One-step replica-symmetry-breaking phase below the de Almeida-Thouless line in low-dimensional spin glasses

TL;DR

This paper investigates the nature of phase transitions in low-dimensional Ising spin glasses under magnetic fields, revealing a transition from full to one-step RSB and the existence of a quasi-first-order transition near the AT line.

Contribution

It introduces a field-theoretic renormalization group analysis showing a modified transition structure below the AT line in low-dimensional spin glasses, including a tricritical point and the persistence of quasi-first-order transitions.

Findings

For dimensions just above 6, a tricritical point separates different RSB transition types.

In dimensions less than or equal to 6, quasi-first-order transitions may occur at small fields.

The quasi-first-order transition preempts the AT transition at lower temperatures.

Abstract

The de Almeida-Thouless (AT) line is the phase boundary in the temperature--magnetic field plane of an Ising spin glass at which a continuous (i.e. second-order) transition from a paramagnet to a replica-symmetry-breaking (RSB) phase occurs, according to mean-field theory. Here, using field-theoretic perturbative renormalization group methods on the Bray-Roberts reduced Landau-Ginzburg-type theory for a short-range Ising spin glass in space of dimension $d$, we show that at nonzero magnetic field the nature of the corresponding transition is modified as follows: a) for $d-6$ small and positive, with increasing field on the AT line first, the ordered phase just below the transition becomes the so-called one-step RSB, instead of the full RSB that occurs in mean-field theory; the transition on the AT line remains continuous with a diverging correlation length. Then at a higher field, a tricritical point separates the latter transition from a quasi-first-order one, that is one at which the correlation length does not diverge, and there is a jump in part of the order parameter, but no latent heat. The location of the tricritical point tends to zero as $d\to6^+$; b) for $d\leq 6$, we argue that the quasi-first-order transition could persist down to arbitrarily small nonzero fields, with a transition to full RSB still expected at lower temperature. Whenever the quasi-first-order transition occurs, it is at a higher temperature than the AT transition would be for the same field, preempting it as the temperature is lowered. We also draw attention to the similarity of the "dynamically-frozen" state, which occurs at temperatures just above the quasi-first-order transition, and the "metastate-average state" of the one-step RSB phase, and discuss the issue of the number of pure states in either.