The Bogoliubov free energy functional. I: Existence of minimizers and phase diagram (Q1661664)

The paper is the first part of a more extended study of the so-called Bogoliubov free-energy functional for interacting Bose gases, in which the existence of variational minimizers is investigated together with an issue on the (unique) phase transition in the considered physical system. The sequel (second part) addresses the dilute limit of the theory [the authors, Commun. Math. Phys. 360, No. 1, 347--403 (2018; Zbl 1395.82077)]. The authors depart from an original Bogoliubov's approximate Hamiltonian (that is quadratic in creation and annihilation operators) and retain the full Hamiltonian with the direct and exchange terms, while admitting a broad class of Gaussian variational (trial) states. The Bogoliubov variational theory can be seen as the bosonic counterpart of the Hartree-Fock theory for Fermi gases. That is in fact encoded in the name of the HBF (Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov) theory which includes, e.g., the BCS trial states. Motivated by the HFB theory, the bosonic counterpart of the BCS functional is introduced, following [\textit{G. Bräunlich} et al., Rev. Math. Phys. 26, No. 7, Article ID 1450012, 37 p. (2014; Zbl 1327.82099)]. Although there exist earlier analyses of this functional by means of variational methods, the authors address the problem in its full generality. The main result of the paper is the existence proof for minimizers (actually grand canonical ones for \(T=0\) and next for \(T>0\)), which are found to be the pure quasi-free states. The latter result is not at all obvious. The existence and structure of the phase transition in the model is investigated: the Bose-Einstein condensation and the presence of pairing are found to be equivalent within the model. The grand canonical phase diagram issue and that of the canonical critical temperature are outlined in the dilute gas limit. These issues are discussed in more detail in the companion paper.