Lattice QED in an external magnetic field: Evidence for dynamical chiral symmetry breaking

TL;DR

This paper uses lattice QED simulations in a strong magnetic field to provide evidence that magnetic fields induce chiral symmetry breaking, supporting theoretical predictions about dimensional reduction and dynamical mass generation.

Contribution

First lattice QED simulation demonstrating magnetic catalysis of chiral symmetry breaking with direct numerical evidence.

Findings

Non-zero chiral condensate at zero electron mass

Evidence of dimensional reduction to 1+1 dimensions

Supports Schwinger-Dyson predictions of magnetic catalysis

Abstract

We simulate QED in a strong constant homogeneous external magnetic field on a euclidean space-time lattice using the Rational Hybrid Monte Carlo method, developed for simulating lattice QCD. Our primary goal is to measure the chiral condensate in the limit when the input electron mass $m$ is zero. We observe a non-zero value, indicating that the external magnetic field catalyzes chiral symmetry breaking as predicted by approximate truncated Schwinger-Dyson methods. Such behaviour is associated with dominance by the lowest Landau level which causes the effective dimensional reduction from $3+1$~dimensions to $1+1$ dimensions for charged particles (electrons and positrons) where the attractive forces of QED can produce chiral symmetry breaking with a dynamical electron mass and associated chiral condensate. Since our lattice simulations use bare (lattice) parameters, while the Schwinger-Dyson analyses work with renormalized quantities, direct numerical comparison will require renormalization of our lattice results.