TY - JOUR
T1 - Many-body localization with long-range interactions
AU - Nandkishore, Rahul M.
AU - Sondhi, Shivaji Lal
PY - 2017/10/25
Y1 - 2017/10/25
N2 - Many-body localization (MBL) has emerged as a powerful paradigm for understanding nonequilibrium quantum dynamics. Folklore based on perturbative arguments holds that MBL arises only in systems with short-range interactions. Here, we advance nonperturbative arguments indicating that MBL can arise in systems with long-range (Coulomb) interactions, through a mechanism we dub "order enabled localization." In particular, we show using bosonization that MBL can arise in one-dimensional systems with ∼r interactions, a problem that exhibits charge confinement. We also argue that (through the Anderson-Higgs mechanism) MBL can arise in two-dimensional systems with log r interactions, and speculate that our arguments may even extend to three-dimensional systems with 1=r interactions. Our arguments are asymptotic (i.e., valid up to rare region corrections), yet they open the door to investigation of MBL physics in a wide array of long-range interacting systems where such physics was previously believed not to arise.
AB - Many-body localization (MBL) has emerged as a powerful paradigm for understanding nonequilibrium quantum dynamics. Folklore based on perturbative arguments holds that MBL arises only in systems with short-range interactions. Here, we advance nonperturbative arguments indicating that MBL can arise in systems with long-range (Coulomb) interactions, through a mechanism we dub "order enabled localization." In particular, we show using bosonization that MBL can arise in one-dimensional systems with ∼r interactions, a problem that exhibits charge confinement. We also argue that (through the Anderson-Higgs mechanism) MBL can arise in two-dimensional systems with log r interactions, and speculate that our arguments may even extend to three-dimensional systems with 1=r interactions. Our arguments are asymptotic (i.e., valid up to rare region corrections), yet they open the door to investigation of MBL physics in a wide array of long-range interacting systems where such physics was previously believed not to arise.
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U2 - 10.1103/PhysRevX.7.041021
DO - 10.1103/PhysRevX.7.041021
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85034423767
VL - 7
JO - Physical Review X
JF - Physical Review X
SN - 2160-3308
IS - 4
M1 - 041021
ER -