Arxiv:1012.0653V3
Quantum phase transitions in transverse field spin models: From Statistical Physics to Quantum Information Amit Dutta∗ Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur 208 016, India Uma Divakaran† Theoretische Physik, Universit¨at des Saarlandes, 66041 Saarbr¨ucken, Germany Diptiman Sen‡ Centre for High Energy Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, India Bikas K. Chakrabarti§ Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics Division and Centre for Applied Mathematics and Computational Science, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, 1/AF Bidhan Nagar, Kolkata 700 064, India Thomas F. Rosenbaum¶ Department of Physics and the James Franck Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637 Gabriel Aeppli∗∗ London Centre for Nanotechnology and Department of Physics and Astronomy, UCL, London, WC1E 6BT, United Kingdom We review quantum phase transitions of spin systems in transverse magnetic fields taking the examples of some paradigmatic models, namely, the spin-1/2 Ising and XY models in a transverse field in one and higher spatial dimensions. Beginning with a brief overview of quantum phase transitions, we introduce the model Hamiltonians and discuss the equivalence between the quantum phase transition in such a model and the finite temperature phase transition in a higher dimensional classical model. We then provide exact solutions in one spatial dimension connecting them to conformal field theoretical studies when possible. We also discuss Kitaev models, and some other exactly solvable spin systems in this context. Studies of quantum phase transitions in the presence of quenched randomness and with frustrating interactions are presented in details. We discuss novel phenomena like Griffiths-McCoy singularities associated with quantum phase transitions of low- dimensional transverse Ising models with random interactions and transverse fields.
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