Exact phase boundaries and topological phase transitions of the XY Z spin chain

Within the block spin renormalization group, we give a very simple derivation of the exact phase boundaries of the XYZ spin chain. First, we identify the Ising order along (x) over cap or (y) over cap as attractive renormalization group fixed points of the Kitaev chain. Then, in a global phase space composed of the anisotropy lambda of the XY interaction and the coupling Delta of the Delta sigma(z)sigma(z) interaction, we find that the above fixed points remain attractive in the two-dimesional parameter space. We therefore classify the gapped phases of the XYZ spin chain as: (1) either attracted to the Ising limit of the Kitaev-chain, which in turn is characterized by winding number +/- 1, depending on whether the Ising order parameter is along (x) over cap or (y) over cap directions; or (2) attracted to the charge density wave (CDW) phases of the underlying Jordan-Wigner fermions, which is characterized by zero winding number. We therefore establish that the exact phase boundaries of the XYZ model in Baxter's solution indeed correspond to topological phase transitions. The topological nature of the phase transitions of the XYZ model justifies why our analytical solution of the three-site problem that is at the core of the present renormalization group treatment is able to produce the exact phase boundaries of Baxter's solution. We argue that the distribution of the winding numbers between the three Ising phases is a matter of choice of the coordinate system, and therefore the CDW-Ising phase is entitled to host appropriate form of zero modes. We further observe that in the Kitaev-chain the renormalization group flow can be cast into a geometric progression of a properly identified parameter. We show that this new parameter is actually the size of the (Majorana) zero modes.