Dissipative Luttinger liquids

Abstract: We investigate a one dimensional quantum fluid coupled to a dissipative bath. The quantum fluid is captured by the canonical Luttinger liquid; the bath is given by the model of Caldeira and Leggett, i.e. a tower of oscillators coupled linearly to the fluid density, $\rho$. The bath can be integrated out exactly, producing an effective interaction for the fluid that is nonlocal in time; we argue that the form corresponding to Ohmic dissipation is generic. Compared to previous works, we compute correlation functions for this minimal model without approximation, including at finite temperature $T>0$. From these and a Kubo calculation, we conclude that arbitrary dissipation destroys the perfect conductivity of the Luttinger liquid via Zeno localization, even in the absence of a spatial potential; from RG analysis of harmonic terms, we also find that the open Luttinger liquid is significantly more prone to localization by such potentials, in contrast to the usual intuition that baths make systems less localized.