We propose a multi-boundary generalization of thermofield double states (TFD) of a two-dimensional conformal field theory (CFT) and show, through a conformal map to the complex plane, that they are closely related to multi-point correlation functions. We then also describe how to approximately realize these multi-boundary TFD states numerically on the lattice, starting from a critical quantum spin chain Hamiltonian. In addition, finite size corrections on the lattice are seen to be significantly reduced by the use of \textit{smoothers} -- numerically optimized unitary transformations that locally re-arrange the quantum spin degrees of freedom. One merit of the spin chain realization is that it allows us to probe the properties of the proposed multi-boundary TFD states through numerical experiments, including the characterization of their entanglement structure. As an illustration, we explicitly construct generalized TFD states with three and four boundaries for the Ising CFT and compute entanglement quantities using novel free fermion techniques. We find ranges of parameters where their multipartite entanglement is significant or negligible.
Given two copies of any quantum mechanical system, one may want to prepare them in the thermofield double state for the purpose of studying thermal physics or black holes. However, the thermofield double is a unique entangled pure state and may be difficult to prepare. We propose a local interacting Hamiltonian for the combined system whose ground state is approximately the thermofield double. The energy gap for this Hamiltonian is of order the temperature. Our construction works for any quantum system satisfying the Eigenvalue Thermalization Hypothesis.
We present a variational approach for quantum simulators to realize finite temperature Gibbs states by preparing thermofield double (TFD) states. Our protocol is motivated by the quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) and involves alternating time evolution between the Hamiltonian of interest and interactions which entangle the system and its auxiliary counterpart. As a simple example, we demonstrate that thermal states of the 1d classical Ising model at any temperature can be prepared with perfect fidelity using L/2 iterations, where L is system size. We also show that a free fermi…
Finite-temperature phases of many-body quantum systems are fundamental to phenomena ranging from condensed-matter physics to cosmology, yet they are generally difficult to simulate. Using an ion trap quantum computer and protocols motivated by the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA), we generate nontrivial thermal quantum states of the transverse-field Ising model (TFIM) by preparing thermofield double states at a variety of temperatures. We also prepare the critical state of the TFIM at zero temperature using quantum-classical hybrid optimization. The entanglement structure of t…
Scrambling in interacting quantum systems out of equilibrium is particularly effective in the chaotic regime. Under time evolution, initially localized information is said to be scrambled as it spreads throughout the entire system. This spreading can be analyzed with the spectral form factor, which is defined in terms of the analytic continuation of the partition function. The latter is equivalent to the survival probability of a thermofield double state under unitary dynamics. Using random matrices from the Gaussian unitary ensemble (GUE) as Hamiltonians for the time evolution, we obtain exac…
The most important feature of two-dimensional quantum Rokhsar-Kivelson (RK) type models is that their ground state wavefunction norms can be mapped into the partition functions of two-dimensional statistical models so that the quantum phase transitions become the thermal phase transitions of the corresponding statistical models. For a generic quantum critical point, we generalize the framework of RK wavefunctions by introducing the concept of the thermofield double (TFD) state, which is a purification of the equilibrium density operator. Moreover, by expressing the TFD state in terms of the pr…
Finite-temperature Green's function cluster expansion from thermofield doubles: Breakdown of the polaron picture
Computational Science Initiative, Brookhaven National Laboratory（布鲁克海文国家实验室计算科学倡议）；Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of British Columbia（不列颠哥伦比亚大学物理与天文学系）；Stewart Blusson Quantum Matter Institute, University of British Columbia（不列颠哥伦比亚大学斯图尔特·布拉森量子物质研究所）；Center for Computational Quantum Physics, Flatiron Institute（平顿研究所计算量子物理中心）；Department of Physics, Columbia University（哥伦比亚大学物理系）；Department of Chemistry, Columbia University（哥伦比亚大学化学系）；Department of Applied Physics, Yale University（耶鲁大学应用物理系）；Energy Sciences Institute, Yale University（耶鲁大学能源科学研究所）
In arXiv:1407.8203, we introduced the idea of s-sourcery, a general formalism for building many-body quantum ground states using renormalization-group-inspired quantum circuits. Here we define a generalized notion of s-sourcery that applies to mixed states, and study its properties and applicability. We prove a number of theorems establishing the prevalence of mixed s-source fixed points. For our examples we focus on thermal states of local Hamiltonians. Thermal double states (also called thermofield double states) and the machinery of approximate conditional independence are used heavily in t…
In one dimension the area law for the entanglement entropy is violated maximally by the ground state of a strong inhomogeneous spin chain, the so called concentric singlet phase (CSP), that looks like a rainbow connecting the two halves of the chain. In this paper we show that, in the weak inhomogeneity limit, the rainbow state is a thermofield double of a conformal field theory with a temperature proportional to the inhomogeneity parameter. This result suggests some relation of the CSP with black holes. Finally, we propose an extension of the model to higher dimensions.
In this paper, we study the fine structure of entanglement in holographic two-dimensional boundary conformal field theories (BCFT) in terms of the spatially resolved quasilocal extension of entanglement entropy - entanglement contour. We find that the boundary induces discontinuities in the contour revealing hidden localization-delocalization patterns of entanglement degrees of freedom. Moreover, we observe the formation of ``islands'' where the entanglement contour vanishes identically implying that these regions do not contribute to the entanglement at all. We argue that these phenomena are …
We study the spread of Rényi entropy between two halves of a Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) chain of Majorana fermions, prepared in a thermofield double (TFD) state. The SYK chain model is a model of chaotic many-body systems, which describes a one-dimensional lattice of Majorana fermions, with spatially local random quartic interaction. We find that for integer Rényi index $n>1$, the Rényi entanglement entropy saturates at a parametrically smaller value than expected. This implies that the TFD state of the SYK chain does not rapidly thermalize, despite being maximally chaotic: instead, it rapidly ap…
In this work we study the time evolutions of (Renyi) entanglement entropy of locally excited states in two dimensional conformal field theories (CFTs) at finite temperature. We consider excited states created by acting with local operators on thermal states and give both field theoretic and holographic calculations. In free field CFTs, we find that the growth of Renyi entanglement entropy at finite temperature is reduced compared to the zero temperature result by a small quantity proportional to the width of the localized excitations. On the other hand, in finite temperature CFTs with classica…
Adding a second Kondo channel to heavy fermion materials reveals new exotic symmetry breaking phases associated with the development of Kondo coherence. In this paper, we review two such phases, the "hastatic order" associated with non-Kramers doublet ground states, where the two-channel nature of the Kondo coupling is guaranteed by virtual valence fluctuations to an excited Kramers doublet, and "composite pair superconductivity," where the two channels differ by charge 2e and can be thought of as virtual valence fluctuations to a pseudo-isospin doublet. The similarities and differences betwee…
