We use the quantum action to study quantum chaos at finite temperature. We present a numerical study of a classically chaotic 2-D Hamiltonian system - harmonic oscillators with anharmonic coupling. We construct the quantum action non-perturbatively and find temperature dependent quantum corrections in the action parameters. We compare Poincaré sections of the quantum action at finite temperature with those of the classical action.
We address the problem of quantum chaos: Is there a rigorous, physically meaningful definition of chaos in quantum physics? Can the tools of classical chaos theory, like Lyapunov exponents, Poincaré sections etc. be carried over to quantum systems? Can quantitative predictions be made? We show that the recently proposed quantum action is well suited to answer those questions. As an example we study chaotic behavior of the 2-D anharmonic oscillator and compare classical with quantum chaos. Moreover, we study quantum chaos as function of temperature (the classical system can be considered as the…
We have recently suggested a quantum action, which has the form of a classical action and takes into account quantum effects via renormalized action parameters. Here we apply it to quantum chaos. We study a system in 2-D with weak anharmonic coupling ($V_{coupl} \propto x^{2}y^{2}$) being classically chaotic. We construct the quantum action at finite temperature. We compute Poincaré sections of the quantum action at that temperature and compare it with those of the classical action. We observe chaotic behavior in both cases.
In this paper we study the chaos exponent, the exponential growth rate of the out-of-time-ordered four point functions, in a two coupled SYK models which exhibits a first order phase transition between the high temperature black hole phase and the low temperature gapped phase interpreted as a traversable wormhole. We see that as the temperature decreases the chaos exponent exhibits a discontinuous fall-off from the value of order the universal bound $2π/β$ at the critical temperature of the phase transition, which is consistent with the expected relation between black holes and strong chaos. I…
The quantum chaos in the finite-temperature Yang-Mills-Higgs system is studied. The energy spectrum of a spatially homogeneous SU(2) Yang-Mills-Higgs is calculated within thermofield dynamics. Level statistics of the spectra is studied by plotting nearest-level spacing distribution histograms. It is found that finite temperature effects lead to a strengthening of chaotic effects, i.e. spectrum which has Poissonian distribution at zero temperature has Gaussian distribution at finite-temperature.
We use the quantum action to study the dynamics of quantum system at finite temperature. We construct the quantum action non-perturbatively and find temperature dependent action parameters. Here we apply the quantum action to study quantum chaos. We present a numerical study of a classically chaotic 2-D Hamiltonian system - harmonic oscillators with anharmonic coupling. We compare Poincaré sections for the quantum action at finite temperature with those of classical action.
The onset of thermalization in a closed finite system of randomly interacting bosons, at the level of a single eigenstate, is discussed. The main interest is in the emergence of the Bose-Einstein distribution of single-particle occupation numbers, establishing a global and local criterion for thermalization. We show how to define the temperature of a given eigenstate, provided that it has a chaotic structure in the basis defined by single-particle states. The analytical expression for the eigenstate temperature as a function of the inter-particle interaction and energy is complemented by numer…
Classical arguments for thermalization of isolated systems do not apply in a straightforward way to the quantum case. Recently, there has been interest in diagnostics of quantum chaos in many- body systems. In the classical case, chaos is a popular explanation for the legitimacy of the methods of statistical physics. In this work, we relate a previously proposed criteria of quantum chaos in the unitary time evolution operator to the entanglement entropy growth for a far-from-equilibrium initial pure state. By mapping the unitary time evolution operator to a doubled state, chaos can be characte…
We study the low energy quantum spectra of two-dimensional rectangular billiards with a small but finite-size scatterer inside. We start by examining the spectral properties of billiards with a single pointlike scatterer. The problem is formulated in terms of self-adjoint extension theory of functional analysis. The condition for the appearance of so-called wave chaos is clarified. We then relate the pointlike scatterer to a finite-size scatterer through the appropriate truncation of basis. We show that the signature of wave chaos in low energy states is most prominent when the scatterer is we…
We study numerically and analytically the time dependence and saturation of out-of-time ordered correlators (OTOC) in chaotic few-body quantum-mechanical systems: quantum Henon-Heiles system (weakly chaotic), BMN matrix quantum mechanics (strongly chaotic) and Gaussian random matrix ensembles. The growth pattern of quantum-mechanical OTOC is complex and nonuniversal, with no clear exponential regime at relevant timescales in any of the examples studied (which is not in contradiction to the exponential growth found in the literature for many-body systems, i.e. fields). On the other hand, the pl…
We derive Fourier's law for a completely coherent quasi one--dimensional chaotic quantum system coupled locally to two heat baths at different temperatures. We solve the master equation to first order in the temperature difference. We show that the heat conductance can be expressed as a thermodynamic equilibrium coefficient taken at some intermediate temperature. We use that expression to show that for temperatures large compared to the mean level spacing of the system, the heat conductance is inversely proportional to the level density and, thus, inversely proportional to the length of the sy…
New method is developed for calculation of single-particle occupation numbers in finite Fermi systems of interacting particles. It is more accurate than the canonical distribution method and gives the Fermi-Dirac distribution in the limit of large number of particles. It is shown that statistical effects of the interaction are absorbed by an increase of the effective temperature. Criteria for quantum chaos and statistical equilibrium are considered. All results are confirmed by numerical experiments in the two-body random interaction model.
We study a chaotic ratchet system under the influence of a thermal environment. By direct integration of the Lindblad equation we are able to analyze its behavior for a wide range of couplings with the environment, and for different finite temperatures. We observe that the enhancement of the classical and quantum currents due to temperature depend strongly on the specific properties of the system. This makes difficult to extract universal behaviors. We have also found that there is an analogy between the effects of the classical thermal noise and those of the finite $\hbar$ size. These results…
We study many-body chaos in a (2+1)D relativistic scalar field theory at high temperatures in the classical statistical approximation, which captures the quantum critical regime and the thermal phase transition from an ordered to a disordered phase. We evaluate out-of-time ordered correlation functions (OTOCs) and find that the associated Lyapunov exponent increases linearly with temperature in the quantum critical regime, and approaches the non-interacting limit algebraically in terms of a fluctuation parameter. OTOCs spread ballistically in all regimes, also at the thermal phase transition, …
We demonstrate that a weakly disordered metal with short-range interactions exhibits a transition in the quantum chaotic dynamics when changing the temperature or the interaction strength. For weak interactions, the system displays exponential growth of the out-of-time-ordered correlator (OTOC) of the current operator. The Lyapunov exponent of this growth is temperature-independent in the limit of vanishing interaction. With increasing the temperature or the interaction strength, the system undergoes a transition to a non-chaotic behaviour, for which the exponential growth of the OTOC is absen…
It is believed that the two-dimensional (2D) Anderson model exhibits localization for any nonzero disorder in the thermodynamic limit and it is also well known that the finite-size effects are considerable in the weak disorder limit. Here we numerically study the quantum-chaos to localization transition in the finite 2D Anderson model using standard indicators used in the modern literature such as the level spacing ratio, spectral form factor, variances of observable matrix elements, participation entropy and the eigenstate entanglement entropy. We show that many features of these indicators m…
Motion of randomly-driven quantum nonlinear pendulum is considered. Utilizing one-step Poincaré map, we demonstrate that classical phase space corresponding to a single realization of the random perturbation involves domains of finite-time stability. Statistical analysis of the finite-time evolution operator (FTEO) is carried out in order to study influence of finite-time stability on quantum dynamics. It is shown that domains of finite-time stability give rise to ordered patterns in distributions of FTEO eigenfunctions. Transition to global chaos is accompanied by smearing of these patterns; …
The field of Quantum Chaos, addressing the quantum manifestations of an underlying classically chaotic dynamics, was developed in the early eighties, mainly from a theoretical perspective. Few experimental systems were initially recognized to exhibit the versatility of being sensitive, at the same time, to their classical and quantum dynamics. Rydberg atoms provided the main testing ground of Quantum Chaos concepts until the early nineties, marked by the development of microwave billiards, ultra-cold atoms in optical lattices, and low-temperature transport in mesoscopic semiconductor structure…
The proplem of sound propagation in an oceanic waveguide is considered. Scattering on random inhomogeneity of the waveguide leads to wave chaos. Chaos reveals itself in spectral properties of the finite-range evolution operator (FREO). FREO describes transformation of a wavefield in course of propagation along a finite segment of a waveguide. We study transition to chaos by tracking variations in spectral statistics with increasing length of the segment. Analysis of the FREO is accompanied with ray calculations using the one-step Poincaré map which is the classical counterpart of the FREO. Und…
The out-of-time-order correlator (OTOC), recently analyzed in several physical contexts, is studied for low-dimensional chaotic systems through semiclassical expansions and numerical simulations. The semiclassical expansion for the OTOC yields a leading-order contribution in $\hbar^2$ that is exponentially increasing with time within an intermediate, temperature-dependent, time-window. The growth-rate in such a regime is governed by the Lyapunov exponent of the underlying classical system and scales with the square-root of the temperature.
