First order quantum phase transitions in the XX spin chain

Quantum phase transitional behavior of a finite periodic XX spin-1/2 chain with nearest neighbor interaction in a uniform transverse field is studied based on the simple exact solutions. It is found that there are [N/2] level-crossing points in the ground state, where N is the periodic number of the system and [x] stands for the integer part of x, when the interaction strength and magnitude of the magnetic field satisfy certain conditions. The quantum phase transitions are of the first order due to the level-crossing. The ground state in the thermodynamic limit will be divided into three distinguishable quantum phases.