Mr. JoÃO INÁCIO
João Carvalho Inácio is a PhD student in theoretical physics at the University of Würzburg, working under Prof. Fakher F. Assaad. His research focuses on strongly correlated electron systems, with particular interest in quantum spin liquids and quantum Monte Carlo methods. He has experience studying phonon interactions in Kitaev and Dirac spin liquids, as well as transport properties in low-dimensional spin models. João has co-authored several publications on correlated systems and computational methods, and is proficient in high-performance scientific computing using languages such as C/C++, Python, and Fortran.
From electrons to gauge theories: emergence in correlated quantum matter
Abstract:
Emergent phenomena in strongly correlated systems arise when microscopic degrees of freedom reorganise into qualitatively new excitations at low energies. A central example is the Hubbard model, in which collective electronic low-energy excitations behave like bosons, giving rise to the Heisenberg model, and, at lower energy scales, the bosons give rise to fractionalised excitations and emergent gauge fields. Accessing this hierarchy remains challenging due to strong correlations, motivating the use of exact quantum Monte Carlo simulations.In this talk, I explore different facets of emergence, from the exactly solvable Kitaev model, with its Majorana fermions and Z2 gauge field, to more generic spin systems described by parton constructions with fractional excitations and emergent gauge fields. I will present recent numerical results on the interplay between magnetism, lattice vibrations, and topological excitations. In the end, I will discuss extensions to cavity-coupled systems, where light–matter interactions give rise to emergent polaritonic excitations in the Hubbard model.