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Rigidity in the Invariant Theory

of Compact Groups

Michael Larsen**Partially supported by NSF Grant No. DMS-0100537

Department of Mathematics

Indiana University

Bloomington, IN 47405 USA

ABSTRACT

A compact Lie group $`G`$ and a faithful complex representation $`V`$ determine the Sato-Tate measure $`\mu _{G,V}`$ on , defined as the direct image of Haar measure with respect to the character map $`g\mathrm{tr}(g|V)`$. We give a necessary and sufficient condition for a Sato-Tate measure to be an isolated point in the set of all Sato-Tate measures, regarded as a subset of the space of distributions on . In particular we prove that if $`G`$ is connected and semisimple and $`V`$ is irreducible, then $`\mu _{G,V}`$ is an isolated point.

0. IntroductionGiven a compact Lie group $`G`$ and a finite dimensional, faithful, complex representation $`V`$ of $`G`$, there is an associated Sato-Tate measure $`\mu _{G,V}`$ on the complex plane defined as the direct image of Haar measure with respect to the map $`GC`$ given by the trace of $`V`$. This measure is compactly supported and is therefore uniquely determined by its moments

$$_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu _{G,V}=dim(V^aV_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{b})^G,a,b0.$$

To what extent is the pair $`(G,V)`$ determined by the measure $`\mu _{G,V}`$ or equivalently by the dimensions of spaces of $`G`$-invariants of $`V^aV_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{b}`$? Certainly $`(G,V)`$ is not always determined up to isomorphism. For example, when $`G`$ is a finite group and $`V`$ is its regular representation, the only information encoded in $`\mu _{G,V}`$ is the order of $`G`$. In , we showed that $`(G,V)`$ is not in general determined up to isomorphism by $`\mu _{G,V}`$ even when $`G`$ is connected and semisimple. If, however, in addition $`V`$ is irreducible, then the pair is uniquely determined by its measure.

This paper does not directly address the general problem of when $`\mu _{G,V}`$ determines $`(G,V)`$. It considers a related question: for what pairs $`(G,V)`$ is $`\mu _{G,V}`$ isolated from all other Sato-Tate measures in the space of distributions on $`C`$? Equivalently, when is the Sato-Tate function

$$F_{G,V}:(a,b)dim(V^aV_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{b})^G$$

isolated in the space of all Sato-Tate functions in $`N^{N\times N}`$ (endowed with the Tychonoff topology)? It may be worth pointing out that not every limit of a convergent sequence of Sato-Tate measures is again a Sato-Tate measure. For example, if $`(G_i,V_i)`$ is a sequence of classical groups in the same series and $`V_i`$ is the natural representation of $`G_i`$, then $`\mu _{G_i,V_i}`$ converges to a complex (resp. real) Gaussian distribution if the $`G_i`$ are unitary (resp. orthogonal or symplectic) .

The original motivation for this problem comes from the cohomological theory of exponential sums (see, e.g.,  Chap. 3). Suppose that $`U`$ is a geometrically connected curve over a finite field $`F`$, $`\overline{U}`$ the curve obtained from $`U`$ by extension of scalars to $`\overline{F}`$, and $`\pi _1^a`$ and $`\pi _1^g`$ are the fundamental groups of $`U`$ and $`\overline{U}`$ respectively. Let $``$ be a lisse $`\mathrm{}`$-adic sheaf on $`U`$, i.e., a continuous representation $`\pi _1^a\mathrm{GL}_n(Q_{\mathrm{}})`$. For simplicity, assume that $``$ is pure of weight zero, and that $`F`$ is large enough that the Zariski closures $`G^a`$ and $`G^g`$ of $`\pi _1^a`$ and $`\pi _1^g`$ respectively coincide. Then, by , $`G^a=G^g`$ has semisimple identity component. Let $`G`$ denote a compact real form of the complexification of $`G^a`$ (with respect to a fixed embedding $`Q_{\mathrm{}}C`$), so $``$ determines a complex faithful $`n`$-dimensional representation $`V`$ of $`G`$. Every closed point $`u`$ in $`U`$ determines a conjugacy class in $`G`$ whose trace in $`V`$ coincides with the trace of the Frobenius in $``$. Deligne’s geometric analogue of the Sato-Tate conjecture  asserts that the distribution of these conjugacy classes is uniform with respect to Haar measure on $`G`$. At the trace level, this means that the distribution of traces of Frobenius with respect to $``$ is given by the Sato-Tate measure $`\mu _{G,V}`$. In fact, Deligne proves a strong version of this estimate, which allows one to compute any given moment $`F_{G,V}(a,b)`$ effectively. Ideally, we would like to determine $`(G,V)`$, but failing that, we would like to know that a finite amount of computation is enough to determine $`\mu _{G,V}`$. The main theorem of the paper is insufficient for this more limited goal in general, but it turns out to be enough when $`G`$ is connected and $`V`$ is irreducible.

The situation for monodromy of $`\mathrm{}`$-adic sheaves over function fields is special because the Riemann hypothesis is a theorem, and therefore we can achieve certainty concerning individual moments of $`\mu _{G,V}`$. Suppose we have an unknown compact group $`G`$, arising in nature as a subgroup of $`\mathrm{GL}_n`$ (where $`n`$ may be unknown) for which we can sample elements of $`G`$ uniformly distributed with respect to Haar measure and observe the trace. Repeated experiments will lead to greater and greater certainty concerning any given moment of $`\mu _{G,V}`$. We would like to know when they will lead to greater and greater certainty concerning the actual distribution $`\mu _{G,V}`$.

To understand how a Sato-Tate measure could fail to be isolated, we note that from the standpoint of invariant theory, it is hard to distinguish $`U(1)`$ from $`Z/nZ`$ when $`n`$ is large. On the other hand, Jordan’s structure theorem for finite subgroups of $`\mathrm{GL}_n(C)`$ asserts, in effect, that a compact Lie group can be well approximated by finite subgroups only if its identity component is a torus. More generally we expect that a compact Lie group will be well approximated by proper closed subgroups exactly if its identity component fails to be semisimple. This phenomenon turns out to explain all cases in which a measure $`\mu _{G,V}`$ is a limit of other Sato-Tate measures.

The paper is organized as follows. The first section gives two basic finiteness results for conjugacy classes of closed subgroups of compact Lie groups. If not known, they are at least variants of well-known statements. The second section proves that $`\mu _{G,V}`$ cannot be isolated if the center of $`G^{}`$ has positive dimension. The proof of the main theorem is in the third section. The fourth section examines the question of when $`\mu _{G,V}`$ is a limit of distributions associated to representations of finite groups.

I would like to thank N. Katz for introducing me to this circle of ideas in his 1985–86 course at Princeton. This paper is motivated by some more recent questions of his.

1. Some finiteness theoremsThroughout this paper, $`G`$ will denote a compact Lie group, $`G^{}`$ its identity component, $`D`$ the derived group of $`G^{}`$, $`Z`$ the center of $`G^{}`$, and $`Z^{}`$ its identity component. Thus, $`D`$ is semisimple, $`Z^{}`$ is a torus, and $`G^{}=DZ^{}`$.

We begin with a version of Richardson’s rigidity theorem .

Lemma 1.1: Let $`X`$ be a variety over $`R`$, $`G`$ a linear algebraic group over $`R`$, and $`H`$ an $`R`$-subgroup of $`G`$. Let $`JG\times X`$ denote a closed $`R`$-subvariety which is an $`X`$-subgroup scheme (of the constant group scheme $`G\times X/X`$. Suppose that $`H(R)`$ is compact. Then there exists a finite collection $`S`$ of closed subgroups of $`H(R)`$ such that for every $`xX(R)`$, the intersection of $`H(R)`$ with $`J_x(R)`$ is conjugate in $`H(R)`$ to a group in $`S`$.

Proof: Let $`K=JH\times X`$. By a standard Noetherian induction argument, there is a partition of $`X`$ into finitely many locally closed strata over each of which $`K`$ is a smooth group scheme. Without loss of generality, therefore, we may assume $`K`$ is smooth over $`X`$. Therefore, $`K_x(R)`$ is a real analytic family of subgroups of $`H(R)`$ in the sense of . Now, $`K_x(R)`$ is compact for all $`x`$, so every representation of $`K_x(R)`$ is completely reducible, and this means $`H^1(K_x(R),V)=0`$ for any representation $`V`$. By  Theorem 3.1, for every $`x_0X(R)`$, there exists a neighborhood $`U`$ such that $`K_x(R)`$ is conjugate to $`K_{x_0}(R)`$ in $`H(R)`$ for all $`xU`$. As the real locus $`X(R)`$ has finitely many components in the strong topology, there exists a finite set of compact subgroups of $`H(R)`$ representing all $`K_x(R)`$ up to conjugation.

$``$$``$

Now consider a compact Lie group $`G`$, a faithful complex representation $`V`$ of $`G`$, and a finite collection $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ of pairs $`(m,n)N^2`$. If $`HG`$ is a closed subgroup, $`V`$ can also be regarded as a representation of $`H`$, and

$$F_{G,V}(m,n)F_{H,V}(m,n)$$
$`()`$
for all $`(m,n)`$, in particular those belonging to $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$.

Proposition 1.2: Given $`(G,V)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ as above, there exists a set $`S`$ of subgroups $`KG`$ consisting of finitely many $`G`$-conjugacy classes and such that for any subgroup $`HG`$, either $`F_{G,V}`$ coincides with $`F_{H,V}`$ for all $`(m,n)\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ or $`H`$ is contained in some $`KS`$.

Proof: For each $`(m,n)\mathrm{\Sigma }`$, we consider the Grassmannian $`X_{m,n}`$ of $`F_{G,V}(m,n)+1`$-planes in $`V_{m,n}:=V^mV_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{n}`$. If, indeed, the inequality ($``$) is strict, then the space of $`H`$-invariants includes some plane indexed by $`X_{m,n}`$. Let $`X`$ denote the disjoint union over $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ of $`X_{m,n}`$, and for $`xX_{m,n}`$, let $`K_x`$ denote the intersection in $`\mathrm{GL}(V_{m,n})`$ of $`G`$ and $`\mathrm{Stab}(x)`$. By Lemma 1.1, the resulting possibilities for $`K_x`$ are finite, up to conjugation in $`G`$. $``$$``$

The last result in this section is a generalization to compact Lie groups of Jordan’s theorem on finite subgroups of $`GL_n(C)`$.

Theorem 1.3: If $`G`$ is a compact Lie group for which $`G^{}`$ is semisimple, then there exists a finite set $`S`$ of proper compact subgroups of $`G`$ such that every proper compact subgroup can be conjugated into a subgroup of an element of $`S`$.

Proof: Any subgroup which does not meet every component of $`G`$ is contained in a proper subgroup of $`G`$ which is a union of components of $`G`$. Therefore, without loss of generality, we may consider only subgroups $`H`$ of $`G`$ which meet every component of $`G`$. As $`G^{}`$ is semisimple, it has finitely many normal subgroups, and if $`HG^{}`$ contains a positive-dimensional normal subgroup of $`G^{}`$, it contains a positive-dimensional normal subgroup of $`G`$. If a maximal proper subgroup $`H`$ of $`G`$ contains a normal subgroup $`K`$ of $`G`$, then $`H/K`$ is a maximal proper subgroup of $`G/K`$. By induction on dimension, we may consider only subgroups $`H`$ of $`G`$ which do not contain a positive dimensional normal subgroup of $`G`$.

If $`K`$ is any positive dimensional characteristic subgroup of $`H`$,

$$H\mathrm{Norm}_GKG,$$

so without loss of generality, we may assume $`H=\mathrm{Norm}_GK`$. If $`H^{}`$ is noncommutative, we take $`K`$ to be the derived group of $`H^{}`$; if $`H^{}`$ is a non-trivial torus, we set $`K=H^{}`$.

In the first case $`H`$ is the normalizer of a semisimple subgroup of $`G^{}`$, so it suffices to prove there are only finitely many such subgroups up to conjugacy. There are finitely many possible isomorphism classes for $`K`$. Given a fixed embedding $`GU(n)`$, each inclusion $`KG`$ determines an $`n`$-dimensional representation of $`K`$. There are finitely many isomorphism classes of $`n`$-dimensional representations of a fixed semisimple group; each one determines a family of subgroups $`K_xU(n)`$ indexed by $`U(n)`$ itself. By Lemma 1.1, there are only finitely many possibilities for $`K_xGG`$ and therefore finitely many possibilities for $`K=K_x`$ and for $`H`$, up to $`G`$-conjugacy.

If $`K`$ is a torus, $`H`$ contains the centralizer of the torus and therefore some maximal torus $`T`$ of $`G^{}`$. Thus $`K`$ is a maximal torus of $`G^{}`$, which means this case contributes only one conjugacy class of maximal subgroups.

All that remains is the case that $`H`$ is finite. Up to conjugation, there are finitely many conjugacy classes of finite subgroups of $`G`$ of any given order: there are finitely many isomorphism classes of finite groups of a given order, and for each fixed isomorphism class, by Lemma 1.1, there are finitely many conjugacy classes of homomorphisms to $`G`$. By Jordan’s theorem, there exists a constant $`J`$ depending only on $`G`$ such that $`H`$ contains a normal abelian subgroup $`A`$ of index $`J`$. If $`|H|>J|Z|[G:G^{}]`$, then $`A`$ must contain a non-central element $`aG^{}`$. The centralizer of $`a`$ in $`G`$ is a proper closed subgroup of positive dimension, and it contains $`H`$, which is absurd. Thus, $`|H|`$ is bounded above, and the theorem follows. $``$$``$

2. Approximating tori by torsion subgroups

Let $`Z[n]`$ denote the kernel of multiplication by $`n`$ in $`Z`$. This is a characteristic subgroup of $`G`$. We regard the $`Z[n]`$ as finite subgroups approximating $`Z`$. We would like to show that whenever $`Z`$ is infinite, $`G`$ itself can be well approximated by proper closed subgroups.

Lemma 2.1: For every positive integer $`n`$ there exists a compact subgroup $`G_n`$ of $`G`$ such that $`G_nZ=G`$, and $`G_nZ`$ contains $`Z[n]`$ as a subgroup of finite index. In particular, if $`Z`$ is infinite, $`G_n`$ is a proper subgroup of $`G`$.

Proof: Suppose that $`H^2(G/Z^{},Z^{})`$ is finite. Let $`m`$ annihilate this group. Then the cohomology sequence associated to the short exact sequence

$$0Z^{}[m]Z^{}Z^{}0$$

implies every class of $`H^2(G/Z^{},Z^{})`$, in particular the one given by the extension $`0Z^{}GG/Z^{}0`$, lies in the image of $`H^2(G/Z^{},Z^{}[m])`$. It can therefore be trivialized by pulling back to a finite central extension $`F`$ of $`G/Z^{}`$. This means that the pull-back of the homomorphism $`GG/Z^{}`$ to $`F`$ splits, and the splitting gives a homomorphism $`\varphi :FG`$ such that $`\varphi (F)Z^{}=G`$. We can then take $`G_n=\varphi (F)Z[n]`$.

To prove the desired finiteness, first consider the short exact sequence

$$0X_{}(Z^{})X_{}(Z^{})RZ^{}0,$$

where $`X_{}`$ denotes the group of cocharacters. By the long exact cohomology sequence, it suffices to prove that $`H^q(G/Z^{},X_{}(Z^{}))`$ is finite for $`q=2,3`$ or equivalently, that $`H^q(G/Z^{},Z)`$ is finite for the same values of $`q`$. The first is obvious. The second is a consequence of Whitehead’s lemma. $``$$``$

Proposition 2.2: If $`Z`$ is infinite, then $`\mu _{G,V}`$ is a limit point of the sequence

$$\{\mu _{G_n,V}\}_{n=1,2,3,\mathrm{}}.$$

Proof: Clearly

$$F_{G,V}(a,b)F_{G_n,V}(a,b)$$

for all $`a,bN`$. It suffices to show that for any fixed pair $`(a,b)`$, equality holds for all but finitely many $`nN`$. Let $`Z^{}=Z_1\times \mathrm{}\times Z_k`$, where each $`Z_i`$ is isomorphic to $`U(1)`$. Let $`X_{a,b}`$ denote the Grassmannian of $`F_{G,V}(a,b)+1`$-planes in $`V_{a,b}:=V^aV_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{b}`$. For $`xX_{a,b}`$, we let $`Z_{i,x}`$ denote the intersection in $`\mathrm{GL}(V_{a,b})`$ of $`Z_i`$ and $`\mathrm{Stab}(x)`$. As these intersections are the fibers of a morphism of finite type, there is a uniform upper bound $`N`$ such that if $`Z_{i,x}`$ has more than $`N`$ points, it must be all of $`Z_i`$. For $`n>N`$, $`G_n\mathrm{Stab}(x)`$ implies $`Z_i[n]\mathrm{Stab}(x)`$ and therefore $`Z_i\mathrm{Stab}(x)`$ for all $`i`$. As $`G=G_nZ^{}`$, this implies $`G\mathrm{Stab}(x)`$ contrary to hypothesis. Thus, $`F_{G,V}(a,b)=F_{G_n,V}(a,b)`$. $``$$``$

3. Isolated measures

In this section, we prove the main theorem of this paper, namely the isolation of any $`F_{G,V}`$ which is not a limit point by virtue of Proposition 2.2.

Lemma 3.1: For any finite-dimensional Hermitian vector space $`V`$, there exists $`N`$ such that for $`a>N`$,

$$F_{U(V),V}(a,a)>(dimV1)^{2a}.$$

Proof:  Let $`du`$ denote Haar measure on $`U(V)`$ and

$$K=\left\{uU(V)\right||\mathrm{tr}(u)|>dimV\frac{1}{2}\}.$$

By the continuity of the trace function, $`K`$ has positive measure with respect to $`du`$, so if $`a0`$,

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill F_{U(V),V}(a,a)& =_{U(V)}|\mathrm{tr}(u)|^{2a}𝑑u_K|\mathrm{tr}(u)|^{2a}𝑑u\hfill \\ & \left(_K𝑑u\right)\left(dimV\frac{1}{2}\right)^{2a}>(dimV1)^{2a}.\hfill \end{array}$$

$``$$``$

Proposition 3.2: For all pairs $`(G,V)`$ there exists a neighborhood $`U`$ of $`F_{G,V}`$ in the Tychonoff topology such that for all $`(G^{},V^{})`$ with $`F_{G^{},V^{}}U`$, $`dimV=dimV^{}`$.

Proof: We have for all $`a`$ the inequalities

$$F_{U(V),V}(a,a)F_{G,V}(a,a)(dimV)^{2a}.$$

By the second main theorem of invariant theory  2.14.A, if $`adimV`$,

$$F_{U(V),V}(a,a)=a!>(a/e)^a.$$

Therefore, if $`dimV^{}>e(dimV)^2`$, setting $`a=e(dimV)^2`$,

$$F_{G,V}(a,a)(dimV)^{2a}(a/e)^a<F_{U(V^{}),V^{}}(a,a)F_{G^{},V^{}}(a,a).$$

This gives a neighborhood of $`F_{G,V}`$ which contains only $`F_{G^{},V^{}}`$ with $`dimV^{}`$ bounded above. For any fixed value $`dimV^{}dimV`$, by Lemma 3.1, there exists $`a`$ such that

$$F_{G,V}(a,a)(dimV)^{2a}<F_{U(V^{}),V^{}}(a,a)F_{G^{},V^{}}(a,a).$$

or

$$F_{G^{},V^{}}(a,a)(dimV^{})^{2a}<F_{U(V),V}(a,a)F_{G,V}(a,a)$$

Thus, in some neighboorhood $`U`$ of $`F_{G,V}`$, all Sato-Tate sequences arise from representations of degree $`dimV`$. $``$$``$

We can now prove the main theorem of this paper.

Theorem 3.3: Let $`\mu `$ denote any Sato-Tate measure for which $`\mu =\mu _{G,V}`$ implies that $`G^{}`$ is semisimple. Then $`\mu `$ is an isolated point in the space of Sato-Tate measures. Equivalently, there exists $`N`$ such that if

$$F_{G,V}(a,b)=_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu $$

whenever $`a,bN`$, this equation holds for all $`a`$ and $`b`$.

Proof: Let $`\mu =\mu _{G_0,V_0}`$ and $`n=dimV_0`$. By the preceding proposition, all $`\mu _{G,V}`$ sufficiently close to $`\mu `$ satisfy $`dimV=n`$. Consider the set of all isomorphism classes of pairs $`(G,V)`$ with $`dimV=n`$. We construct a directed graph on this set as follows: for each conjugacy class of inclusion maps $`G_1G_2`$ such that the restriction of the representation $`V_2`$ to $`G_1`$ is isomorphic to $`V_1`$, there is an arrow from $`(G_1,V_1)`$ to $`(G_2,V_2)`$. If $`G_2^{}`$ is semisimple and $`G_1`$ is a maximal proper closed subgroup, we color the arrow red. If $`G_2^{}`$ is not semisimple, by hypothesis, there exists a minimal non-negative integer $`N`$ such that

$$F_{G_2,V_2}(a,b)_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu $$

for some $`a+b=N`$. Let $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=\{(a,b)N^2a+bN\}`$. Consider the set $`S`$ of subgroups of $`G_2`$ given by Proposition 1.2. If $`(G_1,V_1)`$ is isomorphic to $`(K,V_2)`$ for some $`KS`$, then we color the arrow blue. All other arrows remain uncolored.

We consider the maximal connected subgraph $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ containing the pair $`(U(V),V)`$ for an $`n`$-dimensional vector space and consisting only of red and blue arrows. The vertices of this graph are those in the original graph which can be obtained from $`(U(V),V)`$ by following a sequence of colored arrows. We claim this graph is finite. It suffices to show that there are no infinite sequences of arrows arranged head to tail and that each pair is the head of finitely many arrows. The first point is clear since any decreasing chain of nested compact groups stabilizes. The second point follows from Proposition 1.2 and Theorem 1.3. Note that $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ contains no directed cycle since every injective endomorphism of a finite-dimensional Lie group is an isomorphism.

Assume $`\mu `$ is a limit point of Sato-Tate measures. It is then a limit point of Sato-Tate measures associated to $`n`$-dimensional representations. For any $`n`$-dimensional pair $`(G,V)`$ in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ it makes sense to ask whether $`\mu `$ is a limit point of Sato-Tate measures subordinate to $`(G,V)`$, that is, of the form $`\mu _{G^{},V}`$, where $`G^{}`$ ranges over subgroups of $`G`$. For the pair $`(U(V),V)`$, the answer is affirmitive. Let $`(G,V)`$ denote a minimal pair in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ for which the answer remains affirmitive.

If $`G^{}`$ is semisimple, then any infinite sequence of Sato-Tate measures subordinate to $`(G,V)`$ contains an infinite subsequence subordinate to $`(G_1,V)`$ for some maximal subgroup $`G_1`$ of $`G`$. This contradicts the minimality of $`(G,V)`$. Thus, $`G^{}`$ is not semisimple. Choose $`N`$ so that for some $`a,bN`$,

$$F_{G,V}(a,b)_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu .$$

If $`F_{G,V}(a,b)`$ exceeds $`_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu `$, the same will be true for any restriction of $`V`$ to a subgroup of $`G`$, contrary to the assumption that $`\mu `$ is a limit of Sato-Tate measures subordinate to $`(G,V)`$. Thus,

$$F_{G,V}(a,b)<_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu ,$$

and every sequence of Sato-Tate measures subordinate to $`(G,V)`$ and converging to $`\mu `$ contains a subsequence $`\mu _{G_1,V_1}`$, $`V_1=V|_{G_1}`$, such that $`F_{G_1,V_1}(a,b)>F_{G,V}(a,b)`$. Every term in the subsequence is subordinate to a pair which is the target of a blue arrow from $`(G,V)`$; by the minimality of $`(G,V)`$, this gives a contradiction. $``$$``$

Corollary 3.4: If $`G`$ is a semisimple group and $`V`$ is an irreducible representation, then $`\mu _{G,V}`$ is isolated.

Proof: It suffices to prove that if $`\mu _{G^{},V^{}}=\mu _{G,V}`$, then $`G^{}`$ has a semisimple identity component.

As

$$dim\mathrm{End}_G^{}(V^{})=dim(V^{}V_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{})^G^{}=F_{G^{},V^{}}(1,1)=F_{G,V}(1,1)=dim\mathrm{End}_G(V)=1,$$

the representation $`V^{}`$ is irreducible. Consider the restriction of $`V^{}`$ to the identity component of $`G^{}`$. This decomposes as a direct sum of isotypic factors $`V_i^{}`$, and the component group $`G^{}/G_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ acts transitively on the set of factors. It is a theorem of Jordan that for every non-trivial transitive group action, there is a group element without fixed points. This element corresponds to a connected component of $`G^{}`$ on which the trace of $`V^{}`$ is zero. Thus, the measure $`\mu _{G^{},V^{}}`$ has an atom at $`0`$. This is impossible, since the pre-image of $`0`$ under the character of $`V`$ is a proper subvariety of the connected real-algebraic variety $`G`$, and therefore has measure zero  I 2.5.3 (i). We conclude that the restriction of $`V^{}`$ is isotypic of type $`W^{}`$. As $`V^{}`$ is a faithful representation of $`G^{}`$, the center of $`G_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ lies in the center of $`G^{}`$. If it has positive dimension, then $`F_{G^{},V^{}}(a,b)`$ is zero, except when $`a=b`$. This is impossible, since $`F_{G,V}(a,b)`$ is positive whenever $`a`$ and $`b`$ are sufficiently large and $`ab`$ annihilates the center of $`G`$. The corollary follows. $``$$``$

4. Limits of finite groups

Lemma 4.1: If $`G`$ is a compact Lie group such that $`D`$ is non-trivial, there exists a finite set $`S^{}`$ of proper closed subgroups such that every finite subgroup of $`G`$ is conjugate to a subgroup of an element of $`S^{}`$.

Proof: Let $`S`$ be the finite set of subgroups of $`G/Z^{}`$ obtained by applying Theorem 1.3 to that group. Let $`S^{}`$ denote the set of preimages with respect to $`GG/Z^{}`$ of elements of $`S`$. The image of any finite subgroup is a proper closed subgroup of $`G/Z^{}`$ and therefore a subgroup of some conjugate of an element of $`S`$; it follows that any finite subgroup of $`G`$ can be conjugated into a subgroup of an element of $`S^{}`$. $``$$``$

Theorem 4.2: If $`\mu `$ is a Sato-Tate measure which is the limit a a sequence of Sato-Tate measures of representations of finite groups, then $`\mu =\mu _{G,V}`$ for some group $`G`$ such that $`G^{}`$ is a torus.

Proof: We follow the proof of Theorem 3.3, using Lemma 4.1 instead of Theorem 1.3. That is, for every $`(G,V)`$ with $`D`$ non-trivial, we draw a red arrow to each $`(G^{},V)`$, $`G^{}S^{}`$. For every $`(G,V)`$ with $`G^{}`$ a torus, we find $`a+b=N`$ such that $`F_{G,V}(a,b)_Cz^a\overline{z}^b\mu `$ and draw a blue arrow to each $`(G^{},V)`$ obtained by applying Proposition 1.2 to $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=\{(a,b)N^2a+bN\}`$. We choose a minimal $`(G,V)`$ on the resulting finite graph for which there exists an infinite sequence of pairs $`(G_i,V_i)`$ with $`G_i`$ finite, subordinate to $`(G,V)`$ and with Sato-Tate measures converging to $`\mu `$. The contradiction results as before. $``$$``$

We remark that, although it seems likely that when $`\mu _{G,V}=\mu _{G^{},V^{}}`$ either both or neither of $`G^{}`$ and $`G_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{}`$ are tori, this has not been proven, so in principle for some non-toric $`(G,V)`$ we could still have $`\mu _{G,V}`$ the limit of Sato-Tate measures of finite groups.

REFERENCES


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# Specific Heat of the Quantum Bragg Glass

## Abstract

We study the thermodynamics of the vibrational modes of a lattice pinned by impurity disorder in the absence of topological defects (Bragg glass phase). Using a replica variational method we compute the specific heat $`C_v`$ in the quantum regime and find $`C_vT^3`$ at low temperatures in dimension three and two. The prefactor is controlled by the pinning length. The non trivial cancellation of the linear term in $`C_v`$ arises from the so-called marginality condition and has important consequences for other mean field models.

Understanding the behavior of the specific heat in disordered and glassy systems is a longstanding theoretical challenge Zeller and Pohl (1971). Its low temperature dependence has been observed to be linear in a variety of glasses, including amorphous solids, disordered crystals and spin glasses Phillips (1978); Ackerman et al. (1981); bin . A phenomenological interpretation was proposed assuming the existence of two level systems Anderson et al. (1972) leading to such a linear behavior. Despite its remarkable success for many systems the range of applicability and microscopic justification of such arguments are still open questions. Analytical calculations based on models of quantum solids with structural disorder account for higher frequency features such as the “boson peak” Dianoux et al. and ref. therein (1993); Schirmacher et al. and ref therein (2002); Grigera et al. (2001) but produce only phonon-like specific heat $`C_vT^3`$, except in the classical limit Schehr et al. (2003); Schirmacher et al. (2002). On the other hand new possibility arises from recent developments of the mean field methods Mézard and Parisi (1991); Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1996) to quantum spin glasses Georges et al. (2001); Cugliandolo et al. (2001). The glass phase is there described by a replica symmetry broken saddle point solution and evidence was found Georges et al. (2001); Cugliandolo et al. (2001) for a linear specific heat both in the $`p`$-spin and Heisenberg spin glasses. Since even in these solvable models the specific heat remains delicate to extract analytically, a later numerical study claims instead $`C_vT^2`$ Camjayi and Rozenberg (2002) and compares to experiments. It is thus still an outstanding problem to understand the behavior of the specific heat already at the level of the mean field description of quantum glasses.

In addition to structural and spin glasses, there has been considerable recent interest in pinned elastic systems where disorder originates from substrate impurities. Such systems cover a wide range of experimental situations both in the classical and quantum limit, such as vortex lattices in superconductors Blatter et al. (1994); Nattermann and Scheidl (2000); Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1998); Giamarchi and Bhattacharya (2002), electron crystals Giamarchi (2002); Chitra et al. (2001), charge and spin density waves Grüner (1994), disordered liquid crystals Saunders et al. (2000), etc.. All these systems are characterized by a competition between disorder and elasticity, which leads to pinning and glassy behavior. Although the question of positional order and correlations is now better understood, with reasonable agreement between theory and experiments, the behavior of the specific heat is still largely not understood and, in some cases, affected by non equilibration effects Odin et al. (2001); Lasjaunias et al. (1996); Blatter and Ivlev (1994); Izawa et al. (2001); Bulaevskii and Maley (1993); Caroli et al. (1964); Volovik (1993).

It is thus crucial to develop a first principle method to compute the temperature dependence of the specific heat in such disordered elastic systems. Here we address this question for a Bragg glass system allowing both for thermal and quantum fluctuations Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1996) and obtain a quite general formula to compute the specific heat. We find that the term proportional to $`T`$ in the specific heat vanishes. This leads to a $`T^3`$ behavior of $`C_v`$ in all dimensions between $`2`$ and $`4`$. The Larkin Ovchinnikov pinning length is found to control the coefficient. The result holds for a periodic object, i.e. a Bragg glass, and for interfaces with continuous degrees of freedom. We elucidate the general mechanism leading, in the mean field approach, to the cancellation of the term linear in $`T`$. We discuss how this property allows to extract such a term in related quantum spin glass models. In a companion paper Schehr et al. (2003) we investigate the classical limit and the applications to vortex lattices.

Let us consider a collection of interacting quantum objects of mass $`\mu `$ whose position variables are denoted by a $`m`$-component vector $`u_\alpha (R_i,\tau )`$. The equilibrium positions $`R_i`$ in the absence of any fluctuations form a perfect lattice of spacing $`a`$. Interactions result in an elastic tensor $`\mathrm{\Phi }_{\alpha ,\beta }(q)`$ which describes the energy associated to small displacements, the phonon degrees of freedom. Impurity disorder is modeled by a $`\tau `$ (imaginary time) independent gaussian random potential $`U(x)`$ interacting with the local density $`\rho (x)=_i\delta (xR_iu(R_i,\tau ))`$. We will describe systems in the weak disorder regime $`a/R_a1`$ where $`R_a`$ is the translational correlation length, e.g. in a Bragg glass phase where the condition $`|u_\alpha (R_i,\tau )u_\alpha (R_i+a,\tau )|a`$ holds, no dislocations being present. At equilibrium the system is described by the partition function $`Z=\text{Tr}e^{\beta H}=DuD\mathrm{\Pi }e^{S/\mathrm{}}`$ with Hamiltonian $`H=H_{\text{ph}}+H_{\text{dis}}`$:

$`H_{\text{ph}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Pi }(q)^2}{\mu }}+{\displaystyle \underset{\alpha ,\beta }{}}u_\alpha (q)\mathrm{\Phi }_{\alpha ,\beta }(q)u_\beta (q)`$
$`H_{\text{dis}}={\displaystyle d^dxU(x)\rho (x,u(x))}`$ (1)
and its associated Euclidean quantum action $`S[u,\mathrm{\Pi }]=_\tau _qi\mathrm{\Pi }_\alpha (q)_\tau u_\alpha (q)H`$. Here $`_q_{BZ}\frac{d^dq}{(2\pi )^d}`$ denotes integration on the first Brillouin zone and all integrals over the imaginary time variable $`\tau `$ go from $`0`$ to $`\beta \mathrm{}`$, $`\beta =1/T`$ being the inverse temperature.

For simplicity we illustrate the calculation on a isotropic system with $`\mathrm{\Phi }_{\alpha ,\beta }(q)=cq^2\delta _{\alpha \beta }`$ and denote disorder correlations $`\overline{U(x)U(x^{})}=\mathrm{\Delta }(xx^{})`$. The disorder average is performed using the replica trick $`\overline{Z^k}=Due^{S_{\text{eff}}/\mathrm{}}`$ and integrating over $`\mathrm{\Pi }`$, after some manipulations Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1996) one obtains the following replicated action $`S_{\text{eff}}=S_{\text{ph}}+S_{\text{dis}}`$ with:

$`S_{\text{ph}}={\displaystyle d^dx𝑑\tau \frac{c}{2}\underset{a}{}(_xu_a)^2}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{v^2}}(_\tau u_a)^2`$
$`S_{\text{dis}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle d^dx𝑑\tau 𝑑\tau ^{}\underset{ab}{}R(u_a(x,\tau )u_b(x,\tau ^{}))}`$
$`R(u)=\rho _0^2{\displaystyle \underset{K}{}}\mathrm{\Delta }_K\mathrm{cos}(Ku)`$ (2)
Here $`v=\sqrt{c/\mu }`$ is the pure phonon velocity and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_K=d^dxe^{iKx}\mathrm{\Delta }(x)`$ denote the harmonics of the disorder correlator at the reciprocal lattice vectors $`K`$, and $`\rho _0a^2`$ the average areal density.

This quantum model is then studied using the Gaussian Variational Method (GVM) on the imaginary time action Mézard and Parisi (1991); Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1995, 1996), implemented by choosing a trial action:

$`S_0={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\beta \mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \underset{a,b=1}{\overset{k}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}G_{ab}^1u_a(q,\omega _n)u_b(q,\omega _n)`$ (3)
where $`k0`$ is the number of replicas. $`S_0`$ minimizes the variational free energy $`F_{\text{var}}=F_0+\frac{1}{\beta \mathrm{}}S_{\text{eff}}S_0_{S_0}`$, where $`F_0`$ denotes the free energy calculated with the trial action $`S_0`$. The specific heat is defined as follows

$`C_v(T)=T{\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{T^2}}={\displaystyle \frac{\overline{H}}{T}}`$ (4)
where $`\mathrm{}`$ denotes a quantum and thermal average and $`\overline{\mathrm{}}`$ disorder averaged. Introducing replicas, one finds $`\overline{H}/\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{1}{k}_aH_{\text{ph}}(u_a,\mathrm{\Pi }_a)+\frac{2}{\beta \mathrm{}}S_{\text{dis}}_{S_{\text{eff}}}`$. Integrating over the $`\mathrm{\Pi }_a`$ fields we compute the resulting average using $`S_0`$ (which amounts exactly - thanks to the variational equations - to compute $`C_v`$ using the variational free energy instead of the exact one). We obtain:

$`\overline{H}/(m\mathrm{\Omega })={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\beta }}{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}{\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{c}{2}}(q^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{v^2}}\omega _n^2)\stackrel{~}{G}(q,i\omega _n)`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle _0^\beta \mathrm{}}𝑑\tau (V(\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{B}(\tau )){\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑uV(\mathrm{}B(u)))`$ (5)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is the volume of the system, $`V(B)=\rho _0^2_K\mathrm{\Delta }_K\mathrm{exp}(BK^2/2)`$ and $`\omega _n=2\pi n/\beta \mathrm{}`$ are the Matsubara frequencies. We have implicitly taken the limit $`k0`$ in (5) : we denote $`\stackrel{~}{G}(q,\omega _n)=G_{aa}(q,\omega _n)`$ and parametrize $`G_{ab}(q,\omega _n)`$ by $`G(q,u)`$, where $`0<u<1`$, which is $`\omega _n`$ independent. One has

$`\stackrel{~}{G}(q,\omega _n)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{c(q^2+\omega _n^2/v^2)+\mathrm{\Sigma }+I(\omega _n)}}`$
$`+\delta _{n,0}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{cq^2}}({\displaystyle \frac{1}{u_c}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }}{cq^2+\mathrm{\Sigma }}}+{\displaystyle _0^{u_c}}{\displaystyle \frac{dv}{v^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{[\sigma ](v)}{cq^2+[\sigma ](v)}})`$
Similarly we take $`\mathrm{}B_{ab}(\tau )=[u_a(x,\tau )u_b(x,0)]^2/m`$ with $`\stackrel{~}{B}(\tau )`$ and $`B(u)`$ which is $`\tau `$ independent. $`u_c`$ and $`[\sigma ](v)`$ are defined in Ref. Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1995, 1996). $`\overline{H}/(m\mathrm{\Omega })`$ is then calculated using the solution of the variational equations Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1995, 1996) where the best trial Gaussian action (3) is obtained by breaking the replica-symmetry (RSB). Although the RSB scheme, and the behavior of $`B(u)`$, depend in general on $`d`$ and on $`V(B)`$, $`C_v(T)`$ depends on $`T`$ only through $`u_c`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ and $`B=B(u>u_c)`$:

$`1=4V^{\prime \prime }(B){\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(cq^2+\mathrm{\Sigma })^2}}`$ (7)
$`\mathrm{\Sigma }=cR_c^2`$ (8)
where $`R_c`$ is the Larkin length, and (7) is the so called marginality condition (MC) which automatically holds here for $`d2`$. We recall here the variational equation Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1996), relevant for the computation of $`C_v(T)`$ :

$$I(\omega _n)=\frac{2}{\mathrm{}}_0^\beta \mathrm{}𝑑\tau (1\mathrm{cos}(\omega _n\tau ))(V^{}(\stackrel{~}{B}(\tau ))V^{}(B))$$
(9)
together with (7), where

$`B`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\beta }}{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}{\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{cq^2+c\omega _n^2/v^2+\mathrm{\Sigma }+I(\omega _n)}}`$ (10)
$`\stackrel{~}{B}(\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\beta }}{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}{\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{1\mathrm{cos}(\omega _n\tau )}{cq^2+c\omega _n^2/v^2+\mathrm{\Sigma }+I(\omega _n)}}`$
The solution of these coupled equations can be organized as an expansion in powers of $`\mathrm{}`$, keeping $`\beta \mathrm{}`$ fixed: $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=\mathrm{\Sigma }_0+\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Sigma }_1(\beta \mathrm{})+O(\mathrm{}^2)`$, $`I(\omega _n)=I_0(\omega _n)+\mathrm{}I_1(\omega _n,\beta \mathrm{})+O(\mathrm{}^2)`$ where one finds that the lowest order solution does not depend explicitly on $`\beta \mathrm{}`$ (of course $`I(\omega _n)`$ always depends implicitly on $`\beta \mathrm{}`$ through $`\omega _n`$). In general, $`\overline{H}/\mathrm{\Omega }`$ and $`C_v(T)`$ will be functions both of $`\mathrm{}`$ and $`\beta \mathrm{}`$ : $`\overline{H}/(m\mathrm{\Omega })(\mathrm{},\beta \mathrm{})=H_0+\mathrm{}H_1(\beta \mathrm{})+\mathrm{}^2H_2(\beta \mathrm{})\mathrm{}`$, where $`H_0`$ is independent of $`\beta \mathrm{}`$ from which it follows that

$`C_v(T)=C_v(\mathrm{},\beta \mathrm{})=C_0(\beta \mathrm{})+\mathrm{}C_1(\beta \mathrm{})+\mathrm{}`$ (11)
After some manipulations, we find for $`d2`$

$`\mathrm{}H_1={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}}{\beta \mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}{\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{cq^2+\mathrm{\Sigma }_0+I_0(\omega _n)}{cq^2+\frac{c}{v^2}\omega _n^2+\mathrm{\Sigma }_0+I_0(\omega _n)}}`$ (12)
where in that limit $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_0`$ is fixed by (7) setting $`B=0`$ and $`I_0(\omega _n)`$ satisfies the equation Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1996)

$`I_0(\omega _n)=4V^{\prime \prime }(0)(J_1(\mathrm{\Sigma }_0)J_1(\mathrm{\Sigma }_0+{\displaystyle \frac{c}{v^2}}\omega _n^2+I_0(\omega _n)))`$
$`J_n(z)={\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(cq^2+z)^n}}`$ (13)
from which we can extract the low $`\omega `$ behavior of its analytic continuation $`I_0(\omega _ni\omega +0^+)=I_0^{}(\omega )+iI_0^{\prime \prime }(\omega )`$ :

$`I_0^{}(\omega )A\omega ^2,I_0^{\prime \prime }(\omega )B\omega `$ (14)
with $`A=\frac{c}{v^2}(1\frac{J_2J_4}{2J_3^2})`$ and $`B=\sqrt{\frac{c}{v^2}\frac{J_2}{J_3}}`$, where $`J_n=J_n(\mathrm{\Sigma }_0)`$. Note that (12) correctly yields the equipartition for $`\beta \mathrm{}`$ : $`\mathrm{}H_1=T_q`$. The expression (12) is more illuminating if we use a spectral representation of the Green function to transform the discrete sum over the Matsubara frequencies in an integral :

$`\mathrm{}H_1={\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}}{\displaystyle \frac{d\omega }{\pi }}\mathrm{}\omega \rho (\omega )f_B(\omega )`$ (15)
$`\rho (\omega )={\displaystyle \frac{c}{v^2}}\omega {\displaystyle _q}\text{Im}G_c(q,\omega _ni\omega +0^+)`$ (16)
$`={\displaystyle _q}{\displaystyle \frac{c}{v^2}}\omega {\displaystyle \frac{I_0^{\prime \prime }(\omega )}{(cq^2\frac{c}{v^2}\omega ^2+\mathrm{\Sigma }_0+I_0^{}(\omega ))^2+(I_0^{\prime \prime }(\omega ))^2}}`$
where $`G_c^1(q,\omega _n)=_bG_{ab}^1(q,\omega _n)`$, $`\rho (\omega )`$ is the density of states and $`f_B(\omega )`$ the Bose factor. Eq. (15) is simply the internal energy of free excitations, whose density of states is given by $`\rho (\omega )`$, computed self-consistently within the variational method. As $`\rho (\omega )`$ does not depend, at this order, on temperature, all the temperature dependence is contained in the Bose factor. We thus obtain the specific heat

$`C_v=(\beta \mathrm{})^2{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}}{\displaystyle \frac{d\omega }{4\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{\rho (\omega )\omega ^2}{\mathrm{sinh}^2\beta \mathrm{}\omega /2}}+O(\mathrm{})`$ (17)
Due to the Bose factor, the low $`T`$ behavior is governed by the low $`\omega `$ behavior of the density of states. From (14) we see that $`\rho (\omega )\omega I_0^{\prime \prime }(\omega )\omega ^2`$, which leads to $`C_v(T)T^3`$ in all dimensions $`d2`$. Surprisingly, the linear term in the specific heat cancels at lowest order in $`\mathrm{}`$. This cancellation, and the resulting $`T^3`$ behavior occurs in fact to all orders in $`\mathrm{}`$, as is shown below. This results in the following behavior at low temperature 111The cumbersome expression for $`\overline{H}/\mathrm{\Omega }`$ will be given elsewhere Schehr et al. (2002) but we just mention that it does not reduce anymore to the “free particles” contribution (15).

$`C_v(\mathrm{},\beta \mathrm{})=(C_0+\mathrm{}C_1+\mathrm{})\left({\displaystyle \frac{T}{\mathrm{}}}\right)^3+O((T/\mathrm{})^4)`$ (18)
$`C_1`$ will be given in Schehr et al. (2002) and we discuss here the dominant contribution (17). Although the $`T^3`$ behavior is independent of the dimension $`2d4`$, the coefficient itself does depend on it. More precisely

$`C_v{\displaystyle \frac{8\pi ^3}{15}}\sqrt{\left({\displaystyle \frac{c}{v^2}}\right)^3{\displaystyle \frac{J_2(\mathrm{\Sigma }_0)^3}{J_3(\mathrm{\Sigma }_0)}}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{T}{\mathrm{}}}\right)^3+O(\mathrm{},(\beta \mathrm{})^4)`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{4\pi ^4}{15}}K_dR_c^{3d}F_{C_v}\left({\displaystyle \frac{R_c}{a}}\right)\left({\displaystyle \frac{T}{\mathrm{}v}}\right)^3+O(\mathrm{},(\beta \mathrm{})^4)`$
where $`K_d=S_d/(2\pi )^d`$, $`S_d`$ being the volume of the sphere in dimension $`d`$ and $`F_{C_v}(x)`$ a scaling function. Choosing a spherical Brillouin zone, $`F_{C_v}(x)=2/\pi (f_2(x)^3/f_3(x))^{1/2}`$, with $`f_n(x)=_0^{2\pi x}𝑑uu^{d1}/(u^2+1)^n`$. If we compare this result to the Debye law for pure phonons,

$`C_{v\text{Debye}}{\displaystyle \frac{4\pi ^4}{15}}K_d\left({\displaystyle \frac{T}{\mathrm{}v}}\right)^d`$ (20)
we see that $`d=3`$ appears as a particular dimension below which the specific heat is lowered by the disorder although it is enhanced above. In three dimensions it remains of the Debye form with a prefactor governed by the scaling function $`F_{C_v}(x)`$:

$`F_{C_v}(x)1x1`$ (21)
$`F_{C_v}(x){\displaystyle \frac{16\pi ^2}{3}}x^3x1`$ (22)
Note that since one does recover exactly the Debye law at vanishing disorder, the corrections at weak disorder are rather small. At stronger disorder $`R_ca`$ the specific heat is significantly lowered by the disorder.

In the case $`d<2`$, it was noticed in Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1996) that to obtain the correct behavior of dynamical quantities (e.g. the conductivity $`\sigma (\omega )\omega ^2`$) through linear response within the Matsubara equilibrium approach, one should enforce the MC (7), which arises naturally within the dynamical methods Cugliandolo et al. (2001). If we use this condition we obtain for $`C_v(T)`$ the expression (17) where in the numerator $`\frac{c}{v^2}\omega ^2`$ is replaced by $`\frac{2d}{2(4d)}\mathrm{\Sigma }_0+\frac{c}{v^2}\omega ^2`$, and this leads to a negative specific heat at low $`T`$. However, if we use the thermodynamic condition, i.e. compute $`u_c`$ by minimizing the variational free energy, the internal energy can again be written as (12) which guarantees the equipartition and a positive $`C_v(T)`$. Then $`I(\omega _n)\omega _n^2`$, and $`C_v(T)`$ vanishes exponentially at low $`T`$, a signature of a gapped excitation spectrum. This apparent discrepancy between thermodynamic and dynamic quantities within the GVM, which occurs only for $`d<2`$, is a hint of possible complications due to slow equilibration in these systems, as observed e.g. in Coulomb glass systems (Ovadyahu (1986); Cohen (1994)).

Extracting the $`T`$-dependence to all orders in $`\mathrm{}`$ is quite difficult, but we found a drastic simplification of the temperature dependence, at order $`T^2`$, of $`\tau `$ integrals such as in (5) and (9). Schematically, for any polynomial form $`V(x)=x^p`$, expressing $`B^p`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{B}(\tau )^p`$ as multiple Matsubara sums using (10) and performing the $`\tau `$ integral, one explicitly checks that cancellations occur term by term in the multinomial expansion of $`\stackrel{~}{B}(\tau )^p`$. Details are given in Schehr et al. (2002). This further allows to derive the cancellation of the contribution linear in temperature of $`C_v`$ to all orders, arising naturally as a consequence of the marginality condition (7), which, here for $`d2`$, holds automatically. We find that the self-energy takes the interesting form:

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }+I(\omega _n)=\mathrm{\Sigma }+M(1\delta _{n0})+\stackrel{~}{I}(\omega _n)`$ (23)
$`\mathrm{\Sigma }+M=\mathrm{\Sigma }^{(0)}+O(T^4)`$ (24)
$`\stackrel{~}{I}(\omega _n)=\stackrel{~}{I}^{(0)}(\omega _n)+T^4\stackrel{~}{I}^{(2)}(\omega _n)+\mathrm{}`$ (25)
with $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=\mathrm{\Sigma }^{(0)}+O(T^2)`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{I}(\omega _n)|\omega _n|+O(\omega _n^2)`$. The absence of $`T^2`$, $`T^3`$ dependences in Eq. (24,25) allows to show, using marginality, that no $`T^2`$ nor $`T^3`$ term survives in (5) for $`d2`$. For $`d<2`$ the same conclusion as above persists (simply replacing $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_0`$ by $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{(0)}`$).

The drastic simplification in $`T`$ dependence found here is also useful to compute analytically the putative linear term in $`C_v(T)`$ in the quantum spin glasses. Both models in Georges et al. (2001) and Cugliandolo et al. (2001) are solved via a one step RSB solution, hence analogous to our $`d<2`$ case, and thus are gapless provided the marginality condition is enforced (see discussion above). Ref. Cugliandolo et al. (2001) studies the specific heat of the quantum $`p`$-spin model and obtain numerical evidence for a linear contribution. We find that this term vanishes. In Ref. Georges et al. (2001) the SU(N) fully connected Heisenberg spin glass (of spin $`S`$) was solved for infinite $`N`$. There too it was found that the dominant term (analogous to $`C_0`$ here) in a $`1/S`$ semiclassical expansion also behaves as $`T^3`$. Whether it holds to higher order in $`1/S`$ has been discussed in Parcollet (2002) and Camjayi and Rozenberg (2002) and is currently under investigation Schehr et al. (2002). In all cases a structure similar to (23,24,25) also holds.

One can discuss the validity of the mean field method. The GVM can also be used to describe non periodic systems (e.g. directed polymer) in terms of a power law $`V(B)`$ Mézard and Parisi (1991); Giamarchi and Le Doussal (1995) and then becomes exact for $`m\mathrm{}`$ with $`R(u)=mV(u^2/m)`$. We thus expect that the $`T^3`$ behavior is exact in this limit in the full RSB case. For the periodic problem it is always an approximation which describes the vibrational phonon-like excitations of the pinned system and may not treat accurately excitations such as solitons. Whether these solitons or other type of excitations such as dislocations for a lattice could reestablish a linear contribution to the specific heat from two level systems type behavior remains to be investigated.

This weak T-dependence of the specific heat in the quantum regime is relevant to the so-called vortons modes of the vortex lattice of superconductors. Other contributions such as core electrons Caroli et al. (1964), or their interaction with vortons (responsible for the dissipation in the quantum dynamics of the vortons) yield linear specific heat Blatter and Ivlev (1994) which may dominate over the present one in the quantum regime. Whether this also holds in the classical regime for the vortons is examined in Schehr et al. (2003).

In conclusion we have obtained from first principles the specific heat of an elastic quantum pinned system, such as the Bragg glass phase of a lattice in presence of impurities. We found that $`C_vT^3`$ in $`d=2,3`$ due to a non trivial mechanism of cancellation of the linear term. This simplification which occurs from the marginality condition will be useful for a general understanding of the specific heat behavior within the mean field theory. The question remains concerning the contribution of other types of excitations such as plastic deformations. Further analytical and numerical investigations would be desirable to a better understanding of the behavior of the specific heat in glasses.

###### Acknowledgements.

We acknowledge G. Blatter, L. F. Cugliandolo, S. Florens, A. Georges, L. Ioffe, T. Klein, P. Monceau, O. Parcollet and C. Varma for helpful discussions.