Non-perturbative behavior of the quantum phase transition to a nematic Fermi fluid

TL;DR

This paper investigates the non-perturbative quantum critical behavior of a two-dimensional Fermi system undergoing a nematic transition, revealing non-Fermi liquid properties and the destruction of quasiparticles.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the quantum critical behavior of a 2D Fermi fluid transitioning to a nematic phase, including non-perturbative effects and quasiparticle breakdown.

Findings

Quantum critical behavior with dynamic exponent z=3.

Quasiparticles are generally wiped out at criticality and in the nematic phase.

Single-particle density of states exhibits non-Fermi liquid behavior with a 2/3 power law.

Abstract

We discuss shape (Pomeranchuk) instabilities of the Fermi surface of a two-dimensional Fermi system using bosonization. We consider in detail the quantum critical behavior of the transition of a two dimensional Fermi fluid to a nematic state which breaks spontaneously the rotational invariance of the Fermi liquid. We show that higher dimensional bosonization reproduces the quantum critical behavior expected from the Hertz-Millis analysis, and verify that this theory has dynamic critical exponent $z=3$. Going beyond this framework, we study the behavior of the fermion degrees of freedom directly, and show that at quantum criticality as well as in the the quantum nematic phase (except along a set of measure zero of symmetry-dictated directions) the quasi-particles of the normal Fermi liquid are generally wiped out. Instead, they exhibit short ranged spatial correlations that decay faster than any power-law, with the law $|x|^{-1} \exp(-\textrm{const.} |x|^{1/3})$ and we verify explicitely the vanishing of the fermion residue utilizing this expression. In contrast, the fermion auto-correlation function has the behavior $|t|^{-1} \exp(-{\rm const}. |t|^{-2/3})$. In this regime we also find that, at low frequency, the single-particle fermion density-of-states behaves as $N^*(\omega)=N^*(0)+ B \omega^{2/3} \log\omega +...$, where $N^*(0)$ is larger than the free Fermi value, N(0), and $B$ is a constant. These results confirm the non-Fermi liquid nature of both the quantum critical theory and of the nematic phase.