Adiabatic continuity and broken symmetry in many-electron systems: a variational perspective
Strongly Correlated Electrons
2011-10-31 v1 Superconductivity
Abstract
Variational wave functions are very useful for describing the panoply of ground states found in interacting many-electron systems. Some particular trial states are "adiabatically" linked to a reference state, from which they borrow the essential properties. A prominent example is the Gutzwiller ansatz, where one starts with the filled Fermi sea. A simple soluble example, the anisotropic XY chain, illustrates the adiabatic continuity of this class of wave functions. To describe symmetry breaking, one has to modify the reference state accordingly. Alternatively, a quantum phase transition can be described by a pair of variational wave functions, starting at weak and strong coupling, respectively.
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Cite
@article{arxiv.1110.6348,
title = {Adiabatic continuity and broken symmetry in many-electron systems: a variational perspective},
author = {Dionys Baeriswyl},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1110.6348},
year = {2011}
}