Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 303 3 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The statistical Hamiltonian in this question is already in thermal units, as indicated by without an additional . Define and . The mean field and its linear response areThese are functional derivatives of the connected generating functional; the subtraction defines the connected correlation function. In the Landau approximation, neglect loop corrections and evaluate the field integral at a stable saddle . It satisfies the Euler-Lagrange equationThis follows by varying the gradient term and integrating by parts, with periodic, decaying, or otherwise appropriate boundary conditions.
The two requested free energy functionals, following the source and Legendre conventions of the question, areIn the scalar-field source Legendre transform on the chosen stable branch, is chosen to produce , and . Thus the imposed-source Helmholtz free energy and the fixed-order-parameter Gibbs free energy have the appropriate opposite source derivatives. These names are used in the question's magnetic-ensemble convention; the defining sign relation is what fixes the calculation. At leading Landau approximation there is no fluctuation-determinant term in .
Differentiate the saddle equation with respect to . The response obeysThereforeEquivalently, the inverse Hessian relation for a connected two-point function states that is the inverse kernel of . The factor follows from twice differentiating the quartic term ; it is not . This tree-level connected response is obtained by varying the saddle. It does not require replacing the exact connected correlator by a product of the saddle values, which would incorrectly give zero.
For the requested single-momentum formula, assume a homogeneous source and a translationally invariant equilibrium phase, so and . SetThe Fourier transform with the printed positive sign sends to , while the Dirac delta function transforms to one. Hence the Ornstein--Zernike correlation function hasThe inverse convention is . For general inhomogeneous , has nonconstant coefficients and depends separately on its two positions; the displayed momentum-diagonal formula then does not follow. The preceding differential equation still holds in that case.
At zero source and for , the homogeneous saddle is for , and on either selected stable ordered branch for . Thus the Landau scalar correlation length isIn the ordered phase the negative bare quadratic coefficient is compensated by the positive curvature at the nonzero saddle. Retaining below the transition would instead give an unstable kernel and is not a physical correlation length. With the usual analytic thermal tuning , , both branches diverge as , so the correlation-length critical exponent isThe high-temperature amplitude is times the low-temperature amplitude for the same . This statement is within Landau theory; fluctuations can change critical behavior outside the mean-field regime.
Renormalization compares the same long-distance physics at different observation scales. The starting object is a microscopic or cutoff statistical Hamiltonian with every symmetry-allowed coupling . Because a critical correlation length is much larger than a lattice spacing, repeatedly eliminating short-distance detail can reveal scale-invariant behavior.
In a real-space transformation choose a normalized blocking kernel for retained variables. DefineSumming over proves exact preservation of before truncation. The transformed Hamiltonian generally gains longer-range and many-body interactions and a field-independent constant. Observables must be blocked consistently. In momentum-shell language split , integrate , then use and a field rescaling to restore cutoff and kinetic normalization. Coarse-graining, rescaling and tracking generated interactions are distinct steps.
Repeated transformations generate a flow with composition when the same exact coarse-graining family is used. Losing degrees of freedom generally makes this a semigroup, despite its conventional group name. A renormalization-group fixed point is invariant after rescaling. At a continuous transition the large-distance theory approaches a critical renormalization-group fixed point; finite correlation length instead eventually flows into an ordinary thermodynamic phase regime.
Linearize in scaling coordinates :For increasing observation length, is relevant and must be tuned, is irrelevant, and is marginal and needs nonlinear analysis. Discrete multipliers must be compared with one, not with zero. The stable manifold forms the critical surface after relevant directions have been set to zero.
After subtracting regular additive contributions, ordinary hyperscaling givesChoosing or choosing the field as scale yieldsFor a critical two-point function , the order parameter scaling dimension is , and its conjugate field has . This recovers the Q1 identities while distinguishing the gap exponent from the field's scaling dimension .
As a concrete dimensional check, start from a scalar gradient action. Restoring its coefficient uses , so at the Gaussian fixed pointQuartic interactions are relevant below four dimensions. They can produce an interacting Wilson-Fisher fixed point, whose exponents differ from naive Gaussian counting. Above four, the quartic coupling is irrelevant at the Gaussian fixed point but dangerous for ordered observables: is singular when is dropped. Thus the simple two-variable hyperscaling formula is not universal above the upper critical dimension.
Different microscopic systems can flow to the same long-distance renormalization-group fixed point, explaining universality of exponents and normalized scaling forms. Critical temperatures, metric factors and regular free energies remain nonuniversal. Dimension, order parameter symmetry, interaction range and additional soft variables constrain the universality class. Truncations, perturbative expansions and numerics approximate the flow; they must not be confused with the exact elimination definition.[ref]
Statistical Field Theory by David Tong. §3.1–§3.3: coarse-graining, scaling, relevance and dangerously irrelevant interactions
Integrate field modes with momenta between a fixed microscopic ultraviolet cutoff and a lower cutoff , retaining the modes below as backgrounds. The exact statistical Hamiltonian includes all generated interactions and field-independent constants. Integrating its retained modes reproduces the original partition function, so long-distance observables do not depend on the arbitrary intermediate cutoff. With sources retained, the corresponding coarse observables reproduce long-distance response and connected correlation functions. A local gradient expansion or a finite-coupling truncation is an additional approximation, rather than a consequence of cutoff independence. The momentum-shell construction is also explained in the Cambridge statistical field theory lecture notes.
In a finite box, retain the constant mode while integrating all nonzero field modes using the Wilsonian coarse-grained statistical Hamiltonian. Below the smallest nonzero momentum, the remaining effective energy is and its Boltzmann weight is precisely the constrained order-parameter free energy weight. Thus the displayed equality holds with consistent field-independent normalization. It is not an identity between a bare statistical Hamiltonian and an unconstrained equilibrium free energy. An analytic polynomial Landau free energy further assumes a homogeneous branch and regular effective coefficients; long-distance fluctuations near and below an upper critical dimension can invalidate that analytic approximation.