Interface roughening in the 3-D Ising model with tensor networks

TL;DR

This paper uses tensor networks to study the interface roughening transition in the 3-D Ising model, revealing how boundary conditions and truncation affect interface physics and phase transitions.

Contribution

First tensor-network analysis of the 3-D Ising interface roughening transition using asymmetric lattices and effective 2-D tensor networks.

Findings

Varying interface width causes symmetry breaking or crossover.

Open boundary conditions lead to $ ext{Z}_2$ transition or crossover.

Antiperiodic boundaries reveal an $ ext{Luttinger}$ liquid phase with $ ext{U}(1)$ symmetry.

Abstract

Interfaces in three-dimensional many-body systems can exhibit rich phenomena beyond the corresponding bulk properties. In particular, they can fluctuate and give rise to massless low energy degrees of freedom even in the presence of a gapped bulk. In this work, we present the first tensor-network study of the paradigmatic interface roughening transition of the 3-D Ising model using highly asymmetric lattices that are infinite in the $(xy)$ direction and finite in $z$. By reducing the problem to an effective 2-D tensor network, we study how truncating the $z$ direction reshapes the physics of the interface. For a truncation based on open boundary conditions, we demonstrate that varying the interface width gives rise to either a $\mathbb{Z}_2$ symmetry breaking transition (for odd $L_z$) or a smooth crossover(for even $L_z$). For antiperiodic boundary conditions, we obtain an effective $\mathbb{Z}_q$ clock model description with $q=2L_z$ that exhibits an intermediate Luttinger liquid phase with an emergent $\U(1)$ symmetry.