Quantcast
  • Register
PhysicsOverflow is a next-generation academic platform for physicists and astronomers, including a community peer review system and a postgraduate-level discussion forum analogous to MathOverflow.

Welcome to PhysicsOverflow! PhysicsOverflow is an open platform for community peer review and graduate-level Physics discussion.

Please help promote PhysicsOverflow ads elsewhere if you like it.

News

PO is now at the Physics Department of Bielefeld University!

New printer friendly PO pages!

Migration to Bielefeld University was successful!

Please vote for this year's PhysicsOverflow ads!

Please do help out in categorising submissions. Submit a paper to PhysicsOverflow!

... see more

Tools for paper authors

Submit paper
Claim Paper Authorship

Tools for SE users

Search User
Reclaim SE Account
Request Account Merger
Nativise imported posts
Claim post (deleted users)
Import SE post

Users whose questions have been imported from Physics Stack Exchange, Theoretical Physics Stack Exchange, or any other Stack Exchange site are kindly requested to reclaim their account and not to register as a new user.

Public \(\beta\) tools

Report a bug with a feature
Request a new functionality
404 page design
Send feedback

Attributions

(propose a free ad)

Site Statistics

205 submissions , 163 unreviewed
5,082 questions , 2,232 unanswered
5,353 answers , 22,789 comments
1,470 users with positive rep
820 active unimported users
More ...

  Fermionic path integral on the disk - Recovering the vacuum state

+ 4 like - 0 dislike
1367 views

I'm trying to get a better feel for the operator to state map in quantum field theory. There is a general claim for 2d theories that doing the path integral on a disk with no operator insertions gives you (the wave function representation of) the ground state. Polchinski works this out explicitly for the free bosonic field on pages 66-68 in Volume 1 of his Superstring Theory. As a self-assigned exercise, I'm now trying to do the same for the fermionic case, though I'm having some trouble with evaluating the path integral.

The system I'm studying is the usual Dirac action given by $$S = \int dt ds [i\bar{\psi}_-(\partial_{t} + \partial_{s})\psi_- + i\bar{\psi}_+(\partial_{t} - \partial_{s})\psi_+].$$

Now I want to do the path integral on the semi-infinite cylinder (equivalently a  unit disk) with coordinates $t \in [0,\infty)$, and $s \in [0, 2\pi)$.

$$\int_{\psi_-(0,s) = f(s), \psi_+(0,s) = g(s)} \mathcal{D}\psi \mathcal{D} \bar{\psi} e^{-S}$$ where $$f(s) = \sum_{n \in \mathbb{z}}\chi_n e^{ins},\,\,\,\,\,g(s) = \sum_{n\in \mathbb{Z}} \phi_n e^{ins} $$ being the boundary conditions on the unit circle ($\chi_n$, $\phi_n$ being Grassmann numbers). Note that I'm imposing periodic boundary conditions on the fermions with respect to $s$.

I'm not sure how to proceed with the path integral at this point. The usual procedure (at least for bosonic fields) of writing your field as $\phi = \phi_{cl} + \phi_{q}$ where $\phi_{cl}$ obeys the classical equations on motion and obeys the right boundary conditions and $\phi_q$ being a fluctuation seems to give some weird stuff since the action evaluated at a classical solution gives $0$. Any help or hints would be appreciated.

Edit: The expression I'm trying to compare to is the following:

The Hilbert space from the wave function perspective is given by "square-integrable" functions of infinitely many Grassmann numbers $f(\chi_i, \bar{\chi}_i)$, $i$ being any integer. The expression for the Hamiltonian is then given by $$H = \sum_{n \in \mathbb{Z}} n(\chi_{n} \frac{\partial}{\partial \chi_n} + \bar{\chi}_{n} \frac{\partial}{\partial \bar{\chi}_n}).$$ From this one computes the ground state to be $$\langle \chi_i, \bar{\chi}_i|0\rangle = \prod_{n=1}^{\infty}\chi_{-n} \bar{\chi}_{-n}.$$

asked May 22, 2015 in Theoretical Physics by anonymous [ revision history ]
edited May 22, 2015

Let's consider a Dirac fermion first. Then $\mathcal{L} = \bar{\Psi} \hat{X} \Psi + $ (total derivative), where $\hat{X}$ is made of 0th and 1st order derivatives. Then the Euler-Lagrange eq is $\hat{X} \Psi = 0$, so classically $\mathcal{L} = 0$, if the total devirative can be neglected. This implies the vaninshing of $\mathcal{L}$ and the action is not so important.

I can't generalize it for compact spacetime. I don't know what's topological insulator, where edge currents matter. Let's wait for a lucid answer by someone else.

Your answer

Please use answers only to (at least partly) answer questions. To comment, discuss, or ask for clarification, leave a comment instead.
To mask links under text, please type your text, highlight it, and click the "link" button. You can then enter your link URL.
Please consult the FAQ for as to how to format your post.
This is the answer box; if you want to write a comment instead, please use the 'add comment' button.
Live preview (may slow down editor)   Preview
Your name to display (optional):
Privacy: Your email address will only be used for sending these notifications.
Anti-spam verification:
If you are a human please identify the position of the character covered by the symbol $\varnothing$ in the following word:
p$\hbar$ysi$\varnothing$sOverflow
Then drag the red bullet below over the corresponding character of our banner. When you drop it there, the bullet changes to green (on slow internet connections after a few seconds).
Please complete the anti-spam verification




user contributions licensed under cc by-sa 3.0 with attribution required

Your rights
...