Physics beyond quasi-particles: Spectrum and completeness of the 3 state superintegrable chiral Potts model

Abstract

We find the rules which count the energy levels of the 3 state superintegrable chiral Potts model and demonstrate that these rules are complete. We then derive the complete spectrum of excitations in the thermodynamic limit in the massive phase and demonstrate the existence of excitations which do not have a quasi-particle form. The physics of these excitations is compared with the BCS superconductivity spectrum and the counting rules are compared with the closely related $S=1$ XXZ spin chain.