No Arabic abstract
We study the spectral statistics of spatially-extended many-body quantum systems with on-site Abelian symmetries or local constraints, focusing primarily on those with conserved dipole and higher moments. In the limit of large local Hilbert space dimension, we find that the spectral form factor $K(t)$ of Floquet random circuits can be mapped exactly to a classical Markov circuit, and, at late times, is related to the partition function of a frustration-free Rokhsar-Kivelson (RK) type Hamiltonian. Through this mapping, we show that the inverse of the spectral gap of the RK-Hamiltonian lower bounds the Thouless time $t_{mathrm{Th}}$ of the underlying circuit. For systems with conserved higher moments, we derive a field theory for the corresponding RK-Hamiltonian by proposing a generalized height field representation for the Hilbert space of the effective spin chain. Using the field theory formulation, we obtain the dispersion of the low-lying excitations of the RK-Hamiltonian in the continuum limit, which allows us to extract $t_{mathrm{Th}}$. In particular, we analytically argue that in a system of length $L$ that conserves the $m^{th}$ multipole moment, $t_{mathrm{Th}}$ scales subdiffusively as $L^{2(m+1)}$. We also show that our formalism directly generalizes to higher dimensional circuits, and that in systems that conserve any component of the $m^{th}$ multipole moment, $t_{mathrm{Th}}$ has the same scaling with the linear size of the system. Our work therefore provides a general approach for studying spectral statistics in constrained many-body chaotic systems.
We consider the spectral statistics of the Floquet operator for disordered, periodically driven spin chains in their quantum chaotic and many-body localized phases (MBL). The spectral statistics are characterized by the traces of powers $t$ of the Floquet operator, and our approach hinges on the fact that, for integer $t$ in systems with local interactions, these traces can be re-expressed in terms of products of dual transfer matrices, each representing a spatial slice of the system. We focus on properties of the dual transfer matrix products as represented by a spectrum of Lyapunov exponents, which we call textit{spectral Lyapunov exponents}. In particular, we examine the features of this spectrum that distinguish chaotic and MBL phases. The transfer matrices can be block-diagonalized using time-translation symmetry, and so the spectral Lyapunov exponents are classified according to a momentum in the time direction. For large $t$ we argue that the leading Lyapunov exponents in each momentum sector tend to zero in the chaotic phase, while they remain finite in the MBL phase. These conclusions are based on results from three complementary types of calculation. We find exact results for the chaotic phase by considering a Floquet random quantum circuit with on-site Hilbert space dimension $q$ in the large-$q$ limit. In the MBL phase, we show that the spectral Lyapunov exponents remain finite by systematically analyzing models of non-interacting systems, weakly coupled systems, and local integrals of motion. Numerically, we compute the Lyapunov exponents for a Floquet random quantum circuit and for the kicked Ising model in the two phases. As an additional result, we calculate exactly the higher point spectral form factors (hpSFF) in the large-$q$ limit, and show that the generalized Thouless time scales logarithmically in system size for all hpSFF in the large-$q$ chaotic phase.
Contrary to the conventional wisdom in Hermitian systems, a continuous quantum phase transition between gapped phases is shown to occur without closing the energy gap $Delta$ in non-Hermitian quantum many-body systems. Here, the relevant length scale $xi simeq v_{rm LR}/Delta$ diverges because of the breakdown of the Lieb-Robinson bound on the velocity (i.e., unboundedness of $v_{rm LR}$) rather than vanishing of the energy gap $Delta$. The susceptibility to a change in the system parameter exhibits a singularity due to nonorthogonality of eigenstates. As an illustrative example, we present an exactly solvable model by generalizing Kitaevs toric-code model to a non-Hermitian regime.
Quantum scars are non-thermal eigenstates characterized by low entanglement entropy, initially detected in systems subject to nearest-neighbor Rydberg blockade, the so called PXP model. While most of these special eigenstates elude an analytical description and seem to hybridize with nearby thermal eigenstates for large systems, some of them can be written as matrix product states (MPS) with size-independent bond dimension. We study the response of these exact quantum scars to perturbations by analysing the scaling of the fidelity susceptibility with system size. We find that some of them are anomalously stable at first order in perturbation theory, in sharp contrast to the eigenstate thermalization hypothesis. However, this stability seems to breakdown when all orders are taken into account. We further investigate models with larger blockade radius and find a novel set of exact quantum scars, that we write down analytically and compare with the PXP exact eigenstates. We show that they exhibit the same robustness against perturbations at first order.
We investigate spectral statistics in spatially extended, chaotic many-body quantum systems with a conserved charge. We compute the spectral form factor $K(t)$ analytically for a minimal Floquet circuit model that has a $U(1)$ symmetry encoded via auxiliary spin-$1/2$ degrees of freedom. Averaging over an ensemble of realizations, we relate $K(t)$ to a partition function for the spins, given by a Trotterization of the spin-$1/2$ Heisenberg ferromagnet. Using Bethe Ansatz techniques, we extract the Thouless time $t^{vphantom{*}}_{rm Th}$ demarcating the extent of random matrix behavior, and find scaling behavior governed by diffusion for $K(t)$ at $tlesssim t^{vphantom{*}}_{rm Th}$. We also report numerical results for $K(t)$ in a generic Floquet spin model, which are consistent with these analytic predictions.
We investigate the spectral and transport properties of many-body quantum systems with conserved charges and kinetic constraints. Using random unitary circuits, we compute ensemble-averaged spectral form factors and linear-response correlation functions, and find that their characteristic time scales are given by the inverse gap of an effective Hamiltonian$-$or equivalently, a transfer matrix describing a classical Markov process. Our approach allows us to connect directly the Thouless time, $t_{text{Th}}$, determined by the spectral form factor, to transport properties and linear response correlators. Using tensor network methods, we determine the dynamical exponent, $z$, for a number of constrained, conserving models. We find universality classes with diffusive, subdiffusive, quasilocalized, and localized dynamics, depending on the severity of the constraints. In particular, we show that quantum systems with Fredkin constraints exhibit anomalous transport with dynamical exponent $z simeq 8/3$.