Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2013 iii Paper 75 2 e Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
The vacuum of the diagonal quasiparticles contains original spin bosons: . Thus the quantum depletion of Néel order givesIn one dimension . Removing the global zero modes with an infrared cutoff, the continuum integral contains near both gapless points and diverges logarithmically as the cutoff is removed. This is a breakdown of the assumed Néel order reference, not a physical infinitely negative magnetization. It indicates that the one-dimensional ordered spin-wave expansion cannot maintain a finite staggered moment; it does not determine the exact spectral gap or all properties of the spin chain for arbitrary .
At zero temperature in dimensions the singular contribution scales as . It is infrared finite for , permitting a finite quantum reduction and a self-consistent ordered spin-wave description in an appropriate regime. This differs from the positive-temperature contribution, where yields . Its divergence for agrees with the Mermin-Wagner theorem for short-range continuous-symmetry models. Finite-temperature nonordering and the zero-temperature one-dimensional depletion argument are separate statements.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2013 iii Paper 75 4 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
The density-phase action of a Bose gas follows directly from :The total derivative integrates to zero for periodic density. HenceA uniform density fluctuation has nonzero quadratic cost , whereas a uniform phase change has no energy cost. Thus the radial fluctuation is massive in the static quadratic-action sense, while the phase is massless. The number-phase conjugacy term couples their dynamics: this does not imply an additional independent gapped quasiparticle branch in the nonrelativistic Bose gas.
The compact phase winding term vanishes for the smooth zero-winding phonon sector. Globally the phase can wind by while the complex field remains periodic, so that term should not be discarded across all topological sectors without a further argument.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 iii Paper 81 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
In the ground state of the diagonal Hamiltonian, . The Bogoliubov transformation therefore gives . Summing all nonzero momenta proves the quantum depletion of a Bose condensate:The nonzero depletion arises from correlated pairs in the interacting quasiparticle vacuum, not thermally populated quasiparticles.
The printed expression is the zero-temperature result. At a nonzero temperature the complete leading-order expression instead hasThe additional term is thermal depletion and cannot be discarded merely because the gas is condensed.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 iii Paper 81 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
For real and , introduce the particle-hole column . Its quadratic block is the Bogoliubov--de Gennes HamiltonianThe BCS coherence factors can be chosen to obeyWith , choose the sign of to match . The rotation diagonalizes the matrix to . Reordering and restoring the mean-field constant givesThe inverse transformation is and . Both annihilate . Since every positive-energy quasiparticle mode is empty, the normalized BCS ground state isEach momentum label refers to the pair once; distinct labels use disjoint single-particle spin states.
A solid's atoms do not travel freely through it, but its phonons and mobile electronic quasiparticles carry energy between scattering events. In a near-equilibrium isotropic diffusive regime, their transport can therefore use a kinetic thermal-conductivity approximation. Carriers moving along the local temperature gradient sample energies characteristic of their last scattering position. Linearizing that temperature difference and averaging squared directional cosines givesHere C is the contributing carrier heat capacity per unit volume, c its group speed and ell a transport mean free path. More accurately, the formula is a mode/energy-weighted sum of heat capacities times , not a product of arbitrary separately averaged values. Anisotropic crystals require a tensor, and ballistic samples or strongly nonquasiparticle regimes need a different description.
Past exam of the physics A course of the University of Cambridge 2015 Paper 2 Section D D12 Solution 2026-10-20
A completely filled valence band carries no net current: its occupied crystal-momentum states have velocities that cancel. Near a valence-band maximum, an almost full band is conveniently described by the few missing electrons, or electron holes. Removing an electron of charge , with , changes the charge relative to the filled band by . This is a quasiparticle description of electronic motion, not a mobile positive ion or a Positron.
For an isotropic parabolic maximum, . Assign the missing-electron state momentum and hole energyIt has positive effective mass . Its velocity equals the velocity of the missing electron state, and its positive-charge current replaces the negative of that state's electronic current. Semiclassical motion is thus . With momentum relaxation time , the low-field mobility is andIf electrons also contribute, : the two species' longitudinal conductivities add.
A Hall bar separates carrier concentration from mobility. Apply current density , magnetic field , and measure transverse electric field . For one isotropic hole population, transverse force balance gives , soFor thickness , the Hall-voltage magnitude is . A longitudinal four-terminal resistance measurement supplies independently. Use ohmic contacts, known conducting thickness, controlled temperature and low enough current to avoid self-heating. Reversing magnetic field removes even-in-field longitudinal offsets from contact misalignment; reversing current also helps reject thermoelectric offsets. These are central controls, rather than merely taking one transverse voltage reading.[ref]
Resistivity and Hall Measurements by National Institute of Standards and Technology. Sample Geometry; Resistivity Measurements; Definitions for Hall Measurements; Hall Measurements and Hall Calculations
The simple inference assumes one carrier type and a known Hall scattering factor. More generally , so measures Hall mobility rather than automatically the drift mobility. With two carrier populations at weak field,Its sign alone need not identify the more numerous carrier. A Hall experiment also cannot determine and separately: their ratio sets mobility. cyclotron resonance supplies an independent mass measurement by sweeping frequency or magnetic field through and detecting resonant absorption. The measured cyclotron effective mass can depend on band anisotropy and need not equal every curvature mass; the isotropic parabolic model identifies them. Its linewidth provides a scattering-time estimate only with a specified damping model.
semiconductor doping generates holes by adding acceptor impurities. In silicon, a substitutional group-III atom such as boron provides one fewer valence electron than silicon. A shallow acceptor level lies slightly above the valence-band edge: accepting a valence electron makes the dopant negatively ionized and leaves a mobile hole in the valence band. The impurity stays fixed in the lattice. charge neutrality and the nondegenerate equilibrium mass-action law giveFor fully ionized, uncompensated acceptors in the extrinsic regime, and ; with fully ionized donor compensation, while holes remain dominant. The Fermi level moves towards the valence band. At low temperature, semiconductor carrier freeze-out suppresses mobile electron holes; at high temperature intrinsic electron-hole generation can dominate. Increasing dopant density also changes scattering, so a conductivity increase alone cannot distinguish increased carrier density from changed mobility. Temperature-dependent Hall and conductivity measurements separate these effects, subject to the carrier and scattering qualifications above.
Past exam of the physics B course of the University of Cambridge 2018 Paper 2 Section C C13 Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
Entropy at absolute zero. The third law of thermodynamics concerns the low-temperature limit of equilibrium states. In the zero-entropy formulation, the entropy of a perfect crystal with a nondegenerate ground state tends to zero as . The statistical interpretation is : a unique accessible ground state has . The entropy-difference formulation of the third law of thermodynamics states that entropy differences associated with regular changes of mechanical parameters tend to zero as absolute zero is approached. These statements require equilibrium and appropriate ground-state assumptions; a frozen disordered material or a degenerate ground state can carry residual entropy.
For a phase of fixed composition and pressure,A finite limiting entropy constrains this integral. Ordinary equilibrium heat capacities therefore vanish as temperature approaches zero, with familiar examples for three-dimensional acoustic phonons and for a normal degenerate Fermi liquid. A constant positive heat capacity extrapolated to zero would give a logarithmically divergent entropy difference and is impossible in this regime. Discontinuous transitions and anomalous limits need separate treatment rather than extending a high-temperature approximation indefinitely.
Gibbs free energy. For fixed particle numbers,Thus, when , the Gibbs free energy approaches its zero-temperature value with a horizontal tangent:The equality uses the enthalpy ; neither limiting value needs to be zero. The low-temperature Gibbs free-energy expansion makes the approach quantitative. For with and ,The second derivative is , although it need not tend to zero. For a reaction between such equilibrium phases, , and and approach one another. If a genuine residual entropy is retained instead, has limiting slope . A horizontal tangent cannot be asserted without the zero-entropy condition.
Why helium remains a liquid. Helium atoms attract each other weakly and are exceptionally light. Their zero-point energy is large compared with the binding that would localize them in a solid. Both helium-4 and helium-3 can therefore remain liquid down to the lowest temperatures at low pressure; substantial applied pressure is needed to solidify them. This is not a violation of the third law. A quantum liquid can have a unique low-entropy ground state, and zero-point motion does not itself imply thermal entropy. The third law does not require every substance to crystallize at atmospheric pressure.
A helium-4 atom has integer spin zero and is a boson. Below the lambda point near at saturated vapor pressure, its liquid is superfluid. Its strong interactions mean that it is not quantitatively an ideal Bose gas, and the condensate fraction need not equal the superfluid fraction. The two-fluid model of superfluidity separates an entropy-carrying normal component of a superfluid from the superfluid component, whose entropy is zero. At sufficiently low temperature the dominant thermal excitations are acoustic phonons: their linear dispersion in three dimensions gives , and . Higher-energy rotons are exponentially suppressed. Thus the normal component of a superfluid and entropy disappear as , while superfluid flow and quantum motion can persist.
A helium-3 atom has spin and is a fermion. Well below its Fermi temperature, but above its superfluid transition, liquid helium-3 is a degenerate interacting Fermi liquid. Only quasiparticles close to the Fermi surface are thermally excited, giving and . At temperatures of order a millikelvin, helium-3 also becomes superfluid through formation of Cooper pairs of fermions. This is not Bose-Einstein condensation of individual helium-3 atoms. Pairing reorganizes the low-energy excitation spectrum; in the fully gapped bulk B phase, the fermionic quasiparticle contribution to heat capacity is exponentially suppressed at temperatures well below the pairing gap. Gapless collective modes can still give thermal terms following a power law. The entropy nevertheless tends to zero. The normal Fermi-liquid law cannot be extrapolated through its pairing transition unchanged.[ref]
The Extraordinary Phases of Liquid 3He by David Morris Lee. 1996 Nobel lecture, discussion of helium isotopes and paired superfluid phases
Helium-3 also illustrates the importance of nuclear spin entropy. Over an intermediate low-temperature range, localized spins in the solid can retain approximately of entropy per atom, while the degenerate liquid has much less. Reversible conversion of liquid to the higher-entropy solid then absorbs heat; adiabatic compression along the melting curve can cool the sample. This is Pomeranchuk cooling. At still lower temperature, interactions between the nuclear spins remove this nearly free-spin entropy, so a constant cannot be extrapolated to absolute zero.[ref]
The Pomeranchuk Effect by Robert Coleman Richardson. 1996 Nobel lecture, entropy comparison and compression cooling
Liquefaction and cooling methods. A gas must be below its liquid-gas critical point to form a distinct liquid phase by compression. Compression above the critical temperature alone cannot achieve ordinary liquid-vapour coexistence. Practical liquefaction removes the compression heat, cools the compressed gas in a heat exchanger and uses expansion to lower its temperature further.
A throttling valve operates approximately at constant specific enthalpy when kinetic-energy changes and heat leakage are negligible. The Joule-Thomson coefficient isusing consistent molar quantities, or consistent total quantities for a fixed amount. A pressure drop cools the gas if . An ideal gas has zero Joule-Thomson coefficient; real intermolecular interactions are essential. In particular, room-temperature helium warms on throttling, so it must first be brought into a region of positive Joule-Thomson coefficient. Expansion through an engine or turbine can instead remove work and produce approximately isentropic cooling.
A regenerative liquefier sends the cold returning gas through a counterflow heat exchanger to precool the incoming compressed gas before its next expansion. Expansion engines and external precooling can supply the initial cooling; repeated operation then produces liquid. Modern helium liquefaction commonly combines work-producing expansion with a final throttle. [ref]
https://trc.nist.gov/cryogenics/Papers/Review/2020-Review_of_Refrigeration_Methods.pdf. Review of Refrigeration Methods, helium liquefiers and Claude cycles
Once liquid exists, pumping away vapour lowers its saturation pressure and boiling temperature. The escaping vapour carries latent heat away, cooling the remaining liquid. At still lower temperatures, a dilution refrigerator exploits the different entropy carried by helium-3 in concentrated and dilute helium mixtures; adiabatic demagnetization and Pomeranchuk cooling provide other routes.
Approaching zero. The unattainability formulation of the third law states that regular cooling operations with finite resources cannot reach absolute zero in finitely many stages. As the entropy available to remove becomes small and thermal couplings weaken, each method loses its ability to take the final step. An isentropic cooling trajectory starting at nonzero entropy cannot reach a common zero-entropy endpoint through regular finite changes of parameters. A fully general finite-time claim also requires assumptions about available controls and heat-transfer rates. Quantum liquids and refrigeration methods can approach while remaining consistent with vanishing equilibrium entropy; they do not provide a finite-operation route to absolute zero.
graphene is a two-dimensional honeycomb lattice with two sublattices. Nearest-neighbour hopping gives two bands . They touch at two inequivalent valleys. Expanding near valley givesThe two-component spinor describes sublattice amplitudes, not real spin. This is a massless two-dimensional Dirac Hamiltonian with material velocity in place of . The emergent band quasiparticles are relativistic in this mathematical sense; the electron's vacuum rest mass is not set to zero. Real spin and valley each contribute a degeneracy of two in the ideal low-energy model.
A single-walled carbon nanotube is a rolled graphene sheet with carbon nanotube chiral vector . Periodicity requires , selecting lines through graphene momentum space and producing one-dimensional transverse electronic modes. Near a valley,A quantization line through one of the Dirac valleys in graphene gives a metallic branch; ideal nanotube zone folding gives the criterion . Otherwise the nearest line misses the valley and opens . The transverse momentum gives a carbon-nanotube Dirac mass, with . For a large-radius ideal semiconducting tube, and , showing the inverse-diameter gap. Curvature, strain, spin-orbit coupling and interactions can change the simple classification; nominally metallic non-armchair tubes can acquire small gaps. One-dimensional transverse electronic mode thresholds give Van Hove singularities, unlike graphene's low-energy density of states proportional to .
A gate changes occupation and the Fermi level in both systems. Ideal monolayer graphene can be tuned through charge neutrality from holes to electrons, but an ordinary scalar gate does not open a bulk band gap. Including spin and valley,The gate relation includes geometric and quantum capacitances, so one should not equate gate voltage to Fermi energy without the capacitance model. A semiconducting carbon nanotube can instead be depleted when its Fermi level lies in a gap and turned on in electron or hole bands. Contact Schottky barriers can strongly influence the observed nanotube field effect. A truly gapless ideal metallic tube cannot be switched off simply by moving the Fermi level through its band crossing. These gate responses reflect band structure and contacts, not a change of wrapping indices.
Past exam of the quantum condensed matter course of the University of Cambridge 2007 Section B B2 b Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
In a heavy fermion material, interactions of narrow, often -derived states with conduction electrons produce low-energy quasiparticles with very large thermodynamic effective mass. A coherent Kondo lattice can form a narrow low-energy band, so the large mass is an interaction-renormalized response rather than a larger bare electron mass.
Two concrete experimental signatures are an enormous linear electronic heat capacity coefficient and a strongly enhanced quadratic low-temperature electrical resistivity. Calorimetry separates by plotting against ; the intercept measures the electronic coefficient rather than a lattice contribution. Four-terminal transport tests the Fermi liquid law . The low-temperature calorimetry and resistivity of CeAl3 found and below , making both signatures quantitative.[ref]
4f-Virtual-Bound-State Formation in CeAl3 at Low Temperatures by Klaus Andres and others. Abstract: specific heat and electrical resistivity below 0.2 K, with gamma and the quadratic resistivity coefficient
An enhanced nearly temperature-independent spin susceptibility and a large quantum-oscillation cyclotron effective mass provide additional tests. Not every heavy-fermion compound has the same ordered ground state; magnetism or superconductivity can intervene before a simple normal Fermi-liquid limit is reached.
Past exam of the quantum condensed matter course of the University of Cambridge 2013 2 a Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
A solid stores thermal energy in lattice vibrations and, when available, electronic and other excitations. For a nonmagnetic insulating crystal at sufficiently low temperature, the gap suppresses mobile electronic excitations and the leading bulk contribution normally comes from acoustic phonons. The three-dimensional Debye heat capacity isThe vibrational density of states scales as , so only a fraction proportional to of the modes is thermally active at low temperature. The two limiting forms areThe high-temperature value is the Dulong-Petit law, or per mole of atoms. Optical phonons add thermally activated contributions as their characteristic energies become accessible. A multiatom cell has more branches, but still three vibrational degrees of freedom per atom.
A normal metal has an additional low-temperature electronic heat capacity. The Pauli exclusion principle restricts excitations to a shell of width about around the Fermi energy. The number of thermally active electrons is therefore proportional to , rather than the total electron number contributing a classical heat capacity. With spin-summed electronic density of states for the whole specimen,For a three-dimensional free-electron gas, and . Only a small fraction of the classical electronic value is accessible when , even though the electronic term dominates the phonon term as in a normal gapless metal.
Plotting against gives a straight line with intercept and slope in the appropriate low-temperature range. This separates the electronic density-of-states information from the acoustic-phonon scale. In a Fermi liquid, the interacting quasiparticle density of states replaces the free value, so an enhanced effective mass enhances .
The qualifications matter experimentally. Superconductivity can gap electronic excitations, magnetic order adds magnetic excitations, defects can generate additional low-temperature terms, and low-dimensional or very small specimens need not obey the bulk cubic law. The Debye expression is for constant-volume heat capacity; constant-pressure heat capacity differs through thermal expansion, although the difference is often small at low temperature. Thus the normal-metal and ordinary insulating limits are useful leading behaviors, not universal formulas for every solid in every phase.
Past exam of the quantum condensed matter course of the University of Cambridge 2013 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
A normal Fermi liquid describes an interacting fermion system whose low-energy excitations remain continuously connected to adding particles to or removing particles from a Fermi gas. The elementary long-lived excitation is a Landau quasiparticle: adding a particle also changes the surrounding many-body state. Its energy, velocity and interactions are renormalized, even though its electric charge and spin remain those appropriate to the excitation.
Near an isotropic Fermi surface,Residual interactions make the quasiparticle energy depend on the occupations of other quasiparticles, expressed by the Landau quasiparticle energy functional. Its angular components give the Landau parameters controlling density and spin responses. Thus the successful particle picture does not mean that interactions have become zero.
Pauli blocking restricts the final states available for low-energy collisions. In an ordinary three-dimensional Fermi liquid with regular interactions, a representative decay law isAt , the width vanishes faster than , so an excitation becomes increasingly sharp as it approaches the Fermi surface. Its coherent spectral weight is the quasiparticle residue , and the physical electron occupation has a discontinuity of height at zero temperature. Incoherent spectral weight accounts for the remainder. The quasiparticle occupations themselves obey a Fermi-Dirac distribution.
Several leading thermodynamic signatures retain their gas-like form but have interaction-dependent coefficients. In particular,for an isotropic spin-one-half model, with the spin-summed quasiparticle density of states per volume. effective mass changes , while the dimensionless interaction parameters separately change the spin susceptibility and compressibility. Collisionless collective density motion can propagate as zero sound, distinct from the single-particle excitations.
The quasiparticle scattering rate often underlies a low-temperature contribution to metallic electrical resistivity, but a mechanism relaxing electrical electric current is needed. In a clean Galilean-invariant continuum, electron-electron collisions conserve total momentum and do not alone give a finite dc electrical resistivity. Crystal Umklapp scattering or other current-relaxing processes change that conclusion.
Normal liquid helium-3 and many metals motivate the Fermi-liquid framework. Pairing, magnetic ordering or other transitions can reconstruct the low-energy states. Generic interacting one-dimensional fermion systems instead form a different low-energy state, so the three-dimensional quasiparticle conclusions should not simply be transferred to a chain.
Heavy fermion materials are correlated metals whose low-energy quasiparticles have exceptionally large effective masses. Partly localized -electron moments hybridize with broader conduction states. The Kondo effect and coherence below the Kondo-lattice coherence temperature produce a narrow low-energy band, so a small energy change corresponds to a large momentum-space state density.
For the electronic heat capacity of a heavy Fermi liquid, the resulting density of states gives a large low-temperature electronic specific-heat coefficient,and often an enhanced magnetic susceptibility. Here includes both spins and must be expressed per sample, mole or volume consistently with . A coherent Fermi-liquid regime often has with an enhanced coefficient . Above coherence, scattering by local moments can instead give a Kondo-like resistivity upturn.
The competition between moment screening and intersite magnetic interactions can yield a heavy paramagnetic metal, magnetic order, quantum-critical behaviour or unconventional superconductivity. Ce- and U-based compounds supply familiar examples. “Heavy” describes the emergent electronic quasiparticles, not the ionic mass; the simple heavy-band picture need not survive at a quantum critical point.[ref]
Heavy Fermions and the Kondo Lattice: A 21st Century Perspective by Piers Coleman. Sections 1.1–1.3: heavy electrons, local moments and Kondo-lattice coherence
Past exam of the quantum condensed matter course of the University of Cambridge 2017 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
A normal Fermi liquid has interacting fermions whose low-energy excitations can be followed continuously from those of a Fermi gas, provided no phase transition destroys that correspondence. A Landau quasiparticle is a particle together with the surrounding many-body response. It has the appropriate charge and spin, a renormalized dispersion and a long lifetime close to the Fermi surface. Interactions remain in both the quasiparticle parameters and the interactions between quasiparticles; they have not been discarded.
Near an isotropic Fermi surface,The last relation defines the local isotropic Fermi-liquid effective mass. The Landau quasiparticle energy functional expresses how changing occupations shifts other quasiparticle energies:with normalization of the sum absorbed into . Its angular components give Landau parameters describing collective density and spin response.
The Pauli exclusion principle severely restricts the available final states for low-energy collisions. In an ordinary three-dimensional Fermi liquid with regular interactions,At zero temperature the decay width decreases faster than , making quasiparticles increasingly sharp near the Fermi surface. Their coherent spectral weight is the quasiparticle residue , and the true electron momentum distribution has a discontinuity of height at zero temperature. The rest of the spectral weight is incoherent. The quasiparticle occupation itself still follows a Fermi-Dirac distribution.
The low-temperature electronic heat capacity is linear, , where is the spin-summed quasiparticle density of states. In an isotropic spin-one-half model, the uniform spin susceptibility and compressibility take the formsThus enhanced effective mass and residual interactions can separately change observable responses. The familiar electrical resistivity requires a mechanism relaxing electrical current, such as allowed Umklapp processes; collisions in a perfectly clean Galilean-invariant continuum conserve total momentum and do not alone produce a finite dc resistivity.
Zero sound is a collisionless collective density oscillation sustained by the quasiparticle interaction; ordinary first sound occurs when collisions establish local equilibrium during a cycle. Metals and normal liquid helium-3 supply important examples. The description fails in phases with no sufficiently sharp low-energy quasiparticles, such as generic interacting one-dimensional systems, and must be modified after pairing or another ordering transition.
Past exam of the quantum condensed matter course of the University of Cambridge 2017 4 Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
Noninteracting spectral line. Treat as a wavevector, so physical crystal momentum is . Write ; an energy zero at the chemical potential can be chosen throughout. The temporal factor of a noninteracting state is . With the Fourier transform convention ,Thus its normalized frequency spectral function isOne should not square the delta distribution as if it were an ordinary finite-time transition amplitude. More precisely, the fermionic retarded Green function is . Its Fourier transform is , whose negative imaginary part divided by is the same delta peak.
Interactions and lifetime. Interactions change the dispersion through the real part of the self-energy and permit decay into other excitations through its imaginary part. In the simplest quasiparticle-pole model, exponential decay of the retarded amplitude givesPerforming the causal integral,The corresponding Lorentzian quasiparticle spectral peak isIts total frequency integral is one. The exponential amplitude lifetime is ; the probability lifetime is . Describing as a scattering rate therefore requires the lifetime convention to be specified. The energy half-width is .
A general interacting electron is more accurately described by near the pole. The coherent peak then integrates to the quasiparticle residue and an incoherent continuum carries the remaining weight. In an energy-unit self-energy convention,Linearizing the real denominator gives and at the pole. The requested unit-weight Lorentzian is the normalized quasiparticle model, not the most general exact interacting spectrum.
Peak position and width. At fixed , put and . Differentiation givesIt is positive for and negative for , so the only maximum is at , with height . Setting to half this height gives . ThereforeIn energy units the maximum is and the half-width is . Frequency dependence of the self-energy would require reconsidering both the shape and peak position.
Fermi gas and Fermi liquid. A noninteracting Fermi gas has a delta-function spectral line at its bare dispersion for every momentum. A normal three-dimensional Fermi liquid has a shifted coherent peak plus incoherent spectral weight; close to the Fermi surface its width scales as . At zero temperature the peak becomes arbitrarily sharp at the Fermi surface, while it broadens farther away. Spectral functions include addition and removal weight; occupied-only photoemission contains an extra Fermi factor.
Photoemission measurement. A photon of known energy ejects an electron. Measure its kinetic energy and emission direction. For binding energy below the Fermi level and the appropriate calibrated work function , conservation of energy givesConservation of momentum parallel to a periodic surface giveswhere is a surface reciprocal-lattice vector. At suitable photon energies the photon momentum can be neglected; at higher energies it must be retained. The surface breaks perpendicular translation symmetry, so the perpendicular crystal momentum generally needs a final-state model. A two-dimensional band can be reconstructed directly from the parallel components.
Within the sudden approximation and electric-dipole approximation, photoemission intensity and spectral function are related byHere is measured relative to the chemical potential. Instrumental resolution convolves the product and inelastic scattering adds background. Thus ARPES maps the occupied electron removal spectral function, weighted by a matrix element; it does not measure the full unoccupied spectrum or an unweighted spectral function automatically. Bright ridges give dispersions, and intrinsic widths give decay information after instrumental effects are removed.
Reading the supplied image. Its bright ridges form a graphene-like cone. The crossing near is the Dirac point, not in general the Fermi level. In the paper's plotted energy coordinates its energy is roughly –. A velocity follows from a branch slope independently of the energy zero:For example, the lower branch moves by about between and . This gives andReading other points changes the estimate by tens of percent. The original exam image has unequal energy increments on nearly equally spaced labelled ticks, so it does not justify a precise fitted velocity. The value is an estimate of the cone slope extrapolated to the Fermi crossing, rather than a measured derivative exactly at a visibly identified Fermi cutoff.
To determine a Fermi energy, first calibrate the Fermi edge, then subtract the chosen reference energy. Neither a Fermi-level marker nor an explicit energy-zero convention is supplied in this crop. If its upper termination near is intended to represent the Fermi cutoff, the conditional graph answer is on that axis, or relative to the Dirac crossing. Identifying the crossing itself as the Fermi energy would incorrectly assume undoped graphene.
The research article cited by the exam identifies this as linearly polarized graphene ARPES and independently states for the substrate-doped sample. That resolves the relative energy when this external calibration is admitted.[ref]
https://hrg.pusan.ac.kr/articles/JPCM_0953-8984_26_33_335501.pdf. Section 3, printed p.2 and figure 1(b): Dirac point below the Fermi energy
The crop alone does not uniquely fix an absolute Fermi energy; the source-supported relative value and the conditional axis reading should be distinguished.Use the contact-interaction Bose-gas field integral for a homogeneous three-dimensional weakly interacting Bose gas with repulsive short-range interaction as the standard model. Let particle mass be , scattering length , physical coupling and gas parameter . These are symbolic model definitions, not supplied numerical parameters. The grand-canonical coherent-state integral has periodic fields and actionThe contact term is the normal symbol of . In three dimensions a contact interaction needs a regulator and coupling matched to the measured scattering length; the displayed is the low-energy physical coupling. This field integral is useful because an ordered saddle and its quantum/thermal fluctuations follow from the same action.
Stationarity with respect to gives the imaginary-time Gross–Pitaevskii equation. A uniform saddle exists at with and condensate density . Its arbitrary phase reflects global symmetry; a selected condensate fixes a phase in the thermodynamic symmetry-breaking description. Write after choosing that phase. Linear terms vanish, and the quadratic part isWith and the Fourier convention , the paired quadratic kernel isThe one-half in the Nambu spinor action removes pair double counting. Analytic continuation of the inverse kernel gives the Bogoliubov dispersionAt high momentum it approaches the free-particle kinetic energy plus its mean-field shift. The crossover scale is the healing length . Gaussian integration adds a fluctuation determinant to the saddle free energy. Expressed using the physical three-dimensional coupling, its zero-temperature integrand can be regularized as ; the subtraction follows from renormalization of a three-dimensional dilute-gas contact coupling, not discarding an infinite answer arbitrarily. The thermal contribution is . A calculation beyond mean field must keep that matching and its thermodynamic derivatives consistent.
The density-phase action of a Bose gas makes the physical content clear, . Up to a periodic density total derivative, the long-wavelength quadratic action containsnumber-phase conjugacy pairs the density fluctuation and phase in the quadratic density-phase action. Dropping the density-gradient term only in the long-wave limit and completing the density Gaussian square gives the Bose-gas phase-only actionThis has the same sound pole. A term is also present before restricting to the smooth zero-winding sector; although locally a total derivative, it cannot in general be ignored in topologically nontrivial sectors. The density and phase variables describe the same coupled Bogoliubov branch, not a second independent massive particle simply because the density has a static restoring cost.[ref]
Physics 215C: Quantum Field Theory, Part 3 by John McGreevy. §2.3, printed pp.29–38: superfluid phase stiffness, amplitude fluctuations and phase dynamics
A phase gradient carries superflow . Its energy cost defines the superfluid number density. At leading mean-field order the stiffness uses , but condensate density and superfluid number density are different observables: for a Galilean-invariant continuum gas at zero temperature the latter is the full density even when interactions deplete the condensate. Bogoliubov coefficients give and a small zero-temperature depletion of relative order in three dimensions. Large depletion or strong long-wavelength phase fluctuations would invalidate the small-fluctuation saddle approximation.
The Landau criterion for creating excitations is for this homogeneous dispersion. Thus repulsion produces a linear sound mode and a positive critical velocity from the Landau criterion, whereas an ideal quadratic gas has zero value of this criterion. Vortices, obstacles and nucleation can reduce an actual flow threshold below ; the criterion alone is not a complete theory of metastable flow. At finite temperature thermal quasiparticles reduce the superfluid number density. Dimensionality and finite size also matter: the uniform three-dimensional weak-depletion condensate expansion must not be transferred unchanged to a one- or two-dimensional thermodynamic system. The field integral provides systematic corrections only within its dilute, stable and sufficiently weak-fluctuation regime.
Past exam of the quantum field theory course of the University of Oxford 2019 1 a Solution 2026-10-25
A real scalar field suffices to describe one neutral species of bosonic quasiparticle. Let be its canonical momentum. In three spatial dimensions, choose the positive classical HamiltonianThe same construction works in any number of spatial dimensions by replacing appropriately. Under a spatial Fourier transform, becomes , so the Hamiltonian is a collection of independent quantum harmonic oscillators with squared angular frequency . The usual reality condition pairs opposite momenta; it does not introduce a second species.
The canonical action is . Varying gives ; eliminating it by the Legendre transform givesThis Lagrangian density is local: only the field and finitely many derivatives at the same point occur. It contains second spatial derivatives but only first time derivatives, so no extra canonical time data are needed. A square root of a differential operator in the classical Hamiltonian is unnecessary. The fourth-order spatial term breaks Lorentz invariance while preserving spatial rotations and translations. This is a free scalar field with quartic spatial dispersion.
Past exam of the quantum field theory course of the University of Oxford 2019 1 c Solution 2026-10-25
Define and . The Hermitian quantum field has the mode expansion of a free fieldwhere the annihilation operators and creation operators obey the bosonic canonical commutation relationsBecause , its mode expansion of a free field isThe two nonzero cross commutators then giveand the equal-time field-field and momentum-momentum commutators vanish. This verifies the factor without requiring Lorentz invariance.
Substitution into the Hamiltonian, followed by normal ordering, yieldsConsequently : one application of a creation operator adds precisely the required quasiparticle energy. Before normal ordering there is the usual constant zero-point vacuum energy. If , the exactly zero-momentum mode has and is a free canonical coordinate, not an oscillator with a normalizable oscillator vacuum state; in a finite box handle that mode separately or introduce a small positive mass. The formula applies directly to all modes with .
Let be the real-space area and use , with . There is one state per momentum cell, since the fermions are spinless. An annulus between and contains states. Near the Fermi surface, the quasiparticle dispersion relation has , so the total density of states isThe density of states per unit area and the occupied-state count are, respectively,In particular, . No factor of two for spin degeneracy is present. This counts Landau quasiparticle levels, so it is not multiplied by the quasiparticle residue of the microscopic particle Green's function.
Within a stable normal Fermi liquid, the low-energy states are described by long-lived Landau quasiparticles and holes in a thin shell about the Fermi surface; the Pauli exclusion principle suppresses their decay. Expanding the energy about the equilibrium occupations gives the one-quasiparticle dispersion relation at first order and the interaction between occupation changes at second order, namely the Landau quasiparticle energy functional. For a smooth interaction, radial deviations in that interaction may be neglected at leading order, leaving its angular dependence; higher occupation terms contribute higher powers of the small shell thickness. Collective occupation deformations are included in the same description. The sufficiency claim is conditional on the normal Fermi liquid regime, and on supplementing this static energy functional with dynamics when required: it is not a description of arbitrary low-energy phases such as a superconductor or non-Fermi liquid.
Use the total density of states and from part (b). In the paper's double-sum convention, has units of energy and scales as . Define its first angular moment byThis convention matters: the Landau quasiparticle energy functional written with an explicit instead uses the intensive kernel .
At zero temperature, the displayed functional is the change in ; a true Galilean boost preserves , so . For a radial displacement , the first term in the Landau quasiparticle energy functional becomesThe oriented radial integral also works for negative : removing occupied levels below the chemical potential costs positive energy. Substituting and using givesThe exact second-order correction to the boundary is unnecessary here because the unperturbed excitation energy vanishes on the Fermi surface; it changes this term only beyond quadratic order. It must nevertheless be understood when identifying with a fixed-particle number energy change.
For the quadratic interaction term, the first-order occupation change alone suffices. The radial Dirac delta function integrals givePut . The remaining angular integral usesso only the first cosine component of the interaction survives. Since ,Adding both contributions and matching the bare-mass result of part (a) yields the two-dimensional Landau effective-mass relation:Equivalently, using the density of states per unit area ,If dimensionless Landau parameters are defined through the Fourier series , then andDefining the cosine expansion with an extra factor of two would instead absorb that factor into ; the angular-integral formula above fixes the convention unambiguously. The physical content is that interaction changes accompanying a moving Fermi sea compensate the renormalized quasiparticle velocity, so the total boost energy is governed by the bare mass. For an interaction independent of angle, and this consistency condition requires .




