Complex Langevin method on rotating matrix quantum mechanics at thermal equilibrium

Abstract

Abstract Rotating systems in thermal equilibrium are ubiquitous in our world. In the context of high-energy physics, rotations would affect the phase structure of quantum chromodynamics (QCD). However, the standard Monte Carlo methods in rotating systems are problematic because the chemical potentials for the angular momenta (angular velocities) cause sign problems even for bosonic variables. In this article, we demonstrate that the complex Langevin method (CLM) may overcome this issue. We apply the CLM to the Yang–Mills (YM)-type one-dimensional matrix model (matrix quantum mechanics) that is a large-N reduction (or dimensional reduction) of the (D + 1)-dimensional U(N) pure YM theory [bosonic Banks–Fischler–Shenker–Susskind (BFSS) model]. This model shows a large-N phase transition at finite temperature, which is analogous to the confinement/deconfinement transition of the original YM theory, and our CLM predicts that the transition temperature decreases as the angular momentum chemical potential increases. In order to verify our results, we compute several quantities via the minimum sensitivity method and find good quantitative agreements. Hence, the CLM works properly in this rotating system. We also argue that our results are qualitatively consistent with a holography and the recent studies of the imaginary angular velocity in QCD. As a byproduct, we develop an analytic approximation to treat the so-called “small black hole” phase in the matrix model.