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    Detecting the Emergent Continuous Symmetry of Criticality via a Subsystem’s Entanglement Spectrum

    Bin-Bin Mao1,2,*, Zhe Wang1,3,*, Bin-Bin Chen4,†, and Zheng Yan1,3,‡

    • 1Department of Physics, School of Science and Research Center for Industries of the Future, Westlake University, Hangzhou 310030, China
    • 2School of Foundational Education, University of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, Qingdao 266000, China
    • 3Institute of Natural Sciences, Westlake Institute for Advanced Study, Hangzhou 310024, China
    • 4Peng Huanwu Collaborative Center for Research and Education, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China

    • *These authors contributed equally to this work.
    • †Contact author: bchen@buaa.edu.cn
    • ‡Contact author: zhengyan@westlake.edu.cn

    Phys. Rev. Lett. 136, 046401 – Published 27 January, 2026

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/7j21-l3pg

    Abstract

    The (emergent) symmetry of a critical point constitutes fundamental pieces of information for determining the universality class and effective field theory. However, the underlying symmetry thus far can be conjectured only indirectly from the dimension of the order parameters in symmetry-breaking phases, and its correctness requires further verification to avoid overlooking hidden order parameters, which by itself is also a difficult task. In this Letter, we introduce an unbiased numerical approach to identify the underlying (emergent) symmetry of a critical point in quantum many-body systems without prior knowledge about the corresponding low-energy effective field theory. By numerically calculating the reduced density matrix in a very small subsystem of the total system, the Anderson tower of states in the entanglement spectrum can be obtained, clearly reflecting the underlying (emergent) symmetry of criticality. This is attributed to the fact that the entanglement spectrum can reveal the broken symmetry of the ground state of entanglement Hamiltonian after cooling from the critical point along an extra entanglement-temperature axis.

    Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

    Corrections

    4 March, 2026

    Correction: A typographical error in a value given in the fifth row of the third column of Table I has been fixed.

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