Quantum critical phenomena: The relationship between spin systems and strongly coupled gauge theories

Abstract In this set of lectures, I shall review some recent work on quantum critical phenomena which involve the changes in phase of the ground state of a quantum antiferromagnetic system when external parameters are varied through some critical values. I will also draw analogies between antiferromagnetic phase transitions and chiral phase transitions in lower (particularly 2 + l)-dimensional gauge theories and also some 2+1-dimensional four-fermi theories where chiral symmetry breaking patterns depend on the coupling constants and also the matter and gauge field content of the theory. I will begin by reviewing some arguments that, in the infrared limit, the dynamics of Goldstone bosons in the confining and chiral symmetry breaking phase of 2 + 1 dimensional QCD is identical to the effective spin wave dynamics in 2 dimensional generalized quantum antiferromagnets. I also discuss the possibility that certain quantum critical behaviors in generalized antiferromagnets can be analyzed using the principle of ...