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We develop a field-theoretic perturbation method preserving the fluctuation-dissipation relation (FDR) for the dynamics of the density fluctuations of a noninteracting colloidal gas plunged in a quenched Gaussian random field. It is based on an expansion about the Brownian noninteracting gas and can be considered and justified as a low-disorder or high-temperature expansion. The first-order bare theory yields the same memory integral as the mode-coupling theory (MCT) developed for (ideal) fluids in random environments, apart from the bare nature of the correlation functions involved. It predicts an ergodic dynamical behavior for the relaxation of the density fluctuations, in which the memory kernels and correlation functions develop long-time algebraic tails. A FDR-consistent renormalized theory is also constructed from the bare theory. It is shown to display a dynamic ergodic-nonergodic transition similar to the one predicted by the MCT at the level of the density fluctuations, but, at variance with the MCT, the transition does not fully carry over to the self-diffusion, which always reaches normal diffusive behavior at long time, in agreement with known rigorous results., Comment: 73 pages, 8 figures; version accepted for publication in Journal of Statistical Mechanics: Theory and Experiment

The discovery of two-dimensional gapless Dirac fermions in graphene and topological insulators (TI) has sparked extensive ongoing research toward applications of their unique electronic properties. The gapless surface states in three-dimensional insulators indicate a distinct topological phase of matter with a non-trivial Z2 invariant that can be verified by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy or magnetoresistance quantum oscillation. In TI nanowires, the gapless surface states exhibit Aharonov-Bohm (AB) oscillations in conductance, with this quantum interference effect accompanying a change in the number of transverse one-dimensional modes in transport. Thus, while the density of states (DOS) of such nanowires is expected to show such AB oscillation, this effect has yet to be observed. Here, we adopt nanomechanical measurements that reveal AB oscillations in the DOS of a topological insulator. The TI nanowire under study is an electromechanical resonator embedded in an electrical circuit, and quantum capacitance effects from DOS oscillation modulate the circuit capacitance thereby altering the spring constant to generate mechanical resonant frequency shifts. Detection of the quantum capacitance effects from surface-state DOS is facilitated by the small effective capacitances and high quality factors of nanomechanical resonators, and as such the present technique could be extended to study diverse quantum materials at nanoscale., Comment: 15+16 pages, 4+11 figures

We report on the fabrication and electrical transport properties of superconducting junctions made of \beta-Ag$_{2}$Se topological insulator (TI) nanowires in contact with Al superconducting electrodes. The temperature dependence of the critical current indicates that the superconducting junction belongs to a short and diffusive junction regime. As a characteristic feature of the narrow junction, the critical current decreases monotonously with increasing magnetic field. The stochastic distribution of the switching current exhibits the macroscopic quantum tunneling behavior, which is robust up to T = 0.8 K. Our observations indicate that the TI nanowire-based Josephson junctions can be a promising building block for the development of nanohybrid superconducting quantum bits., Comment: 27 pages, 8 figures

Single-crystalline \beta-Ag2Se nanostructures, a new class of 3D topological insulators (TIs), were synthesized using the chemical vapor transport method. The topological surface states were verified by measuring electronic transport properties including the weak antilocalization effect, Aharonov-Bohm oscillations, and Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations. First-principles band calculations revealed that the band inversion in \b{eta}-Ag2Se is caused by strong spin-orbit coupling and Ag-Se bonding hybridization. These extensive investigations provide new meaningful information about silver-chalcogenide TIs that have anisotropic Dirac cones, which could be useful for spintronics applications., Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures

We extend a previously proposed field-theoretic self-consistent perturbation approach for the equilibrium dynamics of the Dean-Kawasaki equation presented in [J. Stat. Mech. 2008 P02004]. By taking terms missing in the latter analysis into account we arrive at a set of three new equations for correlation functions of the system. These correlations involve the density and its logarithm as local observables. Our new one-loop equations, which must carefully deal with the noninteracting Brownian gas theory, are more general than the historic Mode-Coupling one in that a further and well-defined approximation leads back to the original mode-coupling equation for the density correlations alone. However, without performing any further approximation step, our set of three equations does not feature any ergodic-non ergodic transition, as opposed to the historical mode- coupling approach., Comment: Corrects and extends arXiv:0712.1096

We investigate the coarsening kinetics of an XY model defined on a square lattice when the underlying dynamics is governed by energy-conserving Hamiltonian equation of motion. We find that the apparent super-diffusive growth of the length scale can be interpreted as the vortex mobility diverging logarithmically in the size of the vortex-antivortex pair, where the time dependence of the characteristic length scale can be fitted as $L(t) \sim ((t+t_{0}) \ln(t+t_{0}))^{1/2}$ with a finite offset time $t_0$. This interpretation is based on a simple phenomenological model of vortex-antivortex annihilation to explain the growth of the coarsening length scale $L(t)$. The nonequilibrium spin autocorrelation function $A(t)$ and the growing length scale $L(t)$ are related by $A(t) \simeq L^{-\lambda}(t)$ with a distinctive exponent of $\lambda \simeq 2.21$ (for $E=0.4$) possibly reflecting the strong effect of propagating spin wave modes. We also investigate the nonequilibrium relaxation (NER) of the system under sudden heating of the system from a perfectly ordered state to the regime of quasi-long-range order, which provides a very accurate estimation of the equilibrium correlation exponent $\eta (E) $ for a given energy $E$. We find that both the equal-time spatial correlation $C_{nr}(r,t)$ and the NER autocorrelation $A_{nr}(t)$ exhibit scaling features consistent with the dynamic exponent of $z_{nr} = 1$., Comment: 11 pages, 10 figures. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:cond-mat/0610590

A new statistical mechanics formulation of characterizing the structural fluctuation of protein correlated with that of water is presented based on the generalized Langevin equation and the 3D-RISM/RISM theory of molecular liquids. The displacement vector of atom positions and their conjugated momentum, are chosen for the dynamic variables for protein, while the density fields of atoms and their momentum fields are chosen for water. Projection of other degrees of freedom onto those dynamic variables using the standard projection operator method produces essentially two equations which describe the time evolution of fluctuation concerning the density field of solvent and the conformation of protein around an equilibrium state, which are coupled with each other. The equation concerning the protein dynamics is formally akin to that of the coupled Langevin oscillators, and is a generalization of the latter, to atomic level. The most intriguing feature of the new equation is that it contains the variance-covariance matrix as the "Hessian" term describing the "force" restoring an equilibrium conformation, which is the second moment of the fluctuation of atom positions. The "Hessian" matrix is naturally identified as the second derivative of the free energy surface around the equilibrium. A method to evaluate the Hessian matrix based on the 3D-RISM/RISM theory is proposed. Proposed also is an application of the present formulation to the molecular recognition, in which the conformational fluctuation of protein around its native state becomes an important factor as exemplified by so called "induced fitting"., Comment: submitted to PRE

We endow a system of interacting particles with two distinct, local, Markovian and reversible microscopic dynamics. Using common field-theoretic techniques used to investigate the presence of a glass transition, we find that while the first, standard, dynamical rules lead to glassy behavior, the other one leads to a simple exponential relaxation towards equilibrium. This finding questions the intrinsic link that exists between the underlying, thermodynamical, energy landscape, and the dynamical rules with which this landscape is explored by the system. Our peculiar choice of dynam- ical rules offers the possibility of a direct connection with replica theory, and our findings therefore call for a clarification of the interplay between replica theory and the underlying dynamics of the system.

We investigate the ground state of the irrationally frustrated Josephson junction array with controlling anisotropy parameter \lambda\ that is the ratio of the longitudinal Josephson coupling to the transverse one. We find that the ground state has one dimensional periodicity whose reciprocal lattice vector depends on \lambda\ and is incommensurate with the substrate lattice. Approaching the isotropic point, \lambda=1 the so called hull function of the ground state exhibits analyticity breaking similar to the Aubry transition in the Frenkel-Kontorova model. We find a scaling law for the harmonic spectrum of the hull functions, which suggests the existence of a characteristic length scale diverging at the isotropic point. This critical behavior is directly connected to the jamming transition previously observed in the current-voltage characteristics by a numerical simulation. On top of the ground state there is a gapless, continuous band of metastable states, which exhibit the same critical behavior as the ground state., Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures

We present a numerical study on an interacting monomer-dimer model with nearest neighbor repulsion on a square lattice, which possesses two symmetric absorbing states. The model is observed to exhibit two nearby continuous transitions: the $Z_2$ symmetry-breaking order-disorder transition and the absorbing transition with directed percolation criticality. We find that the symmetry-breaking transition shows a non-Ising critical behavior, and that the absorbing phase becomes critical, in the sense that the critical decay of the dimer density observed at the absorbing transition persists even within the absorbing phase. Our findings call for further studies on the microscopic models and corresponding continuum description belonging to the generalized voter universality class., Comment: to be published in JSTAT

We report on the fabrication and measurements of a superconducting junction of a single-crystalline Au nanowire, connected to Al electrodes. Current-Voltage characteristic curve shows clear supercurrent branch below the superconducting transition temperature of Al and quantized voltage plateaus on application of microwave radiation, as expected from Josephson relations. Highly transparent (0.95) contacts very close to an ideal limit of 1 are formed at the interface between the normal metal (Au) and the superconductor (Al). The very high transparency is ascribed to the single crystallinity of a Au nanowire and the formation of an oxide-free contact between Au and Al. The sub-gap structures of the differential conductance are well explained by coherent multiple Andreev reflections (MAR), the hallmark of mesoscopic Josephson junctions. These observations demonstrate that single crystalline Au nanowires can be employed to develop novel quantum devices utilizing coherent electrical transport., Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures, to appear in ACS Nano

We investigate, via numerical simulations, the phase ordering kinetics of a two- dimensional soft-spin O(2) Ginzburg-Landau model when a reversible mode cou- pling is included via the conserved conjugate momentum of the spin order parameter (the model E). Coarsening of the system, when quenched from a dis- ordered state to zero temperature, is observed to be enhanced by the existence of the mode coupling terms. The growth of the characteristic length scale L(t) exhibits an effective super-diffusive growth exponent that can be interpreted as a positive logarithmic-like correction to a diffusive growth, i.e., L(t) ~ (t ln t)^{1/2}. In order to understand this behavior, we introduced a simple phenomenological model of coarsening based on the annihilation dynamics of a vortex-antivortex pair, incorporating the effect of vortex inertia and logarithmically divergent mobility of the vortex. With a suitable choice of the parameters, numerical solutions of the simple model can fit the full simulation results very adequately. The effective growth exponent in the early time stage is larger due to the effect of the vortex inertia, which crosses over into late time stage characterized by positive logarithmic correction to a diffusive growth. We also investigated the non-equilibrium autocorrelation function from which the so called {\lambda} exponent can be extracted. We get {\lambda} = 1.99(2) which is distinctively larger than the value of {\lambda} = 1.17 for the purely dissipative model-A dynamics of non-conserved O(2) models., Comment: 19 pages, 8 figures

The Frenkel Kontorova (FK) model is known to exhibit the so called Aubry's transition which is a jamming or frictional transition at zero temperature. Recently we found similar transition at zero and finite temperatures in a super-conducting Josephson junction array (JJA) on a square lattice under external magnetic field. In the present paper we discuss how these problems are related., Comment: 19 pages, 6 figures. To appear in the proceedings of YKIS2009 Frontiers in Nonequilibrium Physics, Progress in Theoretical Physics supplement 2010.

A vortex solid with self-generated randomness is found theoretically in a frustrated Josephson junction array (JJA) under external magnetic field with anisotropic couplings. Vorticies induced by external magnetic field develop stripes parallel to the direction of weaker coupling. It is shown analytically that there is a continuous, gapless band of metastable states in which stripes are deformed randomly by transverse undulation. The vortex solid with the frozen undulation in a metastable state freely slides along the direction of stronger coupling, thereby destroying ordering of phases even at zero temperature, but is jammed along the direction of weaker coupling., Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. To appear in Phys. Rev. Lett

We found a finite temperature glass transition in the absence of quenched disorder in frustrated Josephson junction arrays (JJA) on a square lattice with anisotropic Josephson couplings by numerical simulations. The vortexes develop zigzag stripes into the direction of weaker coupling at low temperatures. The whole amorphous vortex solid can flow smoothly into the direction of stronger coupling by non-trivial soft modes. As the result the macroscopic phase coherence is destroyed being reminiscent of vortex flow in pure bulk superconductors or spin-chirality decoupling in frustrated magnets. On the contrary such soft-modes are absent into the direction of weaker coupling. Consequently the system behaves as a Ohmic (unjammed) liquid or superconducting (jammed) solid with respect to injection of external electric current, i. e. shear, along different directions. This jamming-glass transition can be regarded as a two dimensional realization of the Aubry's transition., Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures

We find a breakdown of the critical dynamic scaling in the coarsening dynamics of an antiferromagnetic {\em XY} model on the kagome lattice when the system is quenched from disordered states into the Kosterlitz-Thouless ({\em KT}) phases at low temperatures. There exist multiple growing length scales: the length scales of the average separation between fractional vortices are found to be {\em not} proportional to the length scales of the quasi-ordered domains. They are instead related through a nontrivial power-law relation. The length scale of the quasi-ordered domains (as determined from optimal collapse of the correlation functions for the order parameter $\exp[3 i \theta (r)]$) does not follow a simple power law growth but exhibits an anomalous growth with time-dependent effective growth exponent. The breakdown of the critical dynamic scaling is accompanied by unusual relaxation dynamics in the decay of fractional ($3\theta$) vortices, where the decay of the vortex numbers is characterized by an exponential function of logarithmic powers in time., Comment: 13 pages, 26 figures

We develop a nonequilibrium mode-coupling theory for uniformly sheared systems starting from microscopic, thermostatted SLLOD equations of motion. Our theory aims at describing stationary-state properties including rheological ones of sheared systems, and this is accomplished via two steps. Firstly, a set of self-consistent equations is formulated based on the projection-operator formalism and on the mode-coupling approach for the transient density correlators which measure the correlations between the density fluctuations in the initial equilibrium state and the ones at later times after the shearing force is turned on. The transient time-correlation function formalism is then used which, combined with the mode-coupling approximation, expresses stationary-state properties in terms of the transient density correlators. A detailed comparison of our theory is also presented with the related mode-coupling theory which is based on the Smoluchowski equation for Brownian particles under stationary shearing.

The static and dynamic critical properties of the ferromagnetic q-state Potts models on a square lattice with q = 2 and 3 are numerically studied via the nonequilibrium relaxation method. The relaxation behavior of both the order parameter and energy as well as that of the second moments are investigated, from which static and dynamic critical exponents can be obtained. We find that the static exponents thus obtained from the relaxation of the order parameter and energy together with the second moments of the order parameter exhibit a close agreement with the exact exponents, especially for the case of q = 2 (Ising) model, when care is taken in the choice of the initial states for the relaxation of the second moments. As for the case of q = 3, the estimates for the static exponents become less accurate but still exhibit reasonable agreement with the exactly known static exponents. The dynamic critical exponent for q = 2 (Ising) model is estimated from the relaxation of the second moments of the order parameter with mixed initial conditions to give z(q = 2) = 2.1668(19)., Comment: 29 pages, 16 figures

Equilibrium and non-equilibrium relaxation behaviors of two-dimensional superconducting arrays are investigated via numerical simulations at low temperatures in the presence of incommensurate transverse magnetic fields, with frustration parameter f= (3-\sqrt{5})/2. We find that the non-equilibrium relaxation, beginning with random initial states quenched to low temperatures, exhibits a three-stage relaxation of chirality autocorrelations. At the early stage, the relaxation is found to be described by the von Schweidler form. Then it exhibits power-law behavior in the intermediate time scale and faster decay in the long-time limit, which together can be fitted to the Ogielski form; for longer waiting times, this crosses over to a stretched exponential form. We argue that the power-law behavior in the intermediate time scale may be understood as a consequence of the coarsening behavior, leading to the local vortex order corresponding to f=2/5 ground-state configurations. High mobility of the vortices in the domain boundaries, generating slow wandering motion of the domain walls, may provide mechanism of dynamic heterogeneity and account for the long-time stretched exponential relaxation behavior. It is expected that such meandering fluctuations of the low-temperature structure give rise to finite resistivity at those low temperatures; this appears consistent with the zero-temperature resistive transition in the limit of irrational frustration., Comment: 9 pages, 18 figures

We demonstrate that a highly frustrated anisotropic Josephson junction array(JJA) on a square lattice exhibits a zero-temperature jamming transition, which shares much in common with those in granular systems. Anisotropy of the Josephson couplings along the horizontal and vertical directions plays roles similar to normal load or density in granular systems. We studied numerically static and dynamic response of the system against shear, i. e. injection of external electric current at zero temperature. Current-voltage curves at various strength of the anisotropy exhibit universal scaling features around the jamming point much as do the flow curves in granular rheology, shear-stress vs shear-rate. It turns out that at zero temperature the jamming transition occurs right at the isotropic coupling and anisotropic JJA behaves as an exotic fragile vortex matter : it behaves as superconductor (vortex glass) into one direction while normal conductor (vortex liquid) into the other direction even at zero temperature. Furthermore we find a variant of the theoretical model for the anisotropic JJA quantitatively reproduces universal master flow-curves of the granular systems. Our results suggest an unexpected common paradigm stretching over seemingly unrelated fields - the rheology of soft materials and superconductivity., Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures. To appear in New Journal of Physics

We present a brief review of our recent efforts to develop a FDR-preserving field theory for the stochastic dynamic density functional model, emphasizing the essential structure of the theory., Comment: A contribution to the Symposium on the 50th Anniversary of the Alder Transition (Nov. 29-30, Kanazawa, Japan). To appear in Progress of Theoretical Physics Supplement