# Fermi liquid theory of electronic topological transitions and screening anomalies in metals

## Abstract

General expressions for the contributions of the Van Hove singularity (VHS) in the electron density of states to the thermodynamic potential $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ are obtained in the framework of a microscopic Fermi liquid theory. The renormalization of the singularities in $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ connected with the Lifshitz electronic topological transition (ETT) is found. Screening anomalies due to virtual transitions between VHS and the Fermi level are considered. It is shown that, in contrast with the one-particle picture of ETT, the singularity in $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ turns out to be two-sided for interacting electrons.

Electronic topological transitions (ETT)  can take place in metals and alloys at the motion of the Van Hove singularities (VHS) of the electron density of states across the Fermi level at the variation of external parameters. Their investigation is now a well-developed branch of solid state physics (see, e.g., the reviews ). Recently the interest in the problem has been revived by the observations of anomalies in the pressure dependence of lattice properties of Cd and Zn, which were explained in terms of ETT . To describe qualitatively the behavior of thermodynamic and transport properties of metals near ETT, correlation effects are to be taken into account since they are by no means small at typical electron densities. Up to now the influence of the interelectron interactions on ETT has been considered only for simplified models. An exact expression for the many-electron renormalization of the most singular contribution to the thermodynamic potential $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ near ETT has been obtained in the model of nearly free electrons . In comparison with the one-particle expression for singular contribution to the thermodynamic potential $`\mathrm{\Omega },`$ correlation effects result in appearance of numerical factors which are expressed in terms of the effective mass of the quasiparticles and three-leg vertex $`\gamma `$ for the wave vectors connecting VHS points in the Brillouin zone. Dzyaloshinskii  demonstrated that in the two-dimensional (2D) case, in contrast with 3D one, $`\gamma `$ diverges and, moreover, the ground state of many-electron system can be of a non-Fermi-liquid type provided that VHS are close enough to the Fermi level (see also the recent papers ). In the 3D case the Fermi-liquid description is valid near ETT. However, the Fermi-liquid renormalization factors contain singularities themselves, and some anomalous contributions to the physical properties appear due to virtual transitions between the VHS point in the electron energy spectrum and the Fermi level (screening anomalies ). It was found in  that these anomalies make the singularity in $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ at ETT to be two-sided, i.e., of order of $`\left(\pm z\right)^{5/2}\theta \left(\pm z\right)const\left(z\right)^{7/2}\theta \left(z\right)`$ where $`z=E_FE_c`$; $`E_F`$ and $`E_c`$ are the Fermi energy and the energy of VHS, $`\theta \left(x>0\right)=1,`$ $`\theta \left(x<0\right)=0.`$ However, these considerations were based on the calculations of particular diagrams in perturbation theory. In this work we present a general consideration of the singularities in the thermodynamic properties of metals near ETT in the framework of the rigorous microscopic Fermi liquid theory . We restrict ourselves only to the consideration of the 3D case and do not discuss the much more complicated 2D case where the applicability of the Fermi liquid theory is doubtful.

Let $`\lambda =n𝐤\sigma `$ be the set of electron quantum numbers in a metal: band index, quasimomentum and spin projection, respectively. For the normal Fermi liquid we have the following general expression for the Green function near the chemical potential level $`\mu `$ 

$`G_\lambda \left(E\right)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{E\epsilon _\lambda ^0+\mu \mathrm{\Sigma }_\lambda (E,\mu )}}`$ (1)   
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{Z_\lambda }{E+\mu \epsilon _\lambda }}+G_\lambda ^{reg}\left(E\right),`$ (2)   
where $`\epsilon _\lambda ^0`$ is the bare electron energy, $`\epsilon _\lambda `$ is the renormalized one that satisfies the equation

$$\epsilon _\lambda =\epsilon _\lambda ^0+\mathrm{\Sigma }_\lambda (\epsilon _\lambda \mu ,\mu ),$$
(3)   
$`\mathrm{\Sigma }_\lambda (E,\mu )`$ is the self-energy, $`Im\mathrm{\Sigma }_\lambda \left(E=0,\mu \right)=0,`$ $`Z_\lambda `$ is the residue of the Green function in the pole and $`G_\lambda ^{reg}\left(E\right)`$ is the regular (incoherent or nonquasiparticle) part of the Green function. To find the singular contribution to the thermodynamic potential connected with the closeness of VHS in the renormalized spectrum to the Fermi energy $`E_F=\mu `$ it is suitable to start from the Luttinger theorem 

$$N=\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }}{\mu }=\underset{\lambda }{}\theta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right)$$
(4)   
where $`N`$ is the number of particles,

$`{\displaystyle \underset{\lambda }{}}={\displaystyle \underset{n\sigma }{}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_0}{\left(2\pi \right)^3}}{\displaystyle \underset{BZ}{}}\mathrm{𝐝𝐤}`$

BZ is the Brillouin zone, $`V_0`$ is the unit cell volume. Differentiating (3) with respect to $`\mu `$ with taking into account Eq. (1) one has

$`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{\mu }}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{^2\mathrm{\Omega }}{\mu ^2}}={\displaystyle \underset{\lambda }{}}\delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right){\displaystyle \frac{\left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right)}{\mu }}`$ (5)   
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\lambda }{}}\delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right){\displaystyle \frac{G_\lambda ^1\left(E=0,\mu \right)}{\mu }}Z_\lambda `$ (6)   
Further, we use the set of well-known identities . First of all, the quantity

$$\frac{G_\lambda ^1\left(E=0,\mu \right)}{\mu }=\gamma _{\lambda \lambda }$$
(7)   
is the three-leg vertex describing the response to the uniform static field. It is connected with the “dynamic” response $`\gamma _{\lambda \lambda }^\omega `$ by the equation

$$\gamma _{\lambda \lambda }=\gamma _{\lambda \lambda }^\omega \underset{\nu }{}\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\lambda \nu }^\omega Z_\nu ^2\delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\nu \right)\gamma _{\nu \nu }$$
(8)   
where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\lambda \nu }^\omega `$ is the “dynamic” limit of the four-leg vertex which is connected with the Landau Fermi-liquid interaction function

$$f_{\lambda \nu }=\frac{\delta ^2E_{tot}}{\delta n_\lambda \delta n_\nu }$$
(9)   
($`E_{tot\text{ }}`$ is the total energy, $`n_\lambda `$ is the quasiparticle distribution function) by the relation

$$f_{\lambda \nu }=Z_\lambda Z_\nu \mathrm{\Gamma }_{\lambda \nu }^\omega $$
(10)   
At the same time, the Ward identity gives

$$\gamma _{\lambda \lambda }^\omega =\frac{1}{Z_\lambda }$$
(11)   
On substituting Eqs. (5-9) into (4) we derive the following exact expression

$$\frac{^2\mathrm{\Omega }}{\mu ^2}=\underset{\lambda }{}\delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right)\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_\lambda $$
(12)   
where $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_\lambda =\gamma _{\lambda \lambda }Z_\lambda `$ satisfies the equation

$$\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_\lambda =1\underset{\nu }{}f_{\lambda \nu }\delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\nu \right)\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_\nu $$
(13)   
It follows from Eq. (10) that the singular contribution to $``$ $`^2\mathrm{\Omega }/\mu ^2`$ is proportional to the singularity in the density of states at the Fermi level,

$$\rho \left(\mu \right)=\underset{\lambda }{}\delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right)$$
(14)   
The coefficient of the proportionality may be found from the solution of the integral equation (11) for a given quasiparticle spectrum and interaction function.

This form of the result is probably most convenient to separate the singularity of order of $`\left(\pm z\right)^{5/2}\theta \left(\pm z\right)`$. To investigate the screening anomalies it is better to use another expression which may be obtained directly from Eqs. (1), (4)

$$\frac{^2\mathrm{\Omega }}{\mu ^2}=\underset{\lambda }{}Z_\lambda \delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right)\left[1\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }_\lambda \left(E=0,\mu \right)}{\mu }\right]$$
(15)   
One can see from the perturbation expansion  that the corresponding contributions to the $`\lambda `$-dependence of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is weaker than to its energy dependence and can be neglected when separating the main singularity. Thus the multiplier $`Z_\lambda \delta \left(\mu \epsilon _\lambda \right)`$ in Eq. (13) turns out to be nonsingular, and we have to consider only the term with $`\mathrm{\Sigma }/\mu `$.

The second-order expression for the self-energy has the form (see e.g. )

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }_\lambda ^{(2)}\left(E=0,\mu \right)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\left\{\lambda _i\right\}}{}}U_{\lambda \lambda _1\lambda _3\lambda _2}^dU_{\lambda _1\lambda _2\lambda \lambda _3}`$ (17)   
$`\times {\displaystyle \frac{\left[n_{\lambda _3}\left(1n_{\lambda _1}n_{\lambda _2}\right)+n_{\lambda _1}n_{\lambda _2}\right]}{\mu +\epsilon _{\lambda _3}\epsilon _{\lambda _1}\epsilon _{\lambda _2}}}`$   
where

$`U_{\lambda _1\lambda _2\lambda _4\lambda _3}`$ $`=`$ $`\lambda _1\lambda _2\left|U\right|\lambda _4\lambda _3`$ (18)   
$`U_{\lambda \lambda _1\lambda _3\lambda _2}^d`$ $`=`$ $`2U_{\lambda \lambda _3\lambda _1\lambda _2}U_{\lambda \lambda _3\lambda _2\lambda _1},`$ (19)   
$`U`$ is the interelectron interaction. Here $`\lambda _i`$ are the orbital quantum numbers, and we restrict ourselves to the nonmagnetic case. In particular, in one-band Hubbard model one has

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_𝐤^{(2)}\left(E=0,\mu \right)=U^2\underset{𝐤_1𝐤_2}{}\frac{\left[n_{_{𝐤_1𝐤_2}}\left(1n_{𝐤_1}n_{𝐤_2}\right)+n_{𝐤_1}n_{𝐤_2}\right]}{\mu +\epsilon _{𝐤_1𝐤_2}\epsilon _{𝐤_1}\epsilon _{𝐤_2}}$$
(20)   
Averaging in $`𝐤`$ over the Brillouin zone we find after simple transformations

$$\underset{𝐤}{}\frac{^2\mathrm{\Sigma }_𝐤^{(2)}\left(E=0,\mu \right)}{\mu ^2}=\frac{3U^2\rho ^2}{8}R\left(\mu \right)$$
(21)   
where

$`R(z)=P{\displaystyle \frac{d\epsilon \rho \left(\epsilon \right)}{z\epsilon }}`$

is the real part of the on-site lattice Green function. Thus one obtains for the contribution $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{sa}`$ of screening anomalies to $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$-potential near ETT $`^3\mathrm{\Omega }_{sa}/\mu ^3U^2R\left(\mu \right).`$ On taking into account that the singularity of order of $`\left(\pm z\right)^{1/2}\theta \left(\pm z\right)`$ in $`\rho \left(\mu \right)`$ corresponds to the singularity of order of $`\left(z\right)^{1/2}\theta \left(z\right)`$ in $`R\left(\mu \right),`$ we conclude from Eqs. (13), (17) that the singularity in $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\mu \right)`$ is two-sided, $`\delta \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\mu \right)\left(\pm z\right)^{5/2}\theta \left(\pm z\right)const\left(z\right)^{7/2}\theta \left(z\right),`$ as it was mentioned above.

General equations (10), (11) seem to be formally applicable also for low-dimensional systems with a non-Fermi-liquid ground state. However, in these cases the Landau function $`f_{\lambda \nu }`$ is divergent for the forward-scattering processes . We will not consider here this complicated case.

To conclude, it is worthwhile to note one more consequence of these equations. There are two types of quasiparticles in interacting Fermi systems: dynamical quasiparticles with the spectrum determined by the poles of Green functions and statistical quasiparticles, i.e. quasiparticles in the sense of Landau theory . Generally speaking, their spectra do not coincide (the difference occurs in the third order of perturbation expansion for paramagnetic state  and in the second order for ferromagnetic state ). However, we prove that the points of ETT found from both spectra are the same since $`\rho \left(\mu \right)`$is determined by the dynamical quasiparticles whereas $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\mu \right)`$by statistical ones. Together with the Luttinger theorem this means that both the volume and topology (but not necessarily the exact shape) of the Fermi surface are the same for these two types of quasiparticles.