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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Recently, condensed matter physicists Zhang and Hu found a remarkable theoretical construction of a new physical phenomenon – a 4+1 dimensional quantum Hall effect  on an $`S^4`$. In this note we will describe a simple brane construction which reproduces the same physics.

In fact, there are many connections between string theory and the ordinary $`2+1`$d quantum Hall physics which were found during the last two years. The first of them was a construction of Bernevig, Brodie, Susskind and Toumbas  reproducing the quantum Hall effect on a sphere (see fig.1), followed by a series of papers including . Another line of progress (including ) was started by the proposal of Susskind  that the granular structure of the quantum Hall fluid can be captured by making the ordinary Chern-Simons description non-commutative. This model can also be obtained from the Lagrangian of a charged particle moving in magnetic field by replacing its coordinates by matrices , in the spirit of matrix theory for D0-branes.

The $`4+1`$d quantum Hall system of  is the dynamics of particles in a large representation of $`SU(2)`$ moving under the influence of the homogeneous instanton of $`SU(2)`$ on an $`S^4`$. An important point in making a connection of this system to string theory is to translate the $`SU(2)`$ dynamics of  into the dynamics of fundamentals of $`U(n)`$ moving in a background $`U(n)`$ field.

The string theory construction itself is a close analog of  (see fig. 2). The four-sphere is modelled by a stack of coincident spherical D4-branes with a homogeneous instanton of $`U(n)`$ in their world-volume. This instanton has instanton number $`N=\frac{1}{6}(n1)n(n+1)`$, and can be also thought of as $`N`$ D0-branes in the D4-brane world-volume. Note that precisely this system was constructed also in matrix theory , and is referred to as the ‘fuzzy four-sphere’. The charged particles themselves can be modelled as the ends of fundamental strings connecting the spherical D4-branes to a stack of flat D4-branes placed at the center of the $`S^4`$. This system by itself will not be stable, but we will briefly comment on possible ways of stabilizing it. Note also that the question of the string end statistics is subtle. However, we can expect logic similar to  to apply here as well.

The string theory point of view makes the analogy between the ordinary $`2+1`$d and the $`4+1`$d quantum Hall systems rather close – one can be obtained from another simply by changing the dimensionality of the D-branes. The QHE corresponds to the dynamics of strings ending on either a fuzzy $`S^2`$ or a fuzzy $`S^4`$.

This point of view also provides an insight into the question of generalizing the QHE to dimensions higher than four. This can be achieved simply by replacing the fuzzy $`S^2`$ or $`S^4`$ by a fuzzy $`S^6`$ or $`S^8`$. It is probably very hard to stabilize such systems in string theory. On the other hand, we can also think of them as a simple quantum mechanics in a non-dynamical background field, out of the framework of string theory, in which case such problems do not arise. Then we can even talk about QHE on an $`S^{2k}`$ for $`k>4`$. The corresponding homogeneous background gauge field can be found for example using the techniques of .

## 2 Review: $`2+1`$d quantum Hall effect on an $`S^2`$

Here we briefly mention some basic properties of charged particles moving in a constant magnetic field on $`S^2`$ . The magnetic field is sourced by a magnetic monopole inside the $`S^2`$, such that the total magnetic flux through the sphere is $`n12I𝐙`$, say $`I>0`$. The single-particle Hamiltonian can be written as

$`H={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2MR^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\mu <\nu }{}}\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }^2,`$ (2.1)
where $`\mu ,\nu =1,2,3`$; $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }i(x_\mu D_\nu x_\nu D_\mu )`$; and $`\stackrel{~}{x}_\mu Rx_\mu `$ are the embedding coordinates of the $`S^2`$. This Hamiltonian is invariant under $`SO(3)`$ transformations generated by $`L_{\mu \nu }\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }+Iϵ_{\mu \nu \rho }x_\rho `$. The spectrum follows from the relation $`_{\mu <\nu }\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }^2=_{\mu <\nu }L_{\mu \nu }^2I(I+1)`$ and from the fact that $`_{\mu <\nu }L_{\mu \nu }^2`$ has eigenvalues $`l(l+1)`$ with $`l=I,I+1,I+2\mathrm{}`$

The lowest Landau level states transform in the $`l=I`$ representation of $`SO(3)`$, so their degeneracy is $`n=2I+1`$. Lowest Landau states localized about a particular point $`x_\mu `$ on the $`S^2`$ are eigenstates of $`x_\mu I_\mu `$, where $`I_\mu `$ are the $`l=I`$ representation matrices of $`SO(3)`$. $`I_\mu `$ can be also viewed as the uplift of 3d Euclidean Dirac gamma matrices (i.e. the Pauli matrices) from the $`l=\frac{1}{2}`$ representation to the $`2I`$-th symmetric tensor power of the $`l=\frac{1}{2}`$ representation (i.e. to the $`l=2I`$ representation). In other words

$`I_\mu (\sigma _\mu 11\mathrm{}1+1\sigma _\mu 1\mathrm{}1+\mathrm{}+111\mathrm{}\sigma _\mu )_{sym}.`$ (2.2)
This point of view will be useful in section 5.3.

### 2.1 The string theory picture

There is a cool string theory realization of this kind of quantum Hall effect due to Bernevig, Brodie, Susskind and Toumbas . To construct their quantum Hall system (see fig.1), one starts with a spherical D2-brane and dissolves $`n1`$ D0-branes in it. Then one takes $`K`$ coincident D6-branes extended in the directions perpendicular to the ones where the D2 lives, and moves them to the center of the two-sphere. When the D6-branes cross the D2’s, the Hanany-Witten effect  produces fundamental strings stretching between them. This configuration can be in equilibrium due to repulsion of D6-branes and D0’s. We know that D0-branes behave as magnetic flux in the world-volume of D2’s and that string ends are charged under the world-volume gauge field. As a result, the low-energy physics is essentially the one described in the previous paragraph.

The D2 with D0 brane charge can be also thought of as $`n1`$ D0-branes expanded into a spherical configuration which has an induced local D2-brane charge , provided the separation between neighboring D0’s is much smaller than the string length, and $`n1`$. In this picture, we can think of the strings as being connected to the constituent D0-branes. Assume for simplicity that $`K=1`$. The lowest Landau levels should correspond to unexcited stings, so their degeneracy should be equal to $`n1`$. This indeed agrees with the original picture in the previous section, up to a subleading correction – a unit shift of $`n`$.

Figure 1: This picture, stolen from , shows a string theory realization

of the $`2+1`$d quantum Hall effect on a two-sphere.

## 3 Review: $`4+1`$d quantum Hall effect on an $`S^4`$

The 4+1d quantum Hall physics of  is the quantum mechanics of massive charged particles moving on a four-sphere in a time-independent $`SU(2)`$ gauge field. This field is taken to be the homogeneous $`SU(2)`$ instanton (i.e. a gauge configuration of a non-vanishing second Chern class, with instanton number one).

The charged particles are in some definite representation of the gauge group corresponding to some value $`I(n1)/2`$ of the $`SU(2)`$ ‘isospin’, and can be described by $`n`$-component vectors. It was found in  that eventually, one has to take $`n`$ very large to obtain a reasonable thermodynamic limit.

### 3.1 The second Hopf map

To parameterize the four-sphere, we will use (slightly modified) conventions of . The embedding coordinates $`\stackrel{~}{x}_\mu =Rx_\mu `$ ($`\mu =\mathrm{1..5}`$, $`x_\mu x_\mu =1`$) of the $`S^4`$ in a 5d Euclidean space can be written as

$`x_\mu =\overline{\mathrm{\Psi }}_\alpha (\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu )_{\alpha \alpha ^{}}\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha ^{},\overline{\mathrm{\Psi }}_\alpha \mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha =1.`$ (3.3)
Here, the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu `$ are $`4\times 4`$ Euclidean Dirac gamma matrices, $`\{\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu ,\mathrm{\Gamma }_\nu \}=2\delta _{\mu \nu }`$, and $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$ is a four component complex spinor, the fundamental spinor of $`SO(5)`$. Obviously, there is a redundancy in parameterizing the $`S^4`$ with $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$. Indeed, if we choose the gamma matrices as

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }^i=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& i\sigma _i\\ i\sigma _i& 0\end{array}\right),i=\mathrm{1..3},\mathrm{\Gamma }^4=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),\mathrm{\Gamma }^5=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right),`$ (3.10)
we can write $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$ in the following form,

$`\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Psi }_1\\ \mathrm{\Psi }_2\end{array}\right)=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1+x_5}{2}}}\left(\begin{array}{c}u_1\\ u_2\end{array}\right),\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Psi }_3\\ \mathrm{\Psi }_4\end{array}\right)=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2(1+x_5)}}}(x_4ix_i\sigma _i)\left(\begin{array}{c}u_1\\ u_2\end{array}\right),`$ (3.20)
with some two-component complex spinor $`(u_1,u_2)`$ satisfying $`\overline{u}_\sigma u_\sigma =1`$. Varying $`u_\sigma `$ changes $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$, but leaves $`x_\mu `$ invariant. The space of different $`u_\sigma `$ is an $`S^3`$, $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$ span an $`S^7`$, and as we said, $`x_\mu `$ are coordinates on an $`S^4`$. This construction of $`S^7`$ as a fibration of $`S^3`$ over $`S^4`$ is known as the second Hopf map. If we mod out this $`S^7`$ by the $`U(1)`$ phase rotations of $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$, we obtain $`\mathrm{𝐂𝐏}^\mathrm{𝟑}`$ as an $`S^2`$ fibration over $`S^4`$.

### 3.2 The quantum Hall mechanics

The gauge field of the homogeneous $`SU(2)`$ instanton on the $`S^4`$, i.e. of the Yang monopole , can be written as

$`A_\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{a_\mu }{R}};a_A={\displaystyle \frac{i}{1+x_5}}\eta _{iAB}x_B{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma _i}{2}},a_5=0,`$ (3.21)
$`\eta _{iAB}=ϵ_{iAB4}+\delta _{iA}\delta _{4B}\delta _{iB}\delta _{4A},A,B=\mathrm{1..4}`$ (3.22)
where $`\sigma _i`$ are the Pauli matrices. (The gauge connection is $`a_\mu dx_\mu `$, with the restriction $`x_\mu dx_\mu `$ =0). This potential can also be obtained as $`\overline{u}_\sigma a_{\sigma \sigma ^{}}u_\sigma ^{}=\overline{\mathrm{\Psi }}_\alpha d\mathrm{\Psi }_\alpha `$ , which means that (3.21) is precisely what we get if we think of the $`S^3`$ in the second Hopf map as an $`SU(2)`$ gauge field living on the $`S^4`$.

The single-particle Hamiltonian of  is simply the kinetic energy of the charged particles plus the interaction with the $`SU(2)`$ gauge field,

$`H={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2MR^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\mu <\nu }{}}\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }^2.`$ (3.23)
Here, $`M`$ is the mass of the particle, and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }=i(x_\mu D_\nu x_\nu D_\mu )`$, with some appropriate covariant derivatives $`D_\mu `$ whose form depends on the $`SU(2)`$ representation chosen. In general, $`H`$ will be an $`n\times n`$ matrix, with $`I(n1)/2`$ being the value of the $`SU(2)`$ ‘isospin’.

The Hamiltonian (3.23) is $`SO(5)`$ invariant, though the usual $`SO(5)`$ action has to be accompanied by an extra isospin rotation. In other words, the $`SO(5)`$ generators are

$`L_{\mu \nu }\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }if_{\mu \nu },f_{\mu \nu }[D_\mu ,D_\nu ].`$ (3.24)
As a result, the energy eigenstates form $`SO(5)`$ representations. Any $`SO(5)`$ representation can be labelled by two integers $`r_1r_20`$, the row lengths of the corresponding Young diagram.111A nice and succinct review of $`SO(2k+1)`$ and $`SO(2k)`$ representations can be found in . The dimension of the representation is

$$D(r_1,r_2)=\frac{1}{6}(r_1+r_2+2)(r_1r_2+1)(3+2r_1)(1+2r_2).$$
(3.25)
Expressed in terms of the variables of ,

$$p=r_1+r_2,q=r_1r_2,pq0,$$
(3.26)
this becomes

$$\stackrel{~}{D}(p,q)=(1+q)(1+pq)(1+\frac{p}{2})(1+\frac{p+q}{3}).$$
(3.27)
The variables $`p`$ and $`q`$ satisfy

$$pq=2I,I\frac{n1}{2},$$
(3.28)
implying

$$r_1r_2=I.$$
(3.29)
The reason why there is a restriction on the value of $`r_2`$ is that the particles are point-like, and therefore they cannot have two independent ‘angular momenta’, i.e. two independent charges under the Cartan subalgebra of the $`SO(5)`$. The value of $`r_2`$ is non-zero just because the generators of this $`SO(5)`$ are not exactly equal to the dynamical angular momenta if $`I0`$.

Using the identity

$$H=\frac{1}{2MR^2}\underset{\mu <\nu }{}\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }^2=\frac{1}{2MR^2}\left(\underset{\mu <\nu }{}L_{\mu \nu }^22I(I+1)\right),$$
(3.30)
one can easily find the energy corresponding to a given $`SO(5)`$ representation,

$$E(I,q)=\frac{1}{2MR^2}(2I+(2I+3)q+q^2).$$
(3.31)
We see that $`q`$ plays the role of the Landau level index. The degeneracy of the lowest Landau level ($`q=0`$) is

$$\stackrel{~}{D}(n1,0)=\frac{1}{6}n(n+1)(n+2).$$
(3.32)
## 4 $`U(n)`$ interpretation of the $`4+1`$d quantum Hall effect

To make any connection to string theory, we have to get rid of the extremely high gauge representations of the charged particles. This can be done very easily. Note that the gauge connection of the charged particles due to (3.21) can be obtained from (3.21) by replacing $`\frac{1}{2}\sigma _i`$ with appropriate generators $`I_i`$ of the $`SU(2)`$ Lie algebra , $`[I_i,I_j]=iϵ_{ijk}I_k`$,

$`A_\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{a_\mu }{R}};a_A={\displaystyle \frac{i}{1+x_5}}\eta _{iAB}x_BI_i,a_5=0.`$ (4.33)
The particles are described by $`n`$-component vectors, and both (3.23) and (4.33) are $`n\times n`$ matrices. Thus, the system is equivalent to particles in the fundamental representation of $`U(n)`$ moving under the influence of a $`U(n)`$ gauge field, given by (4.33). The equivalence is possible only because here we are treating all the gauge fields as a fixed background. Of course, if they were dynamical, there would be a big difference between $`SU(2)`$ and $`U(n)`$ gauge fields.

The gauge configuration (4.33) is actually the homogeneous instanton solution of $`U(n)`$ with instanton number

$`N={\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}(n1)n(n+1).`$ (4.34)
A review of these homogeneous instantons can be found for example in Appendix B of . From string theory we know that for large $`R`$ we can think of this gauge field as $`N`$ D0-branes in the world-volume of $`n`$ coincident spherical D4-branes.

## 5 String theory construction of the $`4+1`$d quantum Hall effect

Having identified the brane construction of the gauge field on the four-sphere in the previous section, it is easy to model the full system, including the ‘electrons’. This can be done in a way analogous to . We start with $`n`$ coincident spherical D4-branes and spread $`\frac{1}{6}(n1)n(n+1)`$ D0-branes in their world-volume. Say these D4-branes are extended in $`\stackrel{~}{x}_\mu ,\mu =\mathrm{1..5}`$. Consider also $`m`$ flat infinite D4-branes far from the four-sphere, extended in $`\stackrel{~}{x}_\mu ,\mu =\mathrm{6..9}`$. Now move the $`m`$ D4-branes to the center of the four-sphere. The Hanany-Witten effect  produces $`mn`$ fundamental strings connecting the D4-branes at the center to the ones forming the four-sphere. The string ends are fundamentals of the D4-brane $`U(n)`$ gauge group, which is precisely what we need to interpret them as the ‘electrons’ of .

Since the system breaks supersymmetry, it cannot be fully stable. It is not even metastable, and it will immediately start to collapse. Of course, if we want to study the stringy quantum Hall physics of this system, we have to make it at least metastable or very slowly decaying. One of the possible ways might be placing the whole system into a fluxbrane  with a non-zero Ramond-Ramond field strength $`F_\mathit{6}=dC_\mathit{5}`$ with Lorentz $`SO(5,1)`$ and rotational $`SO(4)`$ symmetry . (A similar set-up for two-spheres was studied in .) If we make the RR field strong enough, the spherical D4-branes want to expand. On the other hand, the field strength of the RR field goes to zero at infinity, so one might expect that the system will reach some equilibrium radius. Of course, the stability with respect to non-spherical deformations will be important, too. In this paper, we will leave this question open.

Figure 2: The string theory picture of the $`4+1`$d quantum Hall effect on an $`S^4`$ can be

obtained from the one at fig. 1 simply by changing the dimensionality of the D-branes.

### 5.1 Fuzzy four-sphere interpretation

There is a nice interpretation of the spherical D4-branes carrying D0-brane charge – the non-commutative (or fuzzy) four-sphere . Such a system can be constructed in matrix theory, where one starts with $`\frac{1}{6}(n1)n(n+1)`$ D0-branes and expands them into an $`S^4`$ . The local D4-brane charge of such a configuration was found to be $`n`$.

As a result, the system can be described either in terms of D4-branes with a D0-brane charge, or in terms of D0-branes expanded into a fuzzy $`S^4`$. Just like in , these two pictures should agree at the leading order in $`n`$, but there is no reason to expect that also the subleading corrections are the same.

Now, we would like to see what implications the matrix fuzzy $`S^4`$ picture has for the quantum Hall physics. As in , one can think of the fundamental string as being connected to the D0-branes forming the $`S^4`$. Let us for simplicity assume that there is just one D4 at the center of the $`S^4`$ ( i.e. $`m=1`$). We can expect that there is one unexcited string state for each D0-brane. Because unexcited strings have the lowest possible energy, they should correspond to the lowest Landau levels. As a result, we expect the lowest Landau level to be $`\frac{1}{6}(n1)n(n+1)`$-fold degenerate. Indeed, at the leading order in $`n`$, this agrees with (3.32).

### 5.2 The magic geometry of the fuzzy $`S^4`$

We have seen that the $`4+1`$d QHE is in a good sense really $`4+1`$-dimensional – it is the physics of $`U(n)`$ fundamentals on an $`S^4`$. However, if we kept $`n`$ large and asked the fundamentals what configuration space they live in, they would describe it (especially after reading section 3.1) as an $`S^2`$ fibration over $`S^4`$, the $`S^2`$ fibre representing the possible orientations of the $`SU(2)`$ ‘isospin’. They could also mention that the space is actually a $`\mathrm{𝐂𝐏}^\mathrm{𝟑}`$, if they wanted to be as precise as Edward Witten, who pointed out this interesting fact. The $`\mathrm{𝐂𝐏}^\mathrm{𝟑}`$ can be viewed222I would like to thank Luboš Motl for discussions about this point. as $`Sp(2)/SU(2)\times U(1)`$, where $`SU(2)\times U(1)SU(2)\times SU(2)=Sp(1)\times Sp(1)Sp(2)`$. Alternatively, it is also the bundle of unit anti-self-dual two-forms on $`S^4`$.

This agrees with the matrix theory calculations of , where it was found that the full matrix algebra of the fuzzy $`S^4`$ approaches in the large $`n`$ limit the algebra of functions on $`SO(5)/U(2)=Sp(2)/SU(2)\times U(1)`$.

Associated with these two points of view are two alternative descriptions of the same physics – a $`6+1`$-dimensional  and a $`4+1`$-dimensional. This kind of duality was discussed in  in the context of ordinary field theory on the fuzzy $`S^4`$. Probably the most interesting aspect of this correspondence is that from the D4-brane point of view, the two extra dimensions are made out of the D4-brane gauge fields.333For later developments see

### 5.3 How to see the fuzzy $`S^4`$ without using string theory

The fuzzy four-sphere structure of the lowest Landau level ($`q=0`$, $`p=2I`$) of  can be seen quite easily even without the machinery of string theory. The single particle states $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}`$ transform in the $`(r_1=I,r_2=I)`$ of $`SO(5)`$, which is the $`2I`$-th symmetric tensor power of the fundamental spinor $`\mathrm{\Psi }`$ of $`SO(5)`$, i.e. $`(\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2})`$. $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}`$ can be thought of as a vector with $`P\frac{1}{6}(p+1)(p+2)(p+3)`$ components, because the lowest Landau level is $`P`$-fold degenerate.

In analogy to section 2, the lowest Landau states localized about a certain point $`x_\mu `$ on the $`S^4`$ are eigenstates of $`x_\mu \stackrel{~}{X}_\mu `$. The operators $`X_\mu `$ can be obtained by uplifting the gamma matrices $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu `$ from the $`(\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2})`$ representation to $`(I,I)=(\frac{p}{2},\frac{p}{2})`$, cf. also (3.3). In other words,

$`X_\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu 11\mathrm{}1+1\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu 1\mathrm{}1+\mathrm{}+111\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu )_{sym}.`$ (5.35)
Moreover, since the wave-functions $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}`$ transform in the $`(I,I)`$ of $`SO(5)`$, we have

$`L_{\mu \nu }\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}={\displaystyle \frac{i}{4}}[X_\mu ,X_\nu ]\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }},`$ (5.36)
and

$`H\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2MR^2}}({\displaystyle \underset{\mu <\nu }{}}L_{\mu \nu }^2I(I+1))\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2MR^2}}({\displaystyle \underset{\mu <\nu }{}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{16}}[X_\mu ,X_\nu ]^2I(I+1))\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}.`$ (5.37)
Now, the connection to the fuzzy four-sphere became obvious. In (5.35) we recognize the matrices representing the fuzzy $`S^4`$ , and (5.36) are the generators of its rotations. However, it is hard to judge from the present calculations whether there is any deeper reason why (5.37) resembles the usual matrix theory Hamiltonian.

## 6 Generalization to Higher Dimensions

We have seen that the QHE on 2d or 4d spherical surfaces corresponds to the quantum mechanics of charged particles moving in the gauge field of the fuzzy $`S^2`$ or $`S^4`$. Higher-dimensional fuzzy spheres have been constructed as well, at least in matrix theory. Physics of charged particles (or string ends) moving in their gauge field naturally generalizes the $`2+1`$d and $`4+1`$d QHE. Let us briefly mention what properties of these quantum Hall systems can be inferred from the matrix theory results of .

The fuzzy $`S^6`$ consists of

$`N_6={\displaystyle \frac{1}{360}}(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)^2(n+4)(n+5)`$ (6.38)
D0-branes and its D6-brane charge is

$`D_6={\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}(n+1)(n+2)(n+3).`$ (6.39)
Therefore the $`6+1`$d QHE should be the dynamics of the fundamentals of $`U(D_6)`$ in a homogeneous background $`U(D_6)`$ gauge field with a non-zero third Chern class. The degeneracy of the lowest Landau level should be $`N_6`$, up to subleading shifts of $`n`$. The case of the fuzzy $`S^8`$ is analogous, with

$`N_8={\displaystyle \frac{1}{302400}}(n+1)^2(n+2)^2(n+3)^4(n+4)^4(n+5)^4(n+6)^2(n+7)^2,`$ (6.40)
and

$`D_8={\displaystyle \frac{1}{360}}(n+1)(n+2)(n+3)^2(n+4)(n+5).`$ (6.41)
In general for a fuzzy $`S^{2k}`$, the configuration space of the fundamentals should closely approximate $`SO(2k+1)/U(k)`$ at large $`n`$.

## 7 Conclusions

We have described a string theory system reproducing the quantum Hall effect of Zhang and Hu. Moreover, we have seen that there is an extremely close relationship between this $`4+1`$d and the ordinary spherical $`2+1`$d quantum Hall system – they are the first two elements in a hierarchy of quantum Hall systems on even-dimensional spheres.

Of course, many questions related to the $`4+1`$d quantum Hall effect are still open – for example the issue of finding an appropriate non-commutative Chern-Simons description444This problem has now been solved ., or understanding well the physics of the edge excitations. It is natural to expect that string theory will play an important role in answering these questions, judging from the many recently discovered connections between string theory and the ordinary quantum Hall effect.

Acknowledgements. I would like to thank B. Freivogel, J. McGreevy, S. Hellerman, J. P. Hu, M. Kleban, X. Liu, L. McAllister, L. Motl, M. Van Raamsdonk, S. Shenker, S. C. Zhang, and especially L. Susskind for extremely helpful discussions. This work was supported in part by a Stanford Graduate Fellowship, by NSF grant PHY-9870115, and by the Institute of Physics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic under grant no. GA-AVČR A10100711.


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

In hydrodynamic models  the freeze-out surface is very sensitive on the initial conditions and is therefore highly model dependent, (see e.g. Fig. 1). However, this dependence disappears when considering ratios of integrated particle yields, $`N^i/N^j`$, which are independent of the details of the initial conditions and are the same as those of point-like particles in a fireball at rest, $`N_0^i/N_0^j`$ . If the rapidity distribution is flat (as is the case at RHIC energies) then it is furthermore possible to show that

$$\frac{dN^i/dy|_{y=0}}{dN^j/dy|_{y=0}}=\frac{N_0^i}{N_0^j}.$$
(1)
The conditions for the validity of these results have been discussed in the literature  and will not be repeated here. Motivated by the above results, a systematic study of fully integrated particle multiplicities in central Au–Au and Pb–Pb collisions at beam momenta of 1.7$`A`$ GeV, 11.6$`A`$ GeV (Au–Au) and 158$`A`$ GeV (Pb–Pb) has been performed . The close similarity of the colliding systems makes it possible to study heavy ion collisions under definite initial conditions over a wide range of beam energies. It can be concluded that a thermal model description of particle multiplicities, with additional strangeness suppression, is possible for each energy. The resulting temperature $`T`$ and chemical potential $`\mu _B`$ are shown in Fig. 2 which also shows results from recent fits to the RHIC data  It can been seen that, at all energies, the average energy per hadron in the comoving frame is always close to 1 GeV per hadron despite the fact that the center-of-mass energy varies more than 100-fold :

$$\frac{E}{N}1\mathrm{GeV}.$$
(2)
It should be noted that, with the advent of more precise data from the NA49 collaboration, this relation is now better satisfied than when it was first proposed in 1998 .

## 2 Energy Dependence of Thermal Parameters.

The energy dependence of the baryon chemical potential, $`\mu _B`$, can be described by a simple fit

$$\mu _B(s)=\frac{a}{1+\sqrt{s}/b}$$
(3)
with $`a1.27`$ GeV and $`b4.3`$ GeV. The temperature is then determined from Eq. 2. The resulting fits to $`\mu _B(s)`$ and $`T(s)`$ are shown in Fig. 3. This parametrisation can be used to discuss the energy dependence of particle ratios. The temperature varies considerably between the lowest and the highest beam energies, namely, between 50 MeV at SIS and 160 MeV at SPS. Similarly, the baryon chemical potential changes appreciably, decreasing from about 820 MeV at SIS to about 240 MeV at SPS. The supplementary $`\gamma _\mathrm{s}`$factor , measuring the deviation from a completely equilibrated hadron gas, is around 0.7 – 0.8 at all energies where it has been considered as a free fit parameter. At the present level of accuracy, a fully equilibrated hadron gas (i.e. $`\gamma _\mathrm{s}`$=1) cannot be ruled out in all examined collisions except in Pb–Pb, where $`\gamma _\mathrm{s}`$deviates from 1 by more than $`4\sigma `$. This result does not agree with a recent similar analysis of Pb–Pb data  imposing full strangeness equilibrium. The main reason for this discrepancy is to be found in the different data set used; whilst in ref.  measurements in different limited rapidity intervals have been collected, we have used only particle yields extrapolated to full phase space. The temperature values that we have found essentially agree with previous analyses in Au–Au collisions  and estimates at 11.7 $`A`$ GeV .

## 3 Maximum Relative Strangeness.

The results of the previous section combined with the energy dependence of the thermal parameters shown in Fig. 3 provide a basis for the study of the energy dependence of strangeness production in heavy ion collisions. Of particular interest are the ratios of strange to non-strange particle multiplicities as well as the relative strangeness content of the system as expressed by the Wroblewski factor  defined as:

$$\lambda _s=\frac{2s\overline{s}}{u\overline{u}+d\overline{d}}$$
(4)
Furthermore, we assume (for simplicity) strangeness to be in complete equilibrium, that is, the strangeness saturation factor is taken as $`\gamma _\mathrm{s}`$=1. When more data will become available, this point can be refined.

We turn our attention first to the energy dependence of the Wroblewski ratio The quark content used in this ratio is determined at the moment of chemical freeze-out, i.e. from the hadrons and especially, hadronic resonances, before they decay. This ratio is thus not an easily measurable observable unless one can reconstruct all resonances from the final-state particles. The results are shown in Fig. 4 as a function of invariant energy $`\sqrt{s}`$. The values calculated from the experimental data at chemical freeze-out in central A-A collisions have been taken from reference . There the statistical model was fitted with the extra parameter $`\gamma _s`$ to account for the possible chemical under-saturation of strangeness. In general, values for $`\gamma _s`$ close to 1 are found. At the SPS, $`\gamma _s0.7`$ gives the best agreement with 4$`\pi `$ data. This is also the reason why the SPS points in Fig. 4 lie below the solid line. The values of $`\lambda _s`$ were extracted from 4$`\pi `$ integrated data with the exception of the result form RHIC where particle ratios were measured only at mid-rapidity . The solid line in Fig. 4 describes the statistical model calculations in complete equilibrium along the unified freeze-out curve  and with the energy dependent thermal parameters presented here. From Fig. 4 we conclude that around 30 A$``$GeV lab energy the relative strangeness content in heavy ion collisions reaches a clear and well pronounced maximum. The Wroblewski factor decreases towards higher incident energies and reaches a value of about 0.43.

The appearance of the maximum can be traced to the specific dependence of $`\mu _B`$ on the beam energy. In Fig. 4 we also show the results for $`\lambda _s`$ calculated under the assumption that only the temperature varies with collision energy but the baryon chemical potential is kept fixed at zero. In this case the Wroblewski factor is indeed seen to be a monotonic function of energy. The assumption of vanishing net baryon density is of course the prevailing situation in e.g. p-$`\overline{\mathrm{p}}`$ and e+-e- collisions. In Fig. 4 the results for $`\lambda _s`$ extracted from the data in p-p, p-$`\overline{\mathrm{p}}`$ and e+-e- are also included . The dashed line represents results with $`\mu _B=0`$ and a radius of 1.2 fm. There are two important differences in the behavior of $`\lambda _s`$ in elementary compared to heavy ion collisions. Firstly, the strangeness content is smaller by a factor of two. In elementary collisions particle multiplicities follow the values given by the canonical ensemble with radius 1.2 fm whereas in A-A collisions there is a transition from canonical to grand canonical behavior. Secondly, there is no significant maximum in the behavior of $`\lambda _s`$ in elementary collisions due to the zero baryon density in the p-$`\overline{\mathrm{p}}`$ and e+-e- systems.

Following the chemical freeze-out curve, shown as a thick full line in Fig. 4, one can see that $`\lambda _s`$ rises quickly from SIS to AGS energies, then reaches a maximum around $`\mu _B500`$ MeV and $`T130`$ MeV. These freeze-out parameters correspond to 30 GeV lab energy. At higher incident energies the increase in $`T`$ becomes negligible but $`\mu _B`$ keeps on decreasing and as a consequence $`\lambda _s`$ also decreases.

The importance of finite baryon density on the behavior of $`\lambda _s`$ is demonstrated in Fig. 4 showing separately the contributions to $`s\overline{s}`$ coming from strange baryons, from strange mesons and from hidden strangeness, i.e., from hadrons like $`\varphi `$ and $`\eta `$. As can be seen in Fig. 5, the origin of the maximum in the Wroblewski ratio can be traced to the contribution of strange baryons. Even strange mesons exhibit a broad maximum. This is due to the presence of associated production of e.g. kaons together with hyperons. This channel dominates at low $`\sqrt{s}`$ and loses importance at high incident energies. Next we study how the behavior of the Wroblewski ratio is reflected in specific particle yields. The energy dependence of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }/\pi ^+`$ ratio is shown in Fig. 6. The model gives a good description of the data, showing a broad maximum at the same energy as the one seen in the Wroblewski factor. The appearance of the maximum in the relative strangeness contribution becomes also obvious when considering ratios which are more sensitive to the baryon chemical potential. Fig. 6 also shows the energy dependence of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}/\pi ^+`$ and the $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{}/\pi ^+`$ ratios which all exhibit maxima. The peak in the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }/\pi ^+`$ ratio is much stronger than the one in the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}/\pi ^+`$ or in the $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{}/\pi ^+`$ ratios. There is also a shift of the maximum to higher energies for particles with increasing strangeness quantum number. These differences appear as a consequence of the enhanced strangeness content of the particles which suppresses the dependence of the corresponding ratio on $`\mu _B`$.

## 4 Centrality Dependence at SPS.

We next analyze the centrality dependence of the thermal parameters describing hadron multiplicities . This provides further information about the effects of the size of the excited strongly interacting system and help in the systematic understanding of the experimental data. We will show that the thermal model is able to describe the available data for various centrality classes at one beam energy.

In order to have a sound basis for the application of the thermal model we rely as much as possible on fully integrated particle multiplicities. For this reason we concentrate our efforts on the analysis of results obtained by the NA49 collaboration  using centrality selected fixed-target Pb–Pb collisions at a beam energy of 158 GeV per nucleon, which are here analyzed within the framework of the thermal model.

As shown in , the inclusion or omission of certain hadron species can change considerably the extracted values of $`T`$ and $`\mu _B`$. We stress however that our analysis, due to the restricted available data, focuses on the trends with changing centrality. The temperature, $`T`$, and the baryon chemical potential, $`\mu _B`$, do not show any noticeable dependence on centrality . There are two thermal parameters which exhibit a pronounced dependence on centrality: the strangeness equilibration factor $`\gamma _s`$ increases approximately linearly and saturates for increasing centrality, as shown in Fig. 7. Other thermodynamic state variables, such as the energy per hadron $`E/N`$, the energy density, the baryon density, and the entropy per baryon $`S/B`$, remain fairly independent of the centrality.

In summary, the analysis of the thermal parameters, describing the integrated yields of $`\pi ^\pm `$, $`K^\pm `$, and $`\overline{p}`$ as obtained by the NA49 experiment  shows that the radius of the fireball increases linearly with increasing centrality. Also the strangeness parameter $`\gamma _s`$ increases, i.e., strange particle multiplicities approach chemical equilibrium. In contrast, the temperature and the baryon chemical potential do not change with centrality. No in-medium modifications are needed to describe the above quoted hadron yields.

## Acknowledgments

Helpful discussions with H. Oeschler, K. Redlich, F. Becattini, A. Keränen, E. Suhonen, B. Kaempfer, P. Braun-Munzinger, J. Stachel, S. Wheaton, S. Yacoob, M. Marais are acknowledged. Thanks are also due to D. Röhrich, P. Seyboth and R. Stock for invaluable help with the NA49 data.


text:
# Comment on an alleged refutation of non-locality

## Abstract

A recent claim (Deutsch and Hayden (2000)), that non-locality can be refuted by considering the evolution of the system in the Heisenberg picture, is denied. What they demonstrated was not the falsity of non-locality but the no-superluminal-signalling principle.

Deutsch and Hayden (2000) have claimed that Bell’s Theorem (or its later variants; for a relatively recent account, see Peres 1993), namely that non-locality follows from an entanglement situation, is a mistake. They argue that if the evolution of the system into an entangled state is viewed in the Heisenberg picture rather than the Schr dinger picture, it can be seen that all effects are transferred sub-luminally.

The purpose of this Comment is to point out that the result they have actually obtained is not that non-locality is false, but the standard theorem that no superluminal signalling is possible. We should remember that in addition to non-locality there is this other result about entangled systems, which, remarkably, co-exists with it, and that is the fact that, so long as each observer simply looks at his or her own results, irrespective of the results of the other observer, then the results are indeed completely local, and in the example of EPR-Bohm are simply a half-and-half random mixture of the two possible outcomes. Non-locality, by contrast, is all in the correlations and has a retrospective character: after the measurements have been made and sufficient time has passed for the results of the observers to be brought together and compared, then it is deduced that a non-local effect must have occurred.

Deutsch and Hayden’s article is expressed in the language of quantum computing, with the entangling evolution into a Bell basis state (Braunstein, Mann and Revzen, 1992) obtained as a composition of the evolution caused by two types of quantum logic gate. However a first point to be made is that non-locality follows solely from the correlations between the results of later disentangling measurements; it does not matter how the pairs came to be entangled in the first place, whether by an evolution or a projection, and for that reason alone considerations of the Heisenberg versus the Schr dinger picture would seem to be irrelevant.

But let us follow the authors in considering the particles to be in a constant Heisenberg state, taken to be in the form before they became entangled, and the spin observables to evolve through the entangling evolution. We will still, of course, obtain the same probabilities when it comes to the disentangling measurements, taking the mod-squared inner product of the constant state with the (inversely) evolved spin-eigenstates, instead of the evolved state with the constant spin eigenstates. Following the usual proof of non-locality, we wish to find the probabilities of the outcomes of both observers being the same and of them being different, when they measure at angles $`\theta `$ and $`\varphi `$ respectively. So, since the individual eigenvalues are $`\pm 1`$, we evolve the product observable whose $`\pm 1`$ eigenstates represent ’same’ and ’different’, namely

$$\left(\widehat{\sigma }_z\mathrm{cos}\theta +\widehat{\sigma }_y\mathrm{sin}\theta \right)\left(\widehat{\sigma }_z\mathrm{cos}\varphi +\widehat{\sigma }_y\mathrm{sin}\varphi \right)$$
(1)
where the $`\widehat{\sigma }`$’s are the spin observables. (Or we could evolve all tensor combinations of the $`\widehat{\sigma }`$’s and then take a combination appropriate to rotations, if preferred.)

But Deutsch and Hayden’s expression for the evolved observables is

$`\widehat{1}(\widehat{\sigma }_x\widehat{1},\widehat{\sigma }_y\widehat{1},\widehat{\sigma }_z\widehat{\sigma }_x)\widehat{1}`$
$`\widehat{1}(\widehat{\sigma }_x\widehat{\sigma }_z,\widehat{\sigma }_y\widehat{1},\widehat{1}\widehat{\sigma }_x)\widehat{1}`$ (2)
(their expression (23)), which is obtained by evolving the observables

$$\widehat{\sigma }_x\widehat{1},\widehat{\sigma }_y\widehat{1},\widehat{\sigma }_z\widehat{1},\widehat{1}\widehat{\sigma }_x,\widehat{1}\widehat{\sigma }_y,\widehat{1}\widehat{\sigma }_z$$
(3)
(with rotations then applied). But these give the total probabilities for each individual observer’s results irrespective of the results of the other observer. These are indeed local, but that is precisely the no-superluminal-signalling theorem.

Note that each product observable in (3) contains the spin observable for one observer, and a sum over the projectors for the two possible results of the other observer, represented by the identity operator for the other observer. In the same way, when Deutsch and Hayden demonstrate the independence of the probabilities for one observer from the choice of angle of the other observer, by evaluating the expectation value for the one observer (their Expression (26)), this summation does not appear explicitly, but it is there, because in evaluating

$$<0|<0|U\left(\widehat{\sigma }\widehat{1}\right)U|0>|0>$$
(4)
(where U is the evolution) the identity $`\widehat{1}`$ is again a summation over the projectors for the second observer. This is precisely how the no-superluminal-signalling theorem is proved, by taking the results of one observer and summing over the results for the other observer (Shimony 1984).

The authors go on to claim that teleportation, as well as non-locality, can be seen to be a purely local phenomenon as a result of their analysis. However their further analysis depends on a technique which seems strange. They define recursively a set of evolutions $`U_G(t)`$ associated with logic gate G, for discrete t’s, by
$`U_G(t+1)`$ = same functional form in terms of updated $`\widehat{\sigma }`$’s (i.e. of the Heisenberg-evolved observables of the system) as $`U_G(t)`$ was in terms of previously updated $`\widehat{\sigma }`$’s.

But why should we regard the updated mapping UG as representing the same logic gate G? A logic gate is presumably going to be a fixed device which is always going to have the same effect on bits, not a different effect at different times. This puts an obstacle, for myself at least, to following their argument on ”locally inaccessible information.”

But in any case, teleportation, although another entanglement effect, is very different to non-locality, and it is not clear that it requires explanation in the same way that non-locality does. Non-locality is an effect at the macroscopic level of observed outcomes and observer choices of what to measure; it follows purely from the correlations, and although quantum mechanics predicts those correlations, non-locality would hold for any other theory which predicted the same correlations, or would hold even if those correlations had been established only by experiment, without any idea of the mechanism between them. Also, it requires that the observers should be able to make free choices of what to measure, since it consists of the assertion that for at least one of the observers (though we don’t know which one, and it may be both), the observer’s outcomes would have been different (note the contrafactual reasoning) if the other observer had made a different choice of what to measure. If the choices were somehow pre-determined, for instance, there would be no problem of non-locality.

Teleportation, by contrast, is an assertion about copying a quantum state, something which is not itself observable (indeed, part of the idea is that the original state may be unknown, and remains unknown after being copied), and the observers have no choice of what to measure. This gives no clear ground for asserting that a superluminal influence crosses space at the stage when the entanglement is ”swapped” (to use the terminology of Pan et al (1998)), and in addition there must then be a sub-luminal message before the copying is accomplished.

It is non-locality which is definitely a problem, and since it follows from correlations at the macroscopic level, any denying of it requires either that the correlations are incorrect, and hence that any theory which predicts them (in particular quantum mechanics) is incorrect222And that the experiments which have apparently confirmed them are invalid through loopholes, or denying the validity of the reasoning which establishes non-locality as a consequence of the correlations, such as denying the validity of contrafactual reasoning.


text:
# Electronic structure and tunneling resonance spectra of nanoscopic aluminum islands

## Abstract

The electronic structure of nanoscopic oxide-coated aluminum islands is investigated using a tight-binding model that incorporates the geometry, chemistry and disorder of the particle. The oxide coat is found to significantly increase the volume accessible to electrons at the Fermi level. The level statistics agree with random matrix theory predictions. States near the Fermi level show pronounced clustering regardless of disorder. It is suggested that the observed clusters of tunneling resonances may have a more complex origin than if they were solely due to many-body non-equilibrium effects.

PACS numbers: 73.22.-f, 73.22.Dj

It is expected that the statistics of the discrete energy spectra of small disordered metal grains should be described by random matrix theory (RMT). Experimental confirmation of RMT predictions for such systems, however, presents a challenge. Recently, some of the technological difficulties have been overcome and electron tunneling spectroscopy experiments have been carried out on Al, Au and Co nanoscopic particles. These transport experiments have opened the possibility of testing directly the applicability of RMT to the energy spectra of these nanoscopic metal islands (nanoislands).

The observed electron tunneling spectra of Al nanoislands coated with aluminum oxide showed a surprisingly high density and pronounced clustering of conductance resonances. Agam and co-workers  proposed that this unexpected behavior is a manifestation of the effects of electron-electron interactions on non-equilibrium states of the nanoislands. By focusing on the many-body aspects of the problem, they were able to account for the anomalous features of the data qualitatively in an appealing way. However, they modeled the underlying one-electron spectra of the nanoislands phenomenologically. For a complete understanding of the experiments a microscopic treatment of the single-electron energy spectra is desirable. Microscopic models of aluminum nano-structures have been proposed, but none of those works addressed the electronic structure or transport properties of Al nanoislands similar to those in the above experiments. Recently, Campbell et al. performed state-of-the-art molecular dynamics simulations of the passivation of Al nanospheres with aluminum oxide but did not calculate the electronic spectra of the particles.

In this communication, we present microscopic tight-binding calculations of the single-electron electronic spectra of Al nanoislands coated with Al-oxide. We include the geometry, atomic lattice, chemistry and disorder of the nanoparticle explicitly in our theory. Our leitmotiv is twofold: i) comparison of RMT predictions for the energy spectra of generic disordered metal grains with the electronic structure obtained from realistic numerical simulations; and ii) improvement of our understanding of the experimentally observed tunneling resonance spectra.

Motivated by the experiment, we consider a hemispheric nanoparticle of volume $`𝒱40nm^3`$, and investigate the effects of the disorder at the metal/oxide interface on the electronic structure and transport properties. (Different geometries yield qualitatively similar results.) We start with an analysis of the mean level spacing and level fluctuations in the neighborhood of the Fermi energy of the particles. We find that describing the discrete energy levels in this region according to RMT should be a satisfactory starting point when dealing with Al nanoislands coated with Al-oxide. However, the magnitude of the calculated mean level spacing is consistent with a significant enhancement of the effective electronic volume of metallic nanoparticle due to the presence of the oxide coat. Next, a closer look at a few levels around the Fermi level reveals a rich electronic structure: There are clusters of levels and the clustering is strongly affected by the specifics of disorder. Furthermore, the clustering of the single-electron energy levels persists even in the presence of severe interface disorder. Finally, we model the differential conductance ($`dI/dV`$) spectrum and find clusters of tunneling resonances. The clustering is due to the complex structure of energy levels around the Fermi energy of the particle. The clusters of resonances are sensitive to disorder and to the capacitances of the tunnel junctions. The predicted number of tunneling resonances is not sufficient to explain the experimental data within a purely single-electron picture of transport. Nonetheless, our results suggest that the observed clusters of tunneling resonances  may have a more complex origin than if they were solely due to many-body non-equilibrium effects during transport.

We assume that the Al atoms in the interior of the nanoparticle form an fcc lattice with a lattice parameter $`a=0.405nm`$. The atoms at the surface of the nanoparticle have a different coordination number from the bulk fcc lattice. This establishes a criterion for defining the surface of the particle. In addition, the Al nanoislands in the experiment were passivated with a thin Al-oxide layer which acts as a tunnel barrier between the particle and leads. This layer also imposes some structural disorder at the metal-oxide interface. We model this metal-oxide interface in the following way: First, we define which atoms of the particle belong to the surface and identify this region as the interface; second, we randomly choose some of those sites (approximately 50%) to represent O atoms while the others correspond to Al. In the first part of this procedure we adopt two different criteria: Criterion 1 ($`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$): We assume the surface atoms to be those whose first neighbor coordination number is not equal to that of an fcc lattice. Criterion 2 ($`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$): Surface atoms are those whose first and/or second neighbor coordination numbers are not equal to those of an fcc lattice. The random choice of O and Al atoms in the metal-oxide interface is the only source of disorder in the results presented here.

We use a multiband (s, p, and d valence orbitals) tight-binding Hamiltonian without spin-orbit coupling:

$$=\underset{i,\alpha }{}\epsilon _i^\alpha c_{i\alpha }^{}c_{i\alpha }+\underset{i,j,\alpha ,\beta }{}\tau _{j\alpha ,i\beta }\left(c_{i\beta }^{}c_{j\alpha }+c_{j\alpha }^{}c_{i\beta }\right)$$
(1)
$`i,j`$ label the atoms, $`c_{i\alpha }^{}(c_{i\alpha })`$ creates(destroys) an electron on site $`i`$, and the index $`\alpha (\beta )`$ indicates the s, p or d orbital. $`\epsilon _i^\alpha `$ and $`\tau _{j\alpha ,i\beta }`$ are the Slater-Koster (SK)  on-site and hopping (up to second neighbors) parameters. We adopt an SK model in which the atomic orbitals on different sites are orthonormal. For the Al sites in the interior (bulk) of the particle we used the SK parameters given in Ref. . The Al and O sites in the metal-oxide interface have different SK parameters as is discussed below. The bonding of the atoms that form the oxide layer is due to charge transfer from the Al to the O. Campbell et al. have shown that the metal-oxide interface of spherical Al nanoparticles consists mainly of intercalated $`O^{1/2}`$ and $`Al^{+1/2}`$. These valence charges determine the SK on-site parameters for the interface atoms which we calculate following the Mulliken-Wolfsberg-Helmholz molecular-orbital approach. We determine the nearest neighbor O-Al hopping parameters by assuming an average separation of $`0.18nm`$ between O and Al atoms in the oxide, applying Harrison’s model to obtain the two-center transfer integrals  and then transforming them to find the SK hopping parameters. The same procedure is applied to find the nearest neighbor O-O hopping, using $`0.30nm`$ as the average separation between O atoms. The SK hopping parameters between Al atoms are assumed to be the same regardless of the valence charge.

We now present our results for a nanoisland of volume $`𝒱=40.45nm^3`$ for different realizations of disorder and surface criteria $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ and $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$. For this volume the particle-in-a-box (SP) mean level spacing $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}=(4E_F^{Al}/3𝒩)𝒱^1=2.09meV`$ where $`E_F^{Al}`$ is the Fermi energy and $`𝒩`$ the electron density of bulk Al. The total number of atoms is $`N=2587`$ and the surface-to-bulk ratio is $`(N_S/N_B)_1=0.538`$ and $`(N_S/N_B)_2=0.970`$ for criteria $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ and $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$, respectively. Note that for $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ the nanoisland is primarily bulk while for $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$ it is almost evenly balanced between bulk and surface. In the latter case the disorder is particularly severe. In Table I we present, for both $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ and $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$, the number of $`O^{1/2}`$ ($`N_O`$) and $`Al^{+1/2}`$ ($`N_{Al}`$) atoms, the total number of electrons ($`n`$) in the nanoisland, the calculated Fermi energy ($`E_F`$), and the calculated mean energy level separation $`(\delta )`$. $`E_F`$ is the energy of the highest occupied level assuming that spin up and down levels are degenerate. We find that the value of $`E_F`$ does not show major changes when switching from $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ to $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$. It seems that the increase in n, due to the increased metal-oxide interface, in going from $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ to $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$ is compensated by the associated changes in the electronic structure of the particles. This compensation keeps $`E_F`$ almost independent of the surface criteria. Surprisingly, we see that the different choices of surface criteria have a minimal effect on the values of $`\delta `$. Additionally, these values of $`\delta `$ agree well with $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$. These two findings are non-trivial and important: They imply that the mean level separation around $`E_F`$ is determined not by the volume of the aluminum core of the nanoparticle but by a larger volume that includes part of the oxide coat. For small particles with large surface to volume ratios this should have a significant effect (exceeding a factor of 2) on the mean level spacing which should be reflected in the experimental spectra. However, a qualitatively similar enhancement of the value of the nanoisland volume that is deduced from the experimental capacitance measurements of the tunnel junctions may also be possible. In this work the total volume $`𝒱`$ that determines $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$ is kept fixed at an experimentally estimated value for the different disorder realizations and surface criteria.

We now discuss the statistics of the energy levels that we find around $`E_F`$. In each spectrum, we select a symmetric energy interval (of $`400meV`$) around $`E_F`$ containing $`p=200`$ levels. Then we find the nearest level energy spacing $`E_t=\epsilon _{t+1}\epsilon _t`$ for each level $`|t`$ in the chosen set, and the mean level spacing $`\delta =(1/p)_{t=1}^pE_t`$. To compare our results with the RMT prediction, we build a histogram of the calculated spacings using a bin size $`\mathrm{\Delta }=\delta /5`$. Figure 1(a) shows such histograms for representative realizations of criteria $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ and $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$. The energy is in normalized units: $`s=E_t/\delta `$. In RMT our system falls into the orthogonal ensemble due to its time reversal symmetry. In this case, the Wigner distribution $`P_W(s)=(\pi s/2)exp(\pi s^2/4)`$ is a good approximation to the distribution predicted for the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble (GOE) for the probability of finding a spacing $`E_t/\delta `$ in the interval $`(s,s+ds]`$. We see from Fig. 1(a) that the probability of finding a spacing $`E_t/\delta `$ in the interval $`(s,s+\mathrm{\Delta }]`$ (histogram) is well described by $`P_W(s)\times p\mathrm{\Delta }`$ (thin-solid line) irrespective of the surface criteria.

In general, given a set of $`q`$ levels, neighboring level distributions $`P_k(s)`$ are defined as the probability of finding a spacing $`E_t^k`$ containing $`k`$ adjacent levels in the interval $`(s,s+ds]`$. The case $`k=0`$ corresponds to the nearest level spacing distribution discussed above. The statistical properties of $`P_k(s)`$ are well established for the GOE . In particular, specific results hold for the standard deviation (or width) $`\sigma _k`$ of these distributions. We now compare our numerical findings with the GOE predictions. Formally, $`(\sigma _k)^2=(\delta ^2/q)_{t=1}^q(E_t^k\delta _k)^2`$ for the k-spacing: $`E_t^k=\epsilon _{k+t+1}\epsilon _t`$ between levels $`|k+t+1`$ and $`|t`$, $`\delta _k`$ the mean of $`E_s^k`$, and $`\delta =\delta _0`$. Note that according to this definition $`\sigma _k`$ is expressed in units of $`\delta `$. Figure 1(b) shows the GOE prediction (solid line) for $`\sigma _k`$ and the values (symbols) found with the above set of $`p`$ calculated energy levels for different disorder realizations. For both surface criteria, the calculated values of $`\sigma _k`$ scatter around the GOE prediction. For criterion $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$, where surface is a large fraction of the particle, the scatter is stronger. Although the number of disorder realizations shown is too small for accurate ensemble averaging, the calculated $`\sigma _k`$ are consistent with the RMT trend.

We now consider the details of the electronic structure in a smaller region around $`E_F`$. Figure 2 is a plot of the first few levels around $`|E_F`$ for five disorder realizations for each surface criterion. The energy is measured relative to $`E_F`$ in units of $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$. The levels present a rich structure and are far from being equally-spaced by the energy $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$. We find that most of the levels form groups of two or more. The results are qualitatively similar for $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$ and $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟸}`$, however, the details around $`E_F`$ are set by disorder and surface criteria. Note that the predicted number of levels ($`19`$) for all disorder realizations (with exception to $`\mathrm{\#}1`$ and $`\mathrm{\#}6`$) studied here is fairly consistent with the number of levels expected from the SP model in the considered energy range: $`[10,10]\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$. It is important to note that the clustering seen in the spectra is taking place in the presence of disorder in the metal-oxide interface. Although we have shown that in a wider range of energy around $`E_F`$ the probability of finding strong bunching of levels is small, this does not mean that pairs or larger clusters are avoided in a small neighborhood around $`E_F`$.

We now turn to the implications of this clustering of energy levels for experimental tunnel resonance spectra of the nanoislands. The orthodox model of the device (nanoisland+tunnel junctions+leads) treats the leads as reservoirs of electrons with chemical potentials $`\mu _L`$ and $`\mu _R`$, coupled capacitively (with capacitances $`𝒞_L`$ and $`𝒞_R`$) to the nanoisland through the tunneling junctions. The applied voltage $`V`$ between the leads is divided between $`𝒞_L`$ and $`𝒞_R`$ setting the the electrochemical potential in the right(left) lead to $`\mu ^{+()}=\mu _{R(L)}+()(𝒞_{L(R)}/𝒞_\mathrm{\Sigma })eV`$ with $`𝒞_\mathrm{\Sigma }=𝒞_L+𝒞_R`$. When $`V=0`$, $`\mu _L`$ and $`\mu _R`$ are considered aligned with $`E_F`$. As discussed by Averin and Korotkov, the discrete energy spectrum of the nanoisland allows tunneling to occur whenever $`\mu ^{+()}`$ (measured from $`E_F`$) matches the energy of one of the available levels of the nanoisland. Figure 3 shows the predicted  $`dI/dV`$ spectra for different disorder realizations and surface criteria. The resonances are marked with flat-top(bottom) segments indicating that $`\mu ^{+()}`$ has originated the resonance. Two different regimes: i) (Fig. 3(a)) symmetric ($`𝒞_L=𝒞_R`$), and ii) (Fig. 3(b)) non-symmetric ($`𝒞_L=1.5aF`$ and $`𝒞_R=3.2aF`$) tunneling junctions were considered. The $`dI/dV`$ spectra arising from a model with equally spaced energy levels is shown (solid circles) for comparison. Clearly, the clustering in the energy spectra creeps into the $`dI/dV`$ spectra in a non-trivial way. The nature of the clusters of resonances in the $`dI/dV`$ spectrum is strongly dependent on disorder and on the relative values of $`𝒞_L`$ and $`𝒞_R`$.

Now we show that the clustering of resonaces present in the calculated $`dI/dV`$ qualitatively resembles the observed clustering. Experimentally (Fig. 1(a) of Ref. ), the clusters of resonances observed are as follows: i) a single resonance at the begining of the spectrum (this sets the origin of energies), ii) 4 near-by resonances around $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$, iii) 2 near-by resonances located at $`1.5\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$, and iv) 4 resonces distributed over an energy interval equal to $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$ centered around $`2.5\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$. We choose spectrum #4 in the symmetric and non-symmetric regime, under criterion $`𝙲_\mathrm{𝟷}`$, for comparison with the experiment. In the symmetric regime the spectrum shows: i) a single resonance at the origin, ii) 2 pairs of resonances located around $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$ and $`2\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$, respectively, and iii) 4 near-by resonances spanning an energy interval approximately equal to $`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$, around $`3.5\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$. When switching to the non-symmetric regime (the experimental regime) the structure of the clustering is slightly modified, with the overall number of resonces smaller. We see, then, that the observed and calculated clusters show qualitative common features. Whether the energy scales ($`\delta _{SP}^{Al}`$) on which the theoretical and experimental clusterings occur are similar or not remains an open question: This depends on what the correct value of the effective volume of the Al island is. We have shown that this volume may be significantly larger than has been assumed previously. If this is the case then the experimental and theoretical energy scales may be very similar; letting the experiment be explained in a new way.

Finally, if we further assume that non-equilibrium many-body effects such as those described by Agam et al. are present then still more clustering appears in the spectrum as most of the single-electron transport resonances in Fig. 3 split to become clusters of resonances. However, our results indicate that the observed tunneling resonance spectra should show a different behavior from what would follow from the simple equidistant-level model of the underlying single-electron spectrum that has been assumed in previous analyses of the experiments, whether many-body non-equilibrium effects are present or not.

Support from NSERC and CIAR is acknowledged.


text:
# Untitled Document

SUBLIMATED DECOUPLING OF THE VORTEX LATTICE

IN EXTREMELY TYPE-II LAYERED SUPERCONDUCTORS

J. P. Rodriguez

Dept. of Physics and Astronomy, California State University, Los Angeles, CA 90032.

Abstract

The question of whether layer decoupling and vortex-lattice melting occur separately or not in the mixed phase of pristine layered superconductors in the extreme type-II limit is studied through a partial duality analysis of the layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration. We find that both transitions occur simultaneously if the normal/superconducting transition of the vortex lattice in an isolated layer is first order and if a sufficient degree of layer anisotropy exists. We also find that a crossover to a highly entangled vortex lattice phase with relatively low phase rigidity across layers does not occur in practice under any circumstances at temperatures below the two-dimensional vortex-lattice melting transition.

PACS Indices: 74.60.Ge, 74.60.-w, 74.60.Ec, 74.25.Dw

I. Introduction

It is now well established experimentally that the Abrikosov vortex lattice state in clean high-temperature superconductors undergoes a first-order melting transition into a liquid phase.1 High-temperature superconductors are layered and extremely type-II.2 The former vortex liquid phase in the most anisotropic materials like BSCCO is best described by a liquid of planar vortices inside of decoupled layers.3 A longstanding question is whether melting and layer decoupling occur simultaneously as a sublimation transition, or whether a separate decoupling transition follows the melting transition. Some experimental studies on the highly anisotropic BSCCO material show evidence for sublimation,4,5 while most experimental studies of the less anisotropic YBCO material point to separate melting and decoupling transitions.6

The experimental situation outlined above suggests that the degree of anisotropy is what in fact determines whether or not the vortex lattice in a layered superconductor sublimates. We shall study this proposal theoretically by analyzing the layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration, which provides a qualitatively correct description of the thermodynamics deep inside of the mixed phase in extremely type-II layered superconductors.7 After performing a partial duality transformation on the $`XY`$ model that is particularly well suited to the weak-coupling limit,8 we find that there can exist as many as three different decoupling transitions at temperatures $`T_D<T_m<T_\times `$, respectively. (We use the term ‘transition’ here loosely to describe both genuine phase transitions and cross-overs.) The phase correlation length across layers is equal to the inter-layer spacing along the dimensional crossover line9,10 at $`T=T_\times `$ that separates two-dimensional (2D) from three-dimensional (3D) vortex-liquid behavior.6 The phase correlation length across layers then either diverges or jumps to infinity along the melting line, $`T=T_m`$, which separates the superconducting and normal phases. Last, the crossover line $`T=T_D`$ that lies inside of the ordered phase is defined by the point at which the Josephson coupling energy reaches about half of its zero-temperature value. The macroscopic phase rigidity across layers becomes small in comparison to its zero-temperature value at temperatures $`T>T_D`$ because of the entanglement of fluxlines between adjacent layers.8,11 All three decoupling transitions occur separately in the continuum regime at low perpendicular vortex density, but $`T_D`$ crosses below the 2D melting temperature at only exponentially weak inter-layer coupling. At a moderate concentration of vortices, on the other hand, we find that the three decoupling transitions collapse onto a single sublimation line for weak enough Josephson coupling. This is due to the first-order nature of the melting of the 2D vortex lattice in such case. These results are compared with previous theoretical calculations based on the elastic medium description of the vortex lattice2,3,11,12 and with direct Monte Carlo simulation results of the $`XY`$ model itself.7

II. Duality Theory

The layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration is the minimum theoretical description of vortex matter in extremely type-II layered superconductors. Both fluctuations of the magnetic induction and of the magnitude of the superconducting order parameter are neglected within this approximation. The model hence is valid deep inside the interior of the mixed phase. The thermodynamics of the 3D $`XY`$ model with anisotropy and uniform frustration is determined by the superfluid kinetic energy $`E_{XY}^{(3)}=_{r,\mu }J_\mu \mathrm{cos}[\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu \varphi A_\mu ]|_r`$, which is a functional of the superconducting phase $`\varphi (r)`$ over the cubic lattice. Here, $`J_x=J=J_y`$ and $`J_z=J/\gamma ^2`$ are the local phase rigidities, with anisotropy parameter $`\gamma ^{}>1`$. The vector potential $`A_\mu =(0,2\pi fx/a,0)`$ represents the magnetic induction oriented perpendicular to the layers, $`B_{}=\mathrm{\Phi }_0f/a^2`$. Here $`a`$ denotes the square lattice constant, which is of order the zero-temperature coherence length, $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ denotes the flux quantum, and $`f`$ denotes the concentration of vortices per site. The component of the magnetic induction parallel to the layers in taken to be null throughout.

We shall now analyze the above layered system in the selective high-temperature limit, $`k_BTJ_z`$. Following ref. 8, the corresponding high-temperature expansion can be achieved through a partial duality transformation of the layered $`XY`$ model along the $`z`$ axis perpendicular to the layers. This leads to a useful layered Coulomb gas (CG) ensemble in terms of loops of Josephson vortices in between layers (fluxons).13 In particular, suppose that $`l`$ denotes the layer index, that $`\stackrel{}{r}`$ represents the x-y coordinates, and that $`r=(\stackrel{}{r},l)`$. Phase correlations across $`N`$ layers are then described by the phase auto-correlation function probed at sites set by an integer field $`p(r)=\delta _{\stackrel{}{r},0}(\delta _{l,1}\delta _{l,N})`$. These can be computed from the quotient

$$\mathrm{exp}\left[i\underset{r}{}p(r)\varphi (r)\right]=Z_{\mathrm{CG}}[p]/Z_{\mathrm{CG}}[0]$$
$`(1)`$
of partition functions for a layered CG ensemble that describes the nature of the Josephson coupling:8

$$Z_{\mathrm{CG}}[p]=\underset{\{n_z(r)\}}{}y_0^{N[n_z]}\mathrm{\Pi }_lC[q_l]e^{i_rn_zA_z},$$
$`(2)`$
where $`n_z(\stackrel{}{r},l)`$ is an integer field on links between adjacent layers $`l`$ and $`l+1`$ located at 2D points $`\stackrel{}{r}`$. The ensemble is weighted by a product of phase auto-correlation functions

$$C[q_l]=\mathrm{exp}\left[i\underset{\stackrel{}{r}}{}q_l(\stackrel{}{r})\varphi (\stackrel{}{r},l)\right]_{J_z=0}$$
$`(3)`$
for isolated layers $`l`$ probed at the dual charge that accumulates onto that layer:

$$q_l(\stackrel{}{r})=p(\stackrel{}{r},l)+n_z(\stackrel{}{r},l1)n_z(\stackrel{}{r},l).$$
$`(4)`$
It is also weighted by a bare fugacity $`y_0`$ that is raised to the power $`N[n_z]`$ equal to the total number of dual charges, $`n_z=\pm 1`$. The fugacity is given by $`y_0=J_z/2k_BT`$ in the selective high-temperature regime, $`J_zk_BT`$, reached at large model anisotropy. Also, the average number of $`n_z`$ charges per link is equal to8 $`2y_0(\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}y_0)`$, which is less than $`J_z/k_BT`$. This implies that the layered CG ensemble (2) is dilute in such case, because $`y_01`$. The former is required by the approximate nature of Eq. (2), which neglects multiple occuppancy of the dual charges, $`n_z`$, on a given link. Last, the thermodynamics of the layered $`XY`$ model is encoded by its partition function, which is given by the following product:

$$Z_{XY}^{(3)}[0]=[I_0(J_z/k_BT)]^𝒩^{}Z_{\mathrm{CG}}[0]\mathrm{\Pi }_lZ_{XY}^{(2)}[0].$$
$`(5)`$
Here, $`I_0(x)`$ is a modified Bessel function, and $`Z_{XY}^{(2)}[0]`$ is the partition function of an isolated layer. Also, $`𝒩^{}`$ denotes the total number of links between adjacent layers.

Interlayer correlations of the layered $`XY`$ are easily determined using the CG ensemble (2) when the phase correlations within an isolated layer are short range.8 Let us introduce the notation $`\varphi _{l,l^{}}(\stackrel{}{r})=\varphi (\stackrel{}{r},l^{})\varphi (\stackrel{}{r},l)`$ and take $`A_z=0`$ due to the null magnetic field parallel to the layers. A useful (in)equality for the autocorrelator between any number of layers, $`n+1`$, can be computed to lowest order in the fugacity, $`y_0`$. It reads8

$$e^{i\varphi _{l,l+n}}\left[𝒞_0\frac{d^2q}{(2\pi )^2}\left(\frac{𝒞_q}{𝒞_0}\right)^{n+1}\right](y_0𝒞_0/a^2)^n,$$
$`(6)`$
where

$$𝒞_q=d^2r|C(\stackrel{}{r})|e^{i\stackrel{}{q}\stackrel{}{r}}$$
$`(7)`$
is the Fourier transform of the magnitude of the phase auto-correlation function (3) for an isolated layer probed at two points, $`\stackrel{}{r}_1`$ and $`\stackrel{}{r}_2`$:

$$C(1,2)=|C(\stackrel{}{r}_{12})|e^{i_1^2\stackrel{}{A}^{}(\stackrel{}{r})𝑑\stackrel{}{r}},$$
$`(8)`$
where $`\stackrel{}{A}^{}`$ is a suitably gauge-transformed vector potential (see below). Its magnitude depends only on the separation $`\stackrel{}{r}_{12}=\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2`$ between the probes, and it decays exponentially at separations beyond a characteristic correlation length $`\xi _{2D}`$ due to the phase-incoherent state that is presently assumed. The layered CG ensemble (2) is therefore in a confining phase.14 The prefactor in brackets above in Eq. (6) typically decays polynomially with the separation $`n`$ between layers. Also, Eq. (6) is an equality for $`n=1`$,15 as well as for pure gauges such that $`\stackrel{}{A}^{}=\stackrel{}{}\varphi _0`$ (see below). To conclude, the autocorrelator $`e^{i\varphi _{l,l+n}}`$ across layers decays at least exponentially with the separation $`n`$ in the weak-coupling limit, $`y_00`$, of the disordered phase.

The layered CG ensemble (2) can also be used to determine interlayer correlations in the ordered phase. Consider again an isolated layer, and suppose that general phase auto-correlation functions (3) are quasi-long range:

$$C[q]=g_0^{n_+}\mathrm{exp}\left[\eta _{2D}\underset{(1,2)}{}q(1)\mathrm{ln}(r_{12}/r_0)q(2)\right]\mathrm{exp}\left(iq\varphi _0\right),$$
$`(9)`$
where $`g_0`$ is equal to the phase rigidity of an isolated layer in units of $`J`$, where $`n_+`$ is equal to half the number probes, where $`r_0`$ is the natural ultraviolet scale of order the inter-vortex spacing, $`a_{\mathrm{vx}}=a/f^{1/2}`$, and where $`\varphi _0(\stackrel{}{r})`$ should resemble the unique zero-temperature configuration (independent of the layer index, $`l`$). The system of dual ($`n_z`$) charges in the layered CG ensemble (2) is then in a plasma phase at low temperatures $`\eta _{2D}<2`$.8,13 In such case, the macroscopic phase rigidity across layers is approximately given by8

$$\rho _s^{}/J_z\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}y_0.$$
$`(10)`$
Furtheremore, in this case an appropriate Hubbard-Stratonovich transformation of the CG partition function (2) in the absence of a source ($`p=0`$) reveals that it is equal to the corresponding one $`Z_{\mathrm{LD}}[0]=𝒟\theta e^{E_{\mathrm{LD}}/k_BT}`$ for a renormalized Lawrence-Doniach (LD) model up to a factor that is independent of the Josephson coupling, $`J_z`$. The corresponding energy functional is given by8

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill E_{\mathrm{LD}}=& \overline{J}d^2r\left[\underset{l}{}\frac{1}{2}(\stackrel{}{}\theta _l)^2\mathrm{\Lambda }_0^2\underset{l}{}\mathrm{cos}(\theta _{l+1}\theta _l)\right],\hfill & (11)\hfill \end{array}$$

where $`\overline{J}=k_BT/2\pi \eta _{2D}`$ is the macroscopic phase rigidity of an isolated layer,18 and where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0=\gamma ^{}a`$ is the Josephson penetration length. The above continuum description (11) is understood to have an ultraviolet cut off of order the inter-vortex spacing, $`r_0`$. A standard analysis of the product of partition functions (5) then yields that the strength of the local Josephson coupling is given by

$$\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}=y_0+g_0\mathrm{cos}\theta _{l,l+1},$$
$`(12)`$
where $`\theta _{l,l+1}=\theta _{l+1}\theta _l`$.

To compute $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{l,l+1}`$ in the weak-coupling limit, it is sufficient to consider only layers $`l`$ and $`l+1`$ in isolation from the rest of the system. At low temperature $`\eta _{2D}1`$, the harmonic approximation for the Josephson coupling term in Eq. (11) is valid: $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{l,l+1}1\frac{1}{2}\theta _{l,l+1}^2`$. The resulting gaussian integration then yields $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{l,l+1}=e^{\theta _{l,l+1}^2/2}`$, with $`\theta _{l,l+1}^2=\eta _{2D}\mathrm{ln}(\mathrm{\Lambda }_J^2/r_0^2)`$. Here $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_J`$ is of order the Josephson pentration length, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0=\gamma ^{}a`$. Subsitution into Eq. (12) then produces the result8

$$\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}=y_0+g_0(r_0/\mathrm{\Lambda }_J)^{\eta _{2D}}$$
$`(13)`$
for the strength of the local Josephson coupling at low temperature $`\eta _{2D}1`$. The latter agrees with the result produced by analyzing a fermion analogy for the LD model (11), as well as with an estimate by Glazman and Koshelev for the zero-field case ($`r_0a`$).10 Subsitution of this result into Eq. (10) therefore yields the formula

$$\rho _s^{}/J_z=g_0(r_0/\mathrm{\Lambda }_J)^{\eta _{2D}}$$
$`(14)`$
for the macroscopic phase rigidity across layers in this regime.8 To conclude, macroscopic phase coherence exists across layers in the ordered phase (9).

III. Continuum Limit

We shall now review the phase diagram that results from employing the above duality analysis for the layered $`XY`$ model in the continuum limit,8 $`a0`$, which coincides with the regime of small perpendicular flux density, $`f1/36`$. In the absence of surface barriers, Monte Carlo simulations16 indicate that the vortex liquid phase of an isolated layer solidifies into a “floating” vortex lattice phase at the 2D melting temperature, $`k_BT_m^{(2D)}J/20`$. A recent duality analysis of such a single layer finds that the standard 2D melting scenario17 takes place as long as rigid translations of the 2D vortex lattice are prohibited by surface barriers.19 In particular, general phase auto-correlation functions follow the form (9) in the vortex lattice phase at $`T<T_m^{(2D)}`$, with a 2D correlation exponent that takes on an extremely small value19 $`\eta _{2D}(28\pi )^1`$ just below the 2D melting temperature, $`T_m^{(2D)}`$. Further, $`\eta _{2D}`$ decreases linearly to zero with decreasing temperature in the 2D vortex lattice. On the otherhand, the phase auto-correlation function (8) decays exponentially with separation in the hexatic phase that lies at temperatures just above $`T_m^{(2D)}`$. The associated correlation length, $`\xi _{2D}`$, diverges exponentially as temperature cools down to $`T_m^{(2D)}`$. The auto-correlation function retains, however, the trivial phase factor of the 2D vortex lattice:19 $`_1^2\stackrel{}{A}^{}𝑑\stackrel{}{r}=\varphi _0(2)\varphi _0(1)`$.

We now illustrate that there exist as many as three distinct decoupling temperatures:8 $`T_\times >T_m>T_D`$. Consider the weak-coupling limit of the layered $`XY`$ model, $`\gamma ^{}\mathrm{}`$. Eq. (6) then becomes an equality in the hexatic phase of an isolated layer due to the trivial phase factor in the phase auto-correlation function (8).19 The phase correlation length across layers, $`\xi _{}`$, is therefore equal to the spacing $`d`$ between adjacent layers when

$$e^1=y_0d^2r|C(\stackrel{}{r})|/a^2.$$
$`(15)`$
This defines a dimensional cross-over field,3,8-10

$$f\gamma _\times ^2g_0(J/k_BT)(\xi _{2D}/a_{\mathrm{vx}})^2$$
$`(16)`$
in units of the naive decoupling scale $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0/\mathrm{\Lambda }_0^2`$, that separates 2D from 3D vortex-liquid behavior.6 It is traced out in Fig. 1. In these units, to be used hereafter, $`f\gamma ^2`$ gives the perpendicular field. The system is best described by a decoupled stack of 2D vortex liquids at fields above $`f\gamma _\times ^2`$. On the ordered side at $`T<T_m^{(2D)}`$, Eq. (14) for $`\rho _s^{}`$ implies that long-range order across layers exists: $`\xi _{}=\mathrm{}`$. And since $`g_0J`$ is equal to the phase rigidity of an isolated layer, Eq. (14) also implies that 3D scaling is violated at weak-coupling, $`(r_0/\mathrm{\Lambda }_J)^{\eta _{2D}}1`$, in which case the phase rigidity across layers, $`\rho _s^{}`$, is small in comparison to its value at zero temperature, $`J_z`$. This occurs at fields above the decoupling scale $`f\gamma _D^2=e^{1/\eta _{2D}}`$, however, which is astronomically large and of order $`10^{38}`$ at temperature below 2D melting due to the extremely small bound on the correlation exponent there,19 $`\eta _{2D}<(28\pi )^1`$. At large anisotropy, $`\gamma ^{}>\gamma _D^{}`$, the system is best described by an entangled stack of 2D vortex lattices11 that exhibit a relatively small macroscopic Josephson effect.8 Last, the CG ensemble (2) indicates that a 3D vortex-lattice melting transition occurs at an intermediate temperature $`T_m`$ when the typical distance between neighboring dual charges, $`n_z=\pm 1`$, grows to be of order $`\xi _{2D}`$, at which point these charges are confined into neutral pairs.8,14 It can be shown that $`T_m`$ lies inside of the 2D-3D cross-over window $`[T_m^{(2D)},T_\times ]`$ by virtue of this definition (see ref. 8, Eq. 62). Also, by comparison with the layered CG ensemble (2) in zero field,8,19 the author has argued that in the weak-coupling limit, $`T_m`$ marks the location of a second-order melting transition that separates the superconducting and normal phases. This means that $`\xi _{}(T)`$ diverges as $`T`$ cools down to $`T_m`$. A second-order transition in the vortex-liquid phase of YBCO that resembles the above has been reported recently.1

Let us now determine what happens as interlayer coupling increases from the weak-coupling limit just studied. The $`n_z`$ charges are screened at low temperature, $`T<T_m^{(2D)}`$, which means that no phase transition can take place as a function of the anisotropy parameter,8 $`\gamma ^{}`$. Instead, a cross-over region exists for anisotropy parameters below $`\gamma _D^{}`$ that separates a set of weakly coupled 2D vortex lattices at high field from a conventional 3D vortex lattice at low field. Again, the extremely small bound on the 2D correlation exponent $`\eta _{2D}`$ at temperatures below 2D melting indicates that the former weakly coupled phase is not attainable there in practice. Eqs. (13) and (14) also imply that the Josephson effect is essentially independent of field/anisotropy at these temperatures, $`T<T_m^{(2D)}`$. This observation is consistent with Monte Carlo simulation results of the layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration.7 On the disordered side, $`T>T_m^{(2D)}`$, the phase correlation length across layers, $`\xi _{}`$ , begins to grow larger than the spacing between adjacent layers at fields below $`f\gamma _\times ^2`$.8 Outside of the 2D critical region, at $`\xi _{2D}a_{\mathrm{vx}}`$, Monte Carlo simulations of the layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration indicate that first-order melting occurs along the decoupling contour $`\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}1/2`$.7,15 The resulting phase diagram is depicted by Fig. 1.

IV. Sublimated Decoupling

We shall next apply the partial duality analysis outlined in section II to the layered $`XY`$ model with only moderately small frustration. Let us consider again an isolated $`XY`$ model over the square lattice, but with a uniform vorticity (frustration) between $`1/30<f<1/2`$. Monte Carlo simulations indicate that a depinning transition at $`k_BT_p^{(2D)}=1.5fJ`$ now separates a pinned triangular vortex lattice at low-temperature from a vortex liquid phase at high temperature.16 The depinning transition is first order and no signs of a “floating” vortex-lattice phase are observed. Strict long-range phase correlations then exist at low temperatures $`T<T_p^{(2D)}`$ in the pinned phase, which implies that the phase auto-correlation functions are given asymptotically by Eq. (9) with $`\eta _{2D}=0`$. Also, the disordered phase at high temperature $`T>T_p^{(2D)}`$ should be hexatic due to the underlying square-lattice grid.17 This means that the phase autocorrelations (8) exhibit exponential decay as well as a trivial phase factor:19 $`\xi _{2D}<\mathrm{}`$ and $`_1^2\stackrel{}{A}^{}𝑑\stackrel{}{r}=\varphi _0(2)\varphi _0(1)`$. Below, we shall use these facts to map out the phase diagram of the layered $`XY`$ model at such relatively high vortex density.

The first-order nature of the depinning transition in an isolated $`XY`$ layer with relatively large uniform vorticity, $`1/2>f>1/30`$, implies that the phase correlation length is finite at temperatures just above the depinning transition: $`\xi _{2D}(T_p^{(2D)}+)<\mathrm{}`$. By Eq. (16), the 2D-3D cross-over field here must also then be finite. Notice that $`f\gamma _\times ^2`$ is larger than unity at depinning if $`\xi _{2D}>a_{\mathrm{vx}}`$ and if $`g_01`$, since $`J>k_BT_p^{(2D)}`$ for $`f<1/2`$. Strict long-range phase coherence ($`\eta _{2D}=0`$) exists on the low-temperature side at $`T<T_p^{(2D)}`$, however. We therefore reach the remarkable conclusion that at large anisotropy parameters of the corresponding layered $`XY`$ model, $`\gamma ^{}\gamma _\times ^{}[T_p^{(2D)}]`$, the line $`T=T_p^{(2D)}`$ marks a sublimation transition that separates a decoupled vortex liquid at $`T>T_p^{(2D)}`$ with essentially no interlayer phase coherence, $`\xi _{}<d`$, from a pinned 3D vortex lattice state at $`T<T_p^{(2D)}`$ with long-range interlayer phase coherence, $`\xi _{}=\mathrm{}`$. As depicted by Fig. 2, no 2D-3D cross-over regime exists in such case. Also, comparison of Eqs. (13) and (14) with the fact that the 2D correlation exponent $`\eta _{2D}`$ vanishes in the low-temperature phase implies that the cross-over at $`\gamma ^{}=\gamma _D^{}(T)`$ between weakly coupled and moderately coupled vortex lattices must collapse onto the depinning line at $`T=T_p^{(2D)}`$ and $`\gamma ^{}>\gamma _\times ^{}[T_p^{(2D)}]`$. Indeed, Eq. (13) indicates that the Josephson coupling $`\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}`$ is independent of field, $`f\gamma ^2`$, at temperatures below the sublimation transition and at such large anisotropy parameters. Last, the local Josephson coupling jumps down to a small value given by the vortex-liquid result,15 Eq. (6) at $`n=1`$, once the vortex lattice sublimates. Similar jumps of order unity have been observed at vortex-lattice melting in BSCCO.5 In conclusion, the three possible decoupling transitions collapse onto a single sublimation transition! Such point-like as opposed to line-like melting of the vortex lattice has been observed in Monte Carlo simulations of the layered $`XY`$ model with moderately small frustration.7

V. Discussion and Conclusions

Among the important theoretical results listed above is the local Josephson coupling in the vortex-lattice phase, Eq. (13), which can be expressed as $`\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}=y_0+g_0e^{\frac{1}{2}T/T_D(B_{})}`$, with a temperature scale $`k_BT_D(B_{})=2\pi \overline{J}/\mathrm{ln}(B_{}/B_{}^{})`$. Here, $`B_{}^{}=\mathrm{\Phi }_0/\mathrm{\Lambda }_0^2`$ is the naive decoupling field3 and $`\overline{J}=k_BT/2\pi \eta _{2D}`$ is the 2D phase rigidity.18 As observed previously, the weak logarithmic field dependence above implies that $`\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}`$ is of order unity at low temperatures $`T<T_m^{(2D)}`$ and at perpendicular fields below the astronomically large scale $`H_D10^{38}B_{}^{}`$. The local Josephson coupling (13) shows essentially no field dependence in such case. This is confirmed directly by Monte Carlo simulations of the layered $`XY`$ with low uniform frustration.7 Despite the fact that the decoupled vortex-lattice state characterized by a small “cosine” does not exist in practice at temperatures below 2D melting, it is nevertheless remarkable that $`T_D(B_{})`$ coincides, to within a large numerical constant, with the temperature scale for layer decoupling induced by the unbinding of topological defects of the vortex lattice known as “quartets”. These consist of two opposing dislocation pairs in parallel inside of a given layer.2,11 Comparison with the present results then indicates that layer decoupling is indeed due to such a “quartet” unbinding mechanism, but that this occurs only for exponentially weak Josephson coupling at temperatures below 2D melting (cf. ref. 12). Glazman and Koshelev have also calculated the local Josephson coupling $`\mathrm{cos}\varphi _{l,l+1}`$ within the 3D elastic medium description for the vortex lattice,3 where they find a much stronger dependence $`T_D^{}(B_{})(B_{}^{}/B_{})^{1/2}T_m^{(2D)}`$ for the decoupling temperature scale with field, on the other hand.2 This discrepancy is due to the fact that the elastic-medium approximation represents a continuum theory. It therefore accounts only for long-wavelength fluctuations of the phase difference across layers. In the weak-coupling limit, the dominant contribution to the “cosine” is due to short-wavelength phase fluctuations between adjacent layers. These fluctuations are missed by the 3D elastic medium approximation, and we believe that this is why the Glazman-Koshelev result3 underestimates the size of the decoupling temperature scale at weak coupling.

In conclusion, a partial duality analysis of the layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration finds that sublimated melting/decoupling of the 3D vortex lattice occurs if (i) the superconducting-normal transition of an isolated layer is first-order and if (ii) a sufficient degree of layer anisotropy exists. Condition (i) is gauranteed at strong substrate pinning,16 $`1/2>f>1/30`$. It has also been emphasized that no decoupled vortex-lattice state exists at temperatures below 2D ordering except for exponentially weak Josephson coupling between layers (see Figs. 1 and 2). This is notably consistent with complementary calculations that include interlayer magnetic coupling, but that turn off the Josephson coupling.12 It must be mentioned, however, that the magnetic coupling between layers is weak in the extreme type-II regime studied here, and that this coupling can in fact be incorporated into the present duality analysis (2) of the vortex lattice in layered superconductors via an effective “substrate potential” for isolated layers (see ref. 12). The additional substrate consists of an array of commensurate pins that mimics the magnetic effect of the vortex lattice in adjacent layers. It can therefore only increase phase coherence (3) inside of each 2D vortex lattice.20 This means that the bound, $`\eta _{2D}<(28\pi )^1`$, on the phase correlation exponent of the 2D vortex lattice continues to hold. Hence, within the “substrate potential” approximation for magnetic coupling,12 the decoupling crossover to an entangled vortex lattice11 with $`\rho _s^{}J_z`$ does not occur in practice at temperatures below 2D melting in the extreme type-II regime \[see Eq. (14)\]. We remind the reader that rigid translations of the vortex lattice are assumed throughout to be prohibited by surface barriers (see ref. 19).

The author is grateful for the hospitality of the Instituto de Ciencias de Materiales de Madrid, where this work was completed, and to Marty Maley and Paco Guinea for discussions.

References

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8. J.P. Rodriguez, Phys. Rev. B 62, 9117 (2000); Physica C 332, 343 (2000); Europhys. Lett. 54, 793 (2001).

9. S. Hikami and T. Tsuneto, Prog. Theor. Phys. 63, 387 (1980); C. Kawabata, M. Takeuchi, S.R. Shenoy and A.R. Bishop, J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 69, 194 (2000).

10. L.I. Glazman and A.E. Koshelev, Zh. Eksp. Teor. Fiz. 97, 1371 (1990) \[Sov. Phys. JETP 70, 774 (1990)\].

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15. A.E. Koshelev, Phys. Rev. Lett. 77, 3901 (1996).

16. M. Franz and S. Teitel, Phys. Rev. B 51, 6551 (1995); S.A. Hattel and J.M. Wheatley, Phys. Rev. B 51, 11951 (1995).

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19. J.P. Rodriguez, Phys. Rev. Lett. 87, 207001 (2001).

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Figure Captions

Fig. 1. Shown is the proposed phase diagram for the layered $`XY`$ model with uniform frustration in the continuum regime, $`f1/36`$. Notice the absence (in practice) of a decoupling transition at temperatures below 2D melting. Rigid translations of the vortex lattice are assumed to be prohibited by surface barriers. The mean-field temperature dependence $`JT_{c0}T`$ is also assumed.

Fig. 2. The proposed phase diagram for the layered $`XY`$ model with moderate uniform frustration, $`1/30<f<1/2`$ is displayed. The mean-field temperature dependence $`JT_{c0}T`$ is assumed once again.

Erratum: “Sublimated decoupling of the vortex lattice

in extremely type-II layered superconductors”,

\[Phys. Rev. B 66, 214506 (2002)\]

J.P. Rodriguez

The decoupling field for temperatures that lie below the 2D ordering transition that was derived in the discussion following Eq. (16) is more generally given by

$$f\gamma _D^2=(r_0/a_{\mathrm{vx}})^2e^{1/\eta _{2D}},$$

where $`r_0a_{\mathrm{vx}}`$ was implicitly assumed. Although the latter is not necessarily true, the ratio $`r_0/a_{\mathrm{vx}}`$ must be larger than $`\kappa ^1=\xi _0/\lambda _0`$. We have $`\kappa 100`$ in YBCO for example. The above then implies that the decoupling field is bounded by $`f\gamma _D^2>10^{34}`$ at temperatures below 2D ordering in such case, since $`\eta _{2D}<(28\pi )^1`$. It therefore remains exponentially big.

More seriously, the claim made in section IV that the 2D phase correlation exponent is null at temperatures that lie below the 2D vortex-lattice depinning transition is incorrect. What is null is its vortex component, which leaves the spin-wave result $`\eta _{2D}=k_BT/2\pi J`$ for the net exponent. The sentences in the middle of both paragraphs of section IV that begin with “Strict long-range phase …” must therefore be replaced with “Quasi long-range phase …”. Also, the equation “$`\eta _{2D}=0`$” that appears in both of these sentences must be replaced with “$`\eta _{2D}=k_BT/2\pi J`$”. The rest of section IV remains valid for Josephson coupling that is not exponentially weak. The equation displayed above, for example, yields an astronomically large lower bound $`f\gamma _D^2>(r_0/a_{\mathrm{vx}})^210^{45}`$ for the decoupling field at temperatures below 2D ordering and at an in-plane vortex concentration of $`f=1/25`$. This bound is due to the value $`k_BT_p^{(2D)}=0.06J`$ of the first-order transition temperature of an isolated layer in such case.

The above corrections do not change any of the conclusions drawn in the paper.