization group theory to the dual formulation. In the regime of a second-order transition, the critical exponents are given by those of a superfluid with a reversed temperature axis., Comment: Latex + Postscript files

We study the critical exponents of the superconducting phase transition in the context of renormalization group theory starting from a dual formulation of the Ginzburg-Landau theory. The dual formulation describes a loop gas of Abrikosov flux tubes which proliferate when the critical temperature is approached from below. In contrast to the Ginzburg-Landau theory, it has a spontaneously broken global symmetry and possesses an infrared stable fixed point. The exponents coincide with those of a superfluid with reversed temperature axis., Comment: Postscript file. For related work see www adress http://www.physik.fu-berlin.de/kleiner_re.html in our homepage http://www.physik.fu-berlin.de/kleinert.html