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arXiv:1707.02328 · SciPost Physics

Analysis of the buildup of spatiotemporal correlations and their bounds outside of the light cone

Nils O. Abeling, Lorenzo Cevolani, Stefan K. Kehrein

Published Nov 26, 2018• 9 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

In non-relativistic quantum theories the Lieb-Robinson bound defines an effective light cone with exponentially small tails outside of it. In this work we use it to derive a bound for the correlation function of two local disjoint observables at different times if the initial state has a power-law decay. We show that the exponent of the power-law of the bound is identical to the initial (equilibrium) decay. We explicitly verify this result by studying the full dynamics of the susceptibilities and correlations in the exactly solvable Luttinger model after a sudden quench from the non-interacting to the interacting model.

DOI
10.21468/scipostphys.5.5.052

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In non-relativistic quantum theories the Lieb-Robinson bound defines an effective light cone with exponentially small tails outside of it. In this work we use it to derive a bound for the correlation function of two local disjoint observables at different times if the initial state has a power-law decay. We show that the exponent of the power-law of the bound is identical to the initial (equilibrium) decay. We explicitly verify this result by studying the full dynamics of the susceptibilities and correlations in the exactly solvable Luttinger model after a sudden quench from the non-interacting to the interacting model.
Lieb-Robinson bounds quantify the maximal speed of information spreading in nonrelativistic quantum systems.We discuss the relation of Lieb-Robinson bounds to out-of-time order correlators, which correspond to different norms of commutators C(r, t ) = [A i (t ), B i+r ] of local operators.Using an exact Krylov space-time evolution technique, we calculate these two different norms of such commutators for the spin-1/2 Heisenberg chain with interactions decaying as a power law 1/r α with distance r.Our numerical analysis shows that both norms (operator norm and normalized Frobenius norm) exhibit the same asymptotic behavior, namely, a linear growth in time at short times and a power-law decay in space at long distance, leading asymptotically to power-law light cones for α < 1 and to linear light cones for α > 1.The asymptotic form of the tails of C(r, t ) ∝ t/r α is described by short-time perturbation theory, which is valid at short times and long distances.
The propagation of information in nonrelativistic quantum systems obeys a speed limit known as a Lieb-Robinson bound.We derive a new Lieb-Robinson bound for systems with interactions that decay with distance r as a power law, 1=r α .The bound implies an effective light cone tighter than all previous bounds.Our approach is based on a technique for approximating the time evolution of a system, which was first introduced as part of a quantum simulation algorithm by Haah et al., FOCS'18.To bound the error of the approximation, we use a known Lieb-Robinson bound that is weaker than the bound we establish.This result brings the analysis full circle, suggesting a deep connection between Lieb-Robinson bounds and digital quantum simulation.In addition to the new Lieb-Robinson bound, our analysis also gives an error bound for the Haah et al. quantum simulation algorithm when used to simulate power-law decaying interactions.In particular, we show that the gate count of the algorithm scales with the system size better than existing algorithms when α > 3D (where D is the number of dimensions).
Recent works have revealed the intricate effect of long-range interactions on information transport in quantum many-body systems: In DDD spatial dimensions, interactions decaying as a power-law r−αr^{-α}r−α with α>2D+1α> 2 D+1α>2D+1 exhibit a Lieb-Robinson bound (LRB) with a linear light cone and the threshold 2D+12D +12D+1 is sharp in general. Here, we observe that mutually commuting, long-range interactions satisfy an enhanced LRB of the form t r−αt \, r^{-α}tr−α for any α>0α>0α>0, and this scaling is sharp. In particular, the linear light cone occurs at α=1α= 1α=1 in any dimension. Part of our motivation stems from quantum error-correcting codes. As applications, we derive enhanced bounds on ground state correlations and an enhanced local perturbations perturb locally (LPPL) principle for which we adapt a recent subharmonicity argument of Wang-Hazzard. Similar enhancements hold for commuting interactions with stretched exponential decay.
Recent works have revealed the intricate effect of long-range interactions on information transport in quantum many-body systems: In D spatial dimensions, interactions decaying as a power-law r−α with α > 2D + 1 exhibit a Lieb-Robinson bound (LRB) with a linear light cone and the threshold 2D + 1 is sharp in general. Here, we observe that mutually commuting, long-range interactions satisfy an enhanced LRB of the form t r−α for any α > 0, and this scaling is sharp. In particular, the linear light cone occurs at α = 1 in any dimension. Part of our motivation stems from quantum error-correcting codes. As applications, we derive enhanced bounds on ground state correlations and an enhanced local perturbations perturb locally principle for which we adapt a recent subharmonicity argument of Wang-Hazzard. Similar enhancements hold for commuting interactions with stretched exponential decay.
The Lieb-Robinson bound states that local Hamiltonian evolution in nonrelativistic quantum mechanical theories gives rise to the notion of an effective light cone with exponentially decaying tails. We discuss several consequences of this result in the context of quantum information theory. First, we show that the information that leaks out to spacelike separated regions is negligible and that there is a finite speed at which correlations and entanglement can be distributed. Second, we discuss how these ideas can be used to prove lower bounds on the time it takes to convert states without topological quantum order to states with that property. Finally, we show that the rate at which entropy can be created in a block of spins scales like the boundary of that block.
Lieb-Robinson bounds demonstrate the emergence of locality in many-body quantum systems. Intuitively, Lieb-Robinson bounds state that, with local or exponentially decaying interactions, the correlation that can be built up between two sites separated by distance r after a time t decays as exp  ( v t − r ) , where v is the emergent Lieb-Robinson velocity. In many problems, it is important to also capture how much of an operator grows to act on r d sites in d spatial dimensions. Perturbation theory and cluster expansion methods suggest that, at short times, these volume-filling operators are suppressed as exp  ( − r d ) . We confirm this intuition, showing that, for r > v t , the volume-filling operator is suppressed by exp  ( − ( r − v t ) d / ( v t ) d − 1 ) . This closes a conceptual and practical gap between the cluster expansion and the Lieb-Robinson bound. We then present two very different applications of this new bound. Firstly, we obtain improved bounds on the classical computational resources necessary to simulate many-body dynamics with error tolerance ε for any finite time t : as ε becomes sufficiently small, only ε − O ( t d − 1 ) resources are needed. A protocol that likely saturates this bound is given. Secondly, we prove that disorder operators have volume-law suppression near the “solvable (Ising) point” in quantum phases with spontaneous symmetry breaking, which implies a new diagnostic for distinguishing many-body phases of quantum matter.