Finite temperature and delta-regime in the 2-flavor Schwinger model

TL;DR

This paper investigates the finite temperature and delta-regime properties of the two-flavor Schwinger model through lattice simulations, validating theoretical approximations and extending universal features known from higher dimensions to 2D.

Contribution

It performs lattice simulations to test the Hosotani approximation for the multi-flavor Schwinger model and explores the delta-regime, deriving the pion decay constant in 2D from universal features.

Findings

Validation of Hosotani approximation in two-flavor case

Extension of universal symmetry-breaking features to 2D

Estimate of the pion decay constant as 1/√(2π)

Abstract

The Schwinger model is often used as a testbed for conceptual and numerical approaches in lattice field theory. Still, some of its rich physical properties in anisotropic volumes have not yet been explored. For the multi-flavor finite temperature Schwinger model there is an approximate solution by Hosotani et al. based on bosonization. We perform lattice simulations and check the validity of this approximation in the case of two flavors. Next we exchange the r\^{o}le of the coordinates to enter the $\delta$-regime, and measure the dependence of the residual "pion" mass on the spatial size, at zero temperature. Our results show that universal features, which were derived by Leutwyler, Hasenfratz and Niedermayer referring to quasi-spontaneous symmetry breaking in $d>2$, extend even to $d=2$. This enables the computation of the Schwinger model counterpart of the pion decay constant $F_{\pi}$. It is consistent with an earlier determination by Harada et al. who considered the divergence of the axial current in a light-cone formulation, and with analytical results that we conjecture from 2d versions of the Witten--Veneziano formula and the Gell-Mann--Oakes--Renner relation, which suggest $F_{\pi} = 1/ \sqrt{2\pi}$.