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Zipper Entanglement Renormalization for Free Fermions

Entanglement renormalization refers to a sequence of real-space coarse-graining transformations in which short-range entanglement on successively longer length scales are distilled out. In this work, we introduce a state-based approach, "zipper entanglement renormalization" (ZER), for free-fermion systems. The name derives from a unitary we construct at every renormalization step, dubbed the zipper, which unzips the state into an approximate tensor product between a short-range entangled state and a renormalized one carrying the longer-range entanglement. By successively performing ZER on the renormalized states, we obtain a unitary transformation of the input state into a state that is approximately factorized over the emergent renormalization spacetime. As a demonstration, we apply ZER to one-dimensional models and show that it efficiently disentangles the ground states of the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model, a scale-invariant critical state, as well as a more general gapless state with two sets of Fermi points.