Branch Point Twist Field Correlators in the Massive Free Boson Theory

TL;DR

This paper computes two-point functions of branch point twist fields in the massive free boson theory, providing precise results for entanglement measures and revealing novel logarithmic corrections at criticality.

Contribution

It offers the first detailed calculation of twist field correlators in the massive free boson, including analytic continuation and universal ratio estimates, confirming and extending conformal field theory predictions.

Findings

Agreement with CFT predictions at short distances

Identification of divergent form factor expansions

Discovery of log(logL) correction to entanglement entropy

Abstract

Well-known measures of entanglement in one-dimensional many body quantum systems, such as the entanglement entropy and the logarithmic negativity, may be expressed in terms of the correlation functions of local fields known as branch point twist fields in a replica quantum field theory. In this "replica" approach the computation of measures of entanglement generally involves a mathematically non-trivial analytic continuation in the number of replicas. In this paper we consider two-point functions of twist fields and their analytic continuation in the 1+1 dimensional massive (non-compactified) free Boson theory. This is one of the few theories for which all matrix elements of twist fields are known so that we may hope to compute correlation functions very precisely. We study two particular two-point functions which are related to the logarithmic negativity of semi-infinite disjoint intervals and to the entanglement entropy of one interval. We show that our prescription for the analytic continuation yields results which are in full agreement with conformal field theory predictions in the short-distance limit. We provide numerical estimates of universal quantities and their ratios, both in the massless (twist field structure constants) and the massive (expectation values of twist fields) theory. We find that particular ratios are given by divergent form factor expansions. We propose such divergences stem from the presence of logarithmic factors in addition to the expected power-law behaviour of two-point functions at short-distances. Surprisingly, at criticality these corrections give rise to a log(logL) correction to the entanglement entropy of one interval of length L. This hitherto overlooked result is in agreement with results by Calabrese, Cardy and Tonni and has been independently derived by Blondeau-Fournier and Doyon (in preparation).