arXiv subjects

Kun Chen

Publications and source records attributed to Kun Chen.

172 records · Page 10Linked to original sources

arXiv2015

The Massive Goldstone (Higgs) mode in two-dimensional ultracold atomic lattice systems

We discuss how to reveal the massive Goldstone mode, often referred to as the Higgs amplitude mode, near the Superfluid-to-Insulator quantum critical point (QCP) in a system of two-dimensional ultracold bosonic atoms in optical lattices. The spectral function of the amplitude response is obtained by analytic continuation of the kinetic energy correlation function calculated by Monte Carlo methods. Our results enable a direct comparison with the recent experiment [M. Endres, T. Fukuhara, D. Pekker, M. Cheneau, P. Schauß, C. Gross, E. Demler, S. Kuhr, and I. Bloch, Nature 487, 454-458 (2012)], and demonstrate a good agreement for temperature shifts induced by lattice modulation. Based on our numerical analysis, we formulate the necessary conditions in terms of homogeneity, detuning from the QCP and temperature in order to reveal the massive Goldstone resonance peak in spectral functions experimentally. We also propose to apply a local modulation at the trap center to overcome the inhomogeneous broadening caused by the parabolic trap confinement.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2015

Regularization vs. Relaxation: A conic optimization perspective of statistical variable selection

Variable selection is a fundamental task in statistical data analysis. Sparsity-inducing regularization methods are a popular class of methods that simultaneously perform variable selection and model estimation. The central problem is a quadratic optimization problem with an l0-norm penalty. Exactly enforcing the l0-norm penalty is computationally intractable for larger scale problems, so dif- ferent sparsity-inducing penalty functions that approximate the l0-norm have been introduced. In this paper, we show that viewing the problem from a convex relaxation perspective offers new insights. In particular, we show that a popular sparsity-inducing concave penalty function known as the Minimax Concave Penalty (MCP), and the reverse Huber penalty derived in a recent work by Pilanci, Wainwright and Ghaoui, can both be derived as special cases of a lifted convex relaxation called the perspective relaxation. The optimal perspective relaxation is a related minimax problem that balances the overall convexity and tightness of approximation to the l0 norm. We show it can be solved by a semidefinite relaxation. Moreover, a probabilistic interpretation of the semidefinite relaxation reveals connections with the boolean quadric polytope in combinatorial optimization. Finally by reformulating the l0-norm pe- nalized problem as a two-level problem, with the inner level being a Max-Cut problem, our proposed semidefinite relaxation can be realized by replacing the inner level problem with its semidefinite relaxation studied by Goemans and Williamson. This interpretation suggests using the Goemans-Williamson rounding procedure to find approximate solutions to the l0-norm penalized problem. Numerical experiments demonstrate the tightness of our proposed semidefinite relaxation, and the effectiveness of finding approximate solutions by Goemans-Williamson rounding.

cs.LG↗

arXiv2014

Universal Conductivity in a Two-Dimensional Superfluid-to-Insulator Quantum Critical System

We compute the universal conductivity of the (2+1)-dimensional XY universality class, which is realized for a superfluid-to-Mott insulator quantum phase transition at constant density. Based on large-scale Monte Carlo simulations of the classical (2+1)-dimensional $J$-current model and the two-dimensional Bose-Hubbard model, we can precisely determine the conductivity on the quantum critical plateau, $σ(\infty)=0.359(4)σ_Q$ with $σ_Q$ the conductivity quantum. The universal conductivity curve is the standard example with the lowest number of components where the bottoms-up AdS/CFT correspondence from string theory can be tested and made to use [R. C. Myers, S. Sachdev, and A. Singh, Phys. Rev. D83, 066017 (2011)]. For the first time, the shape of the $σ(iω_n)- σ(\infty)$ function in the Matsubara representation is accurate enough for a conclusive comparison and establishes the particle-like nature of charge transport. We find that the holographic gauge/gravity duality theory for transport properties can be made compatible with the data if temperature of the horizon of the black brane is different from the temperature of the conformal field theory. The requirements for measuring the universal conductivity in a cold gas experiment are also determined by our calculation.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2013

Deconfined criticality flow in the Heisenberg model with ring-exchange interactions

Quantum transition points in the J -Q model---the test bed of the deconfined critical point theory---and the SU(2)-symmetric discrete noncompact CP^1 representation of the deconfined critical action are directly compared by the flowgram method. We find that the flows of two systems coincide in a broad region of linear system sizes (10 < L < 50 for the J -Q model), implying that the deconfined critical point theory correctly captures the mesoscopic physics of competition between the antiferromagnetic and valence-bond orders in quantum spin systems. At larger sizes, however, we observe significant deviations between the two flows which both demonstrate strong violations of scale invariance. This reliably rules out the second-order transition scenario in at least one of the two models and suggests the most likely explanation for the nature of the transition in the J-Q model.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2013

Universal Properties of the Higgs Resonance in (2+1)-Dimensional U(1) Critical Systems

We present spectral functions for the magnitude squared of the order parameter in the scaling limit of the two-dimensional superfluid to Mott insulator quantum phase transition at constant density, which has emergent particle-hole symmetry and Lorentz invariance. The universal functions for the superfluid, Mott insulator, and normal liquid phases reveal a low-frequency resonance which is relatively sharp and is followed by a damped oscillation (in the first two phases only) before saturating to the quantum critical plateau. The counterintuitive resonance feature in the insulating and normal phases calls for deeper understanding of collective modes in the strongly coupled (2+1)-dimensional relativistic field theory. Our results are derived from analytically continued correlation functions obtained from path-integral Monte Carlo simulations of the Bose-Hubbard model.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2013

On The Degrees of Freedom of Reduced-rank Estimators in Multivariate Regression

In this paper we study the effective degrees of freedom of a general class of reduced rank estimators for multivariate regression in the framework of Stein's unbiased risk estimation (SURE). We derive a finite-sample exact unbiased estimator that admits a closed-form expression in terms of the singular values or thresholded singular values of the least squares solution and hence readily computable. The results continue to hold in the high-dimensional scenario when both the predictor and response dimensions are allowed to be larger than the sample size. The derived analytical form facilitates the investigation of its theoretical properties and provides new insights into the empirical behaviors of the degrees of freedom. In particular, we examine the differences and connections between the proposed estimator and a commonly-used naive estimator, i.e., the number of free parameters. The use of the proposed estimator leads to efficient and accurate prediction risk estimation and model selection, as demonstrated by simulation studies and a data example.

stat.ME↗

arXiv2013

Two-dimensional Potts antiferromagnets with a phase transition at arbitrarily large q

We exhibit infinite families of two-dimensional lattices (some of which are triangulations or quadrangulations of the plane) on which the q-state Potts antiferromagnet has a finite-temperature phase transition at arbitrarily large values of q. This unexpected result is proven rigorously by using a Peierls argument to measure the entropic advantage of sublattice long-range order. Additional numerical data are obtained using transfer matrices, Monte Carlo simulation, and a high-precision graph-theoretic method.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2012

Reduced rank regression via adaptive nuclear norm penalization

Adaptive nuclear-norm penalization is proposed for low-rank matrix approximation, by which we develop a new reduced-rank estimation method for the general high-dimensional multivariate regression problems. The adaptive nuclear norm of a matrix is defined as the weighted sum of the singular values of the matrix. For example, the pre-specified weights may be some negative power of the singular values of the data matrix (or its projection in regression setting). The adaptive nuclear norm is generally non-convex under the natural restriction that the weight decreases with the singular value. However, we show that the proposed non-convex penalized regression method has a global optimal solution obtained from an adaptively soft-thresholded singular value decomposition. This new reduced-rank estimator is computationally efficient, has continuous solution path and possesses better bias-variance property than its classical counterpart. The rank consistency and prediction/estimation performance bounds of the proposed estimator are established under high-dimensional asymptotic regime. Simulation studies and an application in genetics demonstrate that the proposed estimator has superior performance to several existing methods. The adaptive nuclear-norm penalization can also serve as a building block to study a broad class of singular value penalties.

stat.ME↗

arXiv2005

Solving the Advection-Diffusion Equations in Biological Contexts using the Cellular Potts Model

The Cellular Potts Model (CPM) is a robust, cell-level methodology for simulation of biological tissues and morphogenesis. Both tissue physiology and morphogenesis depend on diffusion of chemical morphogens in the extra-cellular fluid or matrix (ECM). Standard diffusion solvers applied to the cellular potts model use finite difference methods on the underlying CPM lattice. However, these methods produce a diffusing field tied to the underlying lattice, which is inaccurate in many biological situations in which cell or ECM movement causes advection rapid compared to diffusion. Finite difference schemes suffer numerical instabilities solving the resulting advection-diffusion equations. To circumvent these problems we simulate advection-diffusion within the framework of the CPM using off-lattice finite-difference methods. We define a set of generalized fluid particles which detach advection and diffusion from the lattice. Diffusion occurs between neighboring fluid particles by local averaging rules which approximate the Laplacian. Directed spin flips in the CPM handle the advective movement of the fluid particles. A constraint on relative velocities in the fluid explicitly accounts for fluid viscosity. We use the CPM to solve various diffusion examples including multiple instantaneous sources, continuous sources, moving sources and different boundary geometries and conditions to validate our approximation against analytical and established numerical solutions. We also verify the CPM results for Poiseuille flow and Taylor-Aris dispersion.

physics.bio-ph↗

arXiv1994

Probing Quark Fragmentation Functions for Spin-1/2 Baryon Production in Unpolarized $e^+e^-$ Annihilation

We study the measurement of the quark fragmentation functions for spin-1/2 baryon production ($Λ$ and $\bar Λ$, in particular) in unpolarized $e^+e^-$ annihilation. The spin-dependent fragmentation functions $\hat g_1(z)$ and $\hat h_1(z)$ can be probed in the process as a result of quark-antiquark spin correlation and the weak decay of the baryons. The relevant cross section is expressed as a product of the two-jet cross-section, the fragmentation functions, and the differential width of the hyperon decay.

hep-ph↗