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arXiv:1903.10517 · Physical review. B./Physical review. B

Quantum many-body scars from magnon condensation

Thomas Iadecola, Michael Schecter, Shenglong Xu

Published Nov 27, 2019• 154 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

According to quantum statistical mechanics, generic many-body systems decohere and thermalize regardless of their initial state. A recent experiment found a surprising exception to this rule, wherein an otherwise thermalizing system maintains its coherence only for a particular initial condition, a phenomenon dubbed ``quantum many-body scarring.'' Here, the authors propose and provide numerical evidence for a physical mechanism underlying the observed phenomena: Bose-Einstein condensation, wherein macroscopic numbers of quasiparticles occupy a single quantum state. While this phenomenon is well known at equilibrium, its emergence in a strongly interacting, far-from-equilibrium system is striking and unexpected. The physical principle explored in this work can be applied to other systems to reveal new examples of quantum many-body scars.

DOI
10.1103/physrevb.100.184312

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According to quantum statistical mechanics, generic many-body systems decohere and thermalize regardless of their initial state. A recent experiment found a surprising exception to this rule, wherein an otherwise thermalizing system maintains its coherence only for a particular initial condition, a phenomenon dubbed ``quantum many-body scarring.'' Here, the authors propose and provide numerical evidence for a physical mechanism underlying the observed phenomena: Bose-Einstein condensation, wherein macroscopic numbers of quasiparticles occupy a single quantum state. While this phenomenon is well known at equilibrium, its emergence in a strongly interacting, far-from-equilibrium system is striking and unexpected. The physical principle explored in this work can be applied to other systems to reveal new examples of quantum many-body scars.
Abstract The spontaneous emergence of coherence is a defining feature of multibody quantum systems, underlying phenomena from superconductivity to quantum information processing. Although Bose–Einstein condensates provide a unique setting for studying this process, direct observation of how a condensate acquires a coherent global phase has remained challenging. Here we provide evidence of spontaneous phase formation in a magnon Bose–Einstein condensate. Using a phase-referenced detection technique, we track the phase of the condensate coherent state relative to an external reference, revealing how an initially incoherent magnon gas thermalizes and undergoes a spontaneous transition into a coherent quantum state with a well-defined macroscopic phase. This observation provides evidence of spontaneous symmetry breaking in a quasiparticle condensate, confirming a central prediction of Bose–Einstein condensation theory that extends across diverse quantum systems.
Quantum many-body scar states are special eigenstates of nonintegrable models with distinctive entanglement features that give rise to infinitely long-lived coherent dynamics under quantum quenches from certain initial states. We elaborate on a construction of quantum many-body scar states in which they emerge from Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen states in systems with two layers, wherein the two layers are maximally entangled. We apply this construction to spin systems as well as systems of itinerant fermions and bosons and demonstrate how symmetries can be harnessed to enhance its versatility. We show that several well-known examples of quantum many-body scars, including the tower of states in the spin-1 XYXYXY model and the $\ensuremath{\eta}$-pairing states in the Fermi-Hubbard model, can be understood within this formalism. We also demonstrate how an infinite tower of many-body scar states can emerge in bilayer Bose-Hubbard models with charge conservation.
The ongoing quest for understanding nonequilibrium dynamics of complex quantum systems underpins the foundation of statistical physics as well as the development of quantum technology. Quantum many-body scarring has recently opened a window into novel mechanisms for delaying the onset of thermalization by preparing the system in special initial states, such as the Z2{\mathbb{Z}}_{2}Z2​ state in a Rydberg atom system. Here we realize many-body scarring in a Bose-Hubbard quantum simulator from previously unknown initial conditions such as the unit-filling state. We develop a quantum-interference protocol for measuring the entanglement entropy and demonstrate that scarring traps the many-body system in a low-entropy subspace. Our work makes the resource of scarring accessible to a broad class of ultracold-atom experiments, and it allows one to explore the relation of scarring to constrained dynamics in lattice gauge theories, Hilbert space fragmentation, and disorder-free localization.
Weakly interacting quasiparticles play a central role in the low-energy description of many phases of quantum matter. At higher energies, however, quasiparticles cease to be well defined in generic many-body systems owing to a proliferation of decay channels. In this review, we discuss the phenomenon of quantum many-body scars, which can give rise to certain species of stable quasiparticles throughout the energy spectrum. This goes along with a set of unusual nonequilibrium phenomena including many-body revivals and nonthermal stationary states. We provide a pedagogical exposition of this physics via a simple yet comprehensive example, that of a spin-1 XY model. We place our discussion in the broader context of symmetry-based constructions of many-body scar states, projector embeddings, and Hilbert space fragmentation. We conclude with a summary of experimental progress and theoretical puzzles.
Quantum many-body scars (QMBSs) are a novel paradigm for the violation of the eigenstate thermalization hypothesis—Hamiltonians of these systems exhibit mid-spectrum eigenstates that are equidistant in energy and which possess low entanglement and evade thermalization for long times. We present a novel approach to understanding the anomalous dynamical behavior in these systems. Specifically, we postulate that QMBS Hamiltonians H can generically be partitioned into a set of terms O a which do not commute over the entire Hilbert space, but commute to all orders within the subspace of scar states. All states in the scar subspace thus evolve according to a “broken unitary” U s ( t ) = ∏ a e − i O a t , where H = ∑ a O a , which provides a simple interpretation of the anomalous dynamical features exhibited by quantum scars; they evolve in time according to a simpler unitary operator allowing for revivals. It is found that the observed dynamical decoupling is often a direct consequence of simple local conditions, which when satisfied lead to recurring aspects of QMBSs, including equidistant eigenvalues, many-body revivals, and sub-volume-law entanglement entropy. Two classes of scar models emerge in this picture—those with a finite set of O a , as pertaining of, for instance, scars in the AKLT model, and those with an extensive set of such operators, such as eta pairing scar states in the Hubbard model. Besides discussing how many well-known scar models fit into the above picture, we show how the broken unitary formalism captures many known scar construction methods, known in the literature and generalizes others such as quasiparticles matrix product state (MPS) based methods, and the Shiraishi-Mori approach. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
A generic closed quantum many-body system will inevitably tend to thermalization, whose local information encoded in the initial state eventually scrambles into the full space, known as quantum ergodicity. A paradigmatic exception in closed quantum systems for strong ergodicity breaking is known as many-body localization, where strong disorder-induced localization prevents the occurrence of thermalization. It is generally recognized that a localized quantum system would be delocalized under dissipation induced by the environment. However, this consequence recently has received challenges where an exotic dissipation-induced localization mechanism is proposed, and transitions between localized and extended phases are found. In this Letter, we promote this mechanism to systems for weak ergodicity breaking hosting quantum many-body scars (QMBS). We find that the system relaxes to a steady state dominated by QMBS, and the dissipative dynamics exhibit dynamic revivals by suitably preparing an initial state. We point out an experimental realization of the controlled dissipation with a cold atomic setup. This makes the signature of ergodicity breaking visible over dissipative dynamics and offers potential possibilities for experimentally preparing stable QMBS with associated coherent dynamics.