Communications in Theoretical Physics ›› 2021, Vol. 73 ›› Issue (9): 095701. doi: 10.1088/1572-9494/ac061d

• Condensed Matter Theory • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Grüneisen ratio quest for self-duality of quantum criticality in a spin-1/2 XY chain with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction

Lin-Jie Ding(丁林杰)(),Yuan Zhong(钟园)   

  1. Department of Physics, ChongQing Three Gorges University, Wanzhou 404100, China
  • Received: 2021-04-27 Revised: 2021-05-25 Accepted: 2021-05-28 Published: 2021-09-01
  • Contact: Lin-Jie Ding(丁林杰) E-mail:dinglinjie82@126.com

Abstract:

The quantum phase transition (QPT) and quantum criticality of an anisotropic spin-1/2 XY chain under the interplay of magnetic field and Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya (DM) interaction, which is interpreted as an electric field, are investigated, wherein the anisotropic parameter plays a similar role as the superconducting pairing gap in the interacting Kitaev topological superconductor model that protects the topological order. It is shown that the thermal Drude weight is a good quantity to characterize the gapped (Dth = 0) and gapless (Dth > 0) ground states. The continuous QPT is marked by a quantum critical point (QCP) associated with entropy accumulation, which is manifested by a characteristic Güneisen ratio (GR) with or without self-duality symmetry. It is shown that at a self-dual QCP, the GR keeps a finite value as T → 0, while at a general QCP without self-duality symmetry, it displays a power-law temperature dependent divergence: Γ(T,rc) ∼±T−1, which provides a novel thermodynamic means for probing QPT.

Key words: Grüneisen ratio, self-duality of quantum critical point, XY spin model, Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction