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Results for “continuous phase transition”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 163 records · Page 9
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2023

Floating Block Method for Quantum Monte Carlo Simulations

Quantum Monte Carlo simulations are powerful and versatile tools for the quantum many-body problem. In addition to the usual calculations of energies and eigenstate observables, quantum Monte Carlo simulations can in principle be used to build fast and accurate many-body emulators using eigenvector continuation or design time-dependent Hamiltonians for adiabatic quantum computing. Furthermore, these new applications require something that is missing from the published literature, an efficient quantum Monte Carlo scheme for computing the inner product of ground state eigenvectors corresponding to different Hamiltonians. In this work, we introduce an algorithm called the floating block method, which solves the problem by performing Euclidean time evolution with two different Hamiltonians and interleaving the corresponding time blocks. We use the floating block method and nuclear lattice simulations to build eigenvector continuation emulators for energies of 4 He, 8 Be, 12 C, and 16 O nuclei over a range of local and nonlocal interaction couplings. From the emulator data, we identify the quantum phase transition line from a Bose gas of alpha particles to a nuclear liquid.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Towards the development of resonantly enhanced laser-based diagnostics for molten salt reactor safeguards

The adoption of Generation IV molten salt reactors (MSRs) depends on the ability to implement compatible monitoring instrumentation to ensure adherence to nuclear safeguards. This task is nontrivial due to the high temperature, reactive, and chemically complex fuel and coolant components contained within these systems. Optical spectroscopy techniques such as laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) and laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) are candidates for monitoring instrumentation. They offer many advantages for continuous monitoring, including the ability to operate at a standoff and compatibility with liquid-phase analytes. We discuss the use of LIF for the detection of Nd, a common fission fragment, within a liquid matrix. Results show that for NdCl3 dissolved in water, the Nd I 492.45 nm resonant transition is detectable without the need to induce a plasma and that the fluorescence emission can be separated in the time domain from the laser scatter signal. Additionally, we present a setup and preliminary results for measurements of solid Nd and U using resonant LIBS. The results demonstrate element-selective measurement capabilities and provide the foundational data necessary to continue the development of laser-based MSR diagnostics. This work also helps address gaps in the literature regarding energy level assignments of Nd.

98 - NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL↗
DOE OSTI2023

Deciphering phase evolution in complex metal oxide thin films via high-throughput materials synthesis and characterization

Discovery of structure-property relationships in thin film alloys of complex metal oxides enabled by high-throughput materials synthesis and characterization facilities is demonstrated here with a case-study. In this study, thin films of binary transition metal oxides (Ti–Zn) are prepared by pulsed laser deposition with continuously varying Ti:Zn ratio, creating combinatorial samples for exploration of the properties of this material family. The atomic structure and electronic properties are probed by spatially resolved techniques including x-ray absorption near edge structures (XANES) and x-ray fluorescence (XRF) at the Ti and Zn K-edge, x-ray diffraction, and spectroscopic ellipsometry. The observed properties as a function of Ti:Zn ratio are resolved into mixtures of five distinguishable phases by deploying multivariate curve resolution analysis on the XANES spectral series, under constraints set by results from the other characterization techniques. First-principles computations based on density function theory connect the observed properties of each distinct phase with structural and spectral characteristics of crystalline polymorphs of Ti–Zn oxide. Continuous tuning of the optical absorption edge as a function of Ti:Zn ratio, including the unusual observation of negative optical bowing, exemplifies a functional property of the film correlated to the phase evolution.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2024

Mean-field equation for phase-modulated optical parametric oscillator

The widely established techniques for the generation of ultrashort optical pulses rely on passive mode locking of lasers, with the output pulse duration and emission spectrum determined by the intrinsic lifetime of laser transition in the gain medium. Due to the instantaneous nature of nonlinear gain, optical parametric oscillators (OPOs) are capable of generating optical radiation in all timescales from continuous-wave (cw) to ultrashort femtosecond regime, if driven by laser pump sources in the corresponding time domain. In the ultrashort timescale, operation of OPOs conventionally relies on mode-locked pump lasers, with the concomitant disadvantages of large footprint and high cost. At the same time, the lack of gain storage mandates the use of synchronous pumping, resulting in increased complexity. In this paper, we present the concept of phase-modulated OPO driven by cw pump laser. The approach overcomes the traditional drawbacks of ultrafast OPOs, enabling femtosecond pulse generation without the need for synchronous pumping, resulting in a simplified, compact, and cost-effective architecture using cw input pump lasers. We derive a mean-field equation for a degenerate χ ( 2 ) OPO driven by a cw laser with intracavity electro-optic modulator (EOM), and also including dispersion compensation. The equation predicts the formation of stable femtosecond pulses ( < 200 fs ) , in both normal and anomalous dispersion regimes, with a controllable repetition rate determined by the frequency of the EOM. The remarkable functionality of the proposed scheme paves the way for the development of an alternative class of widely tunable coherent femtosecond light sources in both bulk and integrated format based on χ ( 2 ) OPOs using cw pump lasers. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Sanchez, A. D. (ORCID:0000000327630339)↗
DOE OSTI2026

Longitudinal Multi-omics Reveal Phase-Dependent Viral Adaptive Strategies and Functional Potential During Formation of Algal-bacterial Granular Sludge

Virus-host interactions within microbial aggregates critically influence microbiome function and stability, yet how physicochemical stresses shape the interactive dynamics remains largely unexplored. Here, we investigated virus–host dynamics during the transition of algal-bacterial granular sludge (ABGS) from activated sludge under continuous hydraulic shear using integrated metagenomics and metatranscriptomics. Hydraulic stress initially reduced host a-diversity, which coincided with a marked increase in viral lysogenicity. During this host diversity bottleneck, viral microdiversity increased, and genes related to virion structure and DNA packaging were under positive selection (pN/pS >1). As host diversity recovered, viral microdiversity declined, while viral anti-defense systems (ADS) significantly increased in abundance. Lagged correlation analysis revealed a significant positive correlation between viral ADS and host defense systems (DS), suggesting an evolutionary arms race. Furthermore, active lysogenic infections were accompanied by enrichment of DS and auxiliary viral genes (AVGs) involved in genetic information processing and amino acid metabolism, potentially enhancing host fitness. Overall, our study unveils a phase-dependent co-evolutionary interplay between viruses and hosts during ABGS formation, providing insights into the development and maintenance of microbial structural and functional resilience in engineered ecosystems.

Qi, Huiyuan↗
DOE OSTI2020

Smooth periodic gauge satisfying crystal symmetry and periodicity to study high-harmonic generation in solids

Intense lasers can easily drive nonadiabatic transitions of excited electron wave packets across the Brillouin zones, thus transition dipole moments (TDM) between energy bands of solids should be continuous, satisfying crystal symmetry, and periodic at zone boundaries. While current ab initio algorithms are powerful in calculating band structures of solids, they all introduced random phases into the eigenfunctions at each crystal momentum k. In this work, we show how to choose a “smooth-periodic” gauge where TDMs can be smooth versus k, preserving crystal symmetry, as well as maintaining periodic at boundaries. The symmetry properties of TDMs with respect to k ensure the absence of even-order harmonics from MgO with inversion symmetry, while the TDM in the “smooth-periodic” gauge for broken-symmetry ZnO is responsible for even harmonics that were underestimated in previous simulations. These results reveal the importance of correctly treating the complex TDMs that satisfy crystal symmetry and continuous across zone boundaries in nonlinear laser-solid interactions, which has been elusive in most theories so far.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2023

Absolutely Stable Time Crystals at Finite Temperature

Here, we show that locally interacting, periodically driven (Floquet) Hamiltonian dynamics coupled to a Langevin bath support finite-temperature discrete time crystals (DTCs) with an infinite autocorrelation time. By contrast to both prethermal and many-body localized DTCs, the time crystalline order we uncover is stable to arbitrary perturbations, including those that break the time translation symmetry of the underlying drive. Our approach utilizes a general mapping from probabilistic cellular automata to open classical Floquet systems undergoing continuous-time Langevin dynamics. Applying this mapping to a variant of the Toom cellular automaton, which we dub the "π-Toom time crystal," leads to a 2D Floquet Hamiltonian with a finite-temperature DTC phase transition. We provide numerical evidence for the existence of this transition, and analyze the statistics of the finite temperature fluctuations. Finally, we discuss how general results from the field of probabilistic cellular automata imply the existence of discrete time crystals (with an infinite autocorrelation time) in all dimensions, d ≥ 1.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Broken Luttinger theorem in the two-dimensional Fermi-Hubbard model

One of the fundamental questions about high-temperature cuprate superconductors is the size of the Fermi surface underlying the superconducting state. By analyzing the single-particle spectral function for the Fermi-Hubbard model as a function of repulsion U and chemical potential μ, we find that the Fermi surface in the normal state undergoes a transition from a large Fermi surface matching the Luttinger volume as expected in a Fermi liquid, to a Fermi surface that encloses fewer electrons that we dub the “Luttinger breaking” phase, as the Mott insulator is approached. This transition into a non-Fermi-liquid phase that violates the Luttinger count occurs at a critical density in the absence of any other broken symmetry. We obtain the Fermi-surface contour from the spectral weight A k (ω = 0) and from an analysis of the singularities of the Green's function Re G k (E = 0), calculated using determinantal quantum Monte Carlo and analytic continuation methods. We discuss our numerical results in connection with experiments on Hall measurements, scanning tunneling spectroscopy, and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2021

Geometry of the charge density wave in the kagome metal A V 3 Sb 5

Kagome lattice is a fertile platform for topological and intertwined electronic excitations. Recently, experimental evidence of an unconventional charge density wave (CDW) is observed in a Z 2 kagome metal AV 3 Sb 5 (A=K, Cs, Rb). This observation triggers wide interest in the interplay between frustrated crystal structure and Fermi surface instabilities. Here, we analyze the lattice effect and its impact on CDW in AV 3 Sb 5 . Based on published experimental data, we show that the 2×2×2 CDW breaks the sixfold rotational symmetry of the crystal due to the phase shift between kagome layers and can explain the twofold symmetric CDW peak intensity observed by scanning tunneling spectroscopy. The coupling between the lattice and electronic degrees of freedom yields a weak first-order structural transition without continuous change of lattice dynamics. Our result emphasizes the fundamental role of lattice geometry in proper understanding of unconventional electronic orders in AV 3 Sb 5 .

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2024

Symmetry breaking in an extended O(2) model

Motivated by attempts to quantum simulate lattice models with continuous Abelian symmetries using discrete approximations, we study an extended-O(2) model in two dimensions that differs from the ordinary O(2) model by the addition of an explicit symmetry breaking term − h q cos ( q φ ) . Its coupling h q allows to smoothly interpolate between the O(2) model ( h q = 0 ) and a q -state clock model ( h q → ∞ ). In the latter case, a q -state clock model can also be defined for noninteger values of q . Thus, such a limit can also be considered as an analytic continuation of an ordinary q -state clock model to noninteger q . In previous work, we established the phase diagram for noninteger q in the infinite coupling limit ( h q → ∞ ). We showed that there is a second-order phase transition at low temperature and a crossover at high temperature. In this work, we seek to establish the phase diagram at finite values of the coupling using Monte Carlo and tensor methods. We show that for noninteger q , the second-order phase transition at low temperature and crossover at high temperature persist to finite coupling. For integer q = 2 , 3, 4, we know there is a second-order phase transition at infinite coupling (i.e. the well-known clock models). At finite coupling, we find that the critical exponents for q = 3 , 4 vary with the coupling, and for q = 4 the transition may turn into a Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless transition at small coupling. We comment on the similarities and differences of the phase diagrams with those of quantum simulators of the Abelian-Higgs model based on ladder-shaped arrays of Rydberg atoms. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗
DOE OSTI2021

Tensor network study of the m = 1/2 magnetization plateau in the Shastry-Sutherland model at finite temperature

The two-dimensional infinite projected entangled pair state tensor network is evolved in imaginary time with the full update (FU) algorithm to simulate the Shastry-Sutherland model in a magnetic field at finite temperature directly in the thermodynamic limit. We focus on the phase transition into the m = 1/2 magnetization plateau, which was observed in experiments on SrCu 2 (BO 3 ) 2 . For the largest simulated bond dimension, the early evolution in the high-temperature regime is simulated with the simple update (SU) scheme and then, as the correlation length increases, continued with the FU scheme towards the critical regime. We apply a small symmetry-breaking bias field and then extrapolate towards zero bias using a simple scaling theory in the bias field. The combined SU + FU scheme provides an accurate estimate of the critical temperature, even though the results could not be fully converged in the bond dimension in the vicinity of the transition. Here, the critical temperature estimate is improved with a generalized scaling theory that combines two divergent length scales: One due to the bias, and the other due to the finite bond dimension. The obtained results are consistent with the transition being in the universality class of the two-dimensional classical Ising model. The estimated critical temperature is 3.5(2) K, which is well above the temperature 2.1 K used in the experiments.

2-dimensional systems↗
DOE OSTI2025

Twisting the Hubbard model into the momentum-mixing Hatsugai–Kohmoto model

The Hubbard model is a standard theoretical tool for studying materials with strong electron–electron interactions, such as cuprate superconductors. Unfortunately, interaction-driven phenomena, such as a transition into the strongly correlated Mott insulator phase, are difficult to treat with established theoretical techniques. However, the exactly solvable Hatsugai–Kohmoto model displays similar Mott physics. In this work we show how the Hatsugai–Kohmoto model can be deformed continuously into the Hubbard model. The trick is to systematically reintroduce all the momentum mixing that the original Hatsugai–Kohmoto model omits. This can be accomplished by grouping n momenta into a cell and hybridizing them, resulting in the momentum-mixing Hatsugai–Kohmoto model. We recover the Bethe ansatz ground-state energy of the one-dimensional Hubbard model to within 1% from only ten mixed momenta. Overall, the convergence scales as 1/n2 as opposed to the inverse linear behaviour of standard finite-cluster techniques. Our results for a square lattice reproduce all the known features from state-of-the-art simulations also with only a few mixed momenta. Consequently, we believe that the momentum-mixing Hatsugai–Kohmoto model offers an alternative tool for strongly correlated quantum matter.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2025

Transient Terahertz Oscillations During Photoinduced Polarization Topology Reconfiguration in Ferroelectric Superlattices

Terahertz resonances embedded in crystalline heterostructures could close a spectral gap between conventional electronics and photonics while opening new windows on non-equilibrium lattice dynamics. We show that femtosecond optical screening of the depolarization field in epitaxial PbTiO3/SrTiO3 superlattices launches a collective polar mode that oscillates near 1 THz and coherently spans the entire mini-Brillouin zone. Wave-vector-resolved pump–probe X-ray diffraction resolves a nearly dispersion-less oscillation at 0.87 THz and 0.94 THz at the zone boundary and zone center, respectively, persisting for ~2.5 ps, corresponding to a weakly damped resonance. Dynamical phase-field simulations reveal the origin of the mode to mesoscopic rotation of closure-domain textures during the photo-excited transition from an unscreened to a screened electrostatic state. Varying the PbTiO3 and SrTiO3 ratio tunes the mode frequency continuously from 0.9 to 1.4 THz, providing a quantitative design rule for frequency-selectable THz oscillators in ferroelectric heterostructures. By coupling nanoscale polarization reconfiguration to long-wavelength coherent dynamics, this work establishes depolarization-field engineering to topology-driven THz functionality and expanding the landscape of collective lattice dynamics.

Sri Gyan, Deepankar [Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, ↗
DOE OSTI2022

Wavelength conversion for single-photon polarization qubits through continuous-variable quantum teleportation

A quantum internet connects remote quantum processors that need to interact and exchange quantum signals over a long distance through photonic channels. However, these quantum nodes operate at the wavelength ranges unsuitable for long-distance transmission. Therefore, quantum wavelength conversion to telecom bands is crucial for long-distance quantum networks based on optical fiber. Here, we propose wavelength conversion devices for single-photon polarization qubits using continuous-variable quantum teleportation that can efficiently convert qubits between near-infrared (780–795 nm suitable for interacting with atomic quantum nodes) and telecom wavelength (1300–1500 nm suitable for long-distance transmission). The teleportation uses entangled photon fields (i.e., nondegenerate two-mode squeezed state) that can be generated by four-wave mixing in a rubidium atomic gas using a diamond configuration of atomic transitions. The entangled fields can be emitted in two orthogonal polarizations with locked relative phase, making them especially suitable for interfacing with single- photon polarization qubits. Furthermore, our work may pave the way for the realization of long-distance quantum networks.

74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Tensor train continuous time solver for quantum impurity models

The simulation of strongly correlated quantum impurity models is a significant challenge in modern condensed matter physics that has multiple important applications. Thus far, the most successful methods for approaching this challenge involve Monte Carlo techniques that accurately and reliably sample perturbative expansions to any order. However, the cost of obtaining high precision through these methods is high. Recently, tensor train decomposition techniques have been developed as an alternative to Monte Carlo integration. In this study, we apply these techniques to the single-impurity Anderson model at equilibrium by calculating the systematic expansion in power of the hybridization of the impurity with the bath. Furthermore, we demonstrate the performance of the method in a paradigmatic application, examining the first-order phase transition on the infinite-dimensional Bethe lattice, which can be mapped to an impurity model through dynamical mean field theory. Our results indicate that using tensor train decomposition schemes allows the calculation of finite-temperature Green's functions and thermodynamic observables with unprecedented accuracy. The methodology holds promise for future applications to frustrated multiorbital systems, using a combination of partially summed series with other techniques pioneered in diagrammatic and continuous time quantum Monte Carlo.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2021

Realizing continuous cation order-to-disorder tuning in a class of high-energy spinel-type Li-ion cathodes

Conventional Li-ion cathode materials are dominated by well-ordered structures, in which Li and transition metals occupy distinct crystallographic sites. Here, we show in this paper that profoundly new degrees of freedom for the optimization of electrochemical properties may be accessed if controllable cation disorder is introduced. In a class of high-capacity spinel-type cathode materials, we identify cation to anion ratio in synthesis as a key parameter for tuning the structure continuously from a well-ordered spinel, through a partially ordered spinel, to rocksalt. We find that the varying degree of cation disorder modifies the voltage profile, rate capability, and charge-compensation mechanism in a rational and predictable way. Our results indicate that spinel-type order is most beneficial for achieving high-rate performance as long as the cooperative 8a to 16c phase transition is suppressed, while more rocksalt-like disorder facilitates O redox, which can increase capacity. Our findings reveal an important tuning handle for achieving high energy and power in the vast space of partially ordered cathode materials.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗