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arXiv:1803.09242 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Controlling dynamical quantum phase transitions

Dante Marvin Kennes, Dirk Schuricht, Christoph Karrasch

Published May 10, 2018• 31 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We study the dynamics arising from a double quantum quench where the parameters of a given Hamiltonian are abruptly changed from being in an equilibrium phase A to a different phase B and back ($\mathrm{A}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{B}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{A}$). As prototype models, we consider the (integrable) transverse Ising field as well as the (nonintegrable) ANNNI model. The return amplitude features nonanalyticities after the first quench through the equilibrium quantum critical point ($\mathrm{A}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{B}$), which is routinely taken as a signature of passing through a so-called dynamical quantum phase transition. We demonstrate that nonanalyticities after the second quench ($\mathrm{B}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{A}$) can be avoided and reestablished in a recurring manner upon increasing the time $T$ spent in phase B. The system retains an infinite memory of its past state, and one has the intriguing opportunity to control at will whether or not dynamical quantum phase transitions appear after the second quench.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.97.184302

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We study the dynamics arising from a double quantum quench where the parameters of a given Hamiltonian are abruptly changed from being in an equilibrium phase A to a different phase B and back (A\ensuremath→B\ensuremath→A\mathrm{A}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{B}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{A}A\ensuremath→B\ensuremath→A). As prototype models, we consider the (integrable) transverse Ising field as well as the (nonintegrable) ANNNI model. The return amplitude features nonanalyticities after the first quench through the equilibrium quantum critical point (A\ensuremath→B\mathrm{A}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{B}A\ensuremath→B), which is routinely taken as a signature of passing through a so-called dynamical quantum phase transition. We demonstrate that nonanalyticities after the second quench (B\ensuremath→A\mathrm{B}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{A}B\ensuremath→A) can be avoided and reestablished in a recurring manner upon increasing the time TTT spent in phase B. The system retains an infinite memory of its past state, and one has the intriguing opportunity to control at will whether or not dynamical quantum phase transitions appear after the second quench.
Abstract Dynamical quantum phase transitions (DQPTs) can occur following quenches in quantum systems when the rate function, a dynamical analogue of the free energy, becomes non-analytic at critical times. Here we exhaustively investigate in an exemplary model how the dynamically evolving state responds to a second quench. We demonstrate that for quenches where the initial and final Hamiltonian belong to different phases always result in DQPTs, irrespective of the intermediate quench and dynamics or the time of the second quench. However, if the initial and final Hamiltonian belong to the same equilibrium phase then the intermediate Hamiltonian must belong to a different phase. In this case, the second quench time in relation to the critical times of the first quench becomes crucial to the existence of DQPTs.
We investigate the dynamics following sudden quenches across quantum critical points belonging to different universality classes. Specifically, we use matrix product state methods to study the quantum Ising chain in the presence of two additional terms which break integrability. We find that in all models the rate function for the return probability to the initial state becomes a nonanalytic function of time in the thermodynamic limit. This so-called ``dynamical phase transition'' was first observed in a recent work by Heyl, Polkovnikov, and Kehrein [Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 135704 (2013)] for the exactly-solvable quantum Ising chain, which can be mapped to free fermions. Our results for ``interacting theories'' indicate that nonanalytic dynamics is a generic feature of sudden quenches across quantum critical points. We discuss potential connections to the dynamics of the order parameter.
We study the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of one-dimensional quantum Ising-like systems, arising from sudden quenches of the Hamiltonian parameter ggg driving quantum transitions between disordered and ordered phases. In particular, we consider quenches to values of ggg around the critical value gc{g}_{c}gc​, and mainly address the question whether, and how, the quantum transition leaves traces in the evolution of the transverse and longitudinal magnetizations during such a deep out-of-equilibrium dynamics. We shed light on the emergence of singularities in the thermodynamic infinite-size limit, likely related to the integrability of the model. Finite systems in periodic and open boundary conditions develop peculiar power-law finite-size scaling laws related to revival phenomena, but apparently unrelated to the quantum transition, because their main features are generally observed in quenches to generic values of ggg. We also investigate the effects of dissipative interactions with an environment, modeled by a Lindblad equation with local decay and pumping dissipation operators within the quadratic fermionic model obtainable by a Jordan-Wigner mapping. Dissipation tends to suppress the main features of the unitary dynamics of closed systems. We finally address the effects of integrability breaking, due to further lattice interactions, such as in anisotropic next-to-nearest-neighbor Ising (ANNNI) models. We show that some qualitative features of the post-quench dynamics persist, in particular, the different behaviors when quenching to quantum ferromagnetic and paramagnetic phases, and the revival phenomena due to the finite size of the system.
The study of quantum phase transitions requires the preparation of a many-body system near its ground state, a challenging task for many experimental systems. The measurement of quench dynamics, on the other hand, is now a routine practice in most cold atom platforms. Here we show that quintessential ingredients of quantum phase transitions can be probed directly with quench dynamics in integrable and nearly integrable systems. As a paradigmatic example, we study global quench dynamics in a transverse-field Ising model with either short-range or long-range interactions. When the model is integrable, we discover a new dynamical critical point with a nonanalytic signature in the short-range correlators. The location of the dynamical critical point matches that of the quantum critical point and can be identified using a finite-time scaling method. We extend this scaling picture to systems near integrability and demonstrate the continued existence of a dynamical critical point detectable at prethermal timescales. We quantify the difference in the locations of the dynamical and quantum critical points away from (but near) integrability. Thus, we demonstrate that this method can be used to approximately locate the quantum critical point near integrability. The scaling method is also relevant to experiments with finite time and system size, and our predictions are testable in near-term experiments with trapped ions and Rydberg atoms.
A phase transition indicates a sudden change in the properties of a large system. For temperature-driven phase transitions this is related to nonanalytic behavior of the free energy density at the critical temperature: The knowledge of the free energy density in one phase is insufficient to predict the properties of the other phase. In this Letter we show that a close analogue of this behavior can occur in the real time evolution of quantum systems, namely nonanalytic behavior at a critical time. We denote such behavior a dynamical phase transition and explore its properties in the transverse-field Ising model. Specifically, we show that the equilibrium quantum phase transition and the dynamical phase transition in this model are intimately related.
We demonstrate the existence of a dynamical quantum phase transition (DQPT) in a dissipative collective-spin model that exhibits the boundary time crystal (BTC) phase. We initialize the system in the ground state of the Hamiltonian in either the BTC or the non-BTC phase, and drive it across the BTC transition. The driving is done by an abrupt quench or by a finite-time linear ramp of a Hamiltonian control parameter under Markovian Lindblad dynamics. We diagnose DQPTs through zeros of the fidelity-based Loschmidt echo between the initial state and the evolving mixed state, which induce nonanalytic cusp-like features in the associated rate function. For quenches into the BTC phase, the Loschmidt echo exhibits repeated zeros due to the emergent time-periodic steady state, whereas for quenches into the non-BTC phase, the overlap vanishes and remains zero once the dynamics relaxes to a stationary state. We further show that the DQPT persists under the ramp protocol followed by unitary evolution with the final Hamiltonian. Finally, we analyze the finite-size scaling of the first critical time and find convergence to a constant in the thermodynamic limit, with distinct power-law approaches for the quench and the ramp protocols.