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arXiv:2212.11955 · Physical Review Letters

Nonlinear Perturbation of Random Matrix Theory

Klaus M. Frahm, Dima L. Shepelyansky

Published Aug 16, 2023• 10 citations
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Abstract

We consider a system of linear oscillators, or quantum states, described by random matrix theory and analyze how its time evolution is affected by a nonlinear perturbation. Our numerical results show that above a certain chaos border a weak or moderate nonlinearity leads to a dynamical thermalization of a finite number of degrees of freedom with energy equipartition over linear eigenmodes as expected from the laws of classical statistical mechanics. The system temperature is shown to change in a broad range from positive to negative values, and the dependence of system characteristics on the initial injected energy is determined. Below the chaos border the dynamics is described by the Kolmogorov-Arnold-Moser integrability. Owing to universal features of random matrix theory we argue that the obtained results describe the generic properties of its nonlinear perturbation.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.131.077201

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We consider a system of linear oscillators, or quantum states, described by random matrix theory and analyze how its time evolution is affected by a nonlinear perturbation. Our numerical results show that above a certain chaos border a weak or moderate nonlinearity leads to a dynamical thermalization of a finite number of degrees of freedom with energy equipartition over linear eigenmodes as expected from the laws of classical statistical mechanics. The system temperature is shown to change in a broad range from positive to negative values, and the dependence of system characteristics on the initial injected energy is determined. Below the chaos border the dynamics is described by the Kolmogorov-Arnold-Moser integrability. Owing to universal features of random matrix theory we argue that the obtained results describe the generic properties of its nonlinear perturbation.
We study numerically time evolution in classical lattices with weak or moderate nonlinearity which leads to interactions between linear modes. Our results show that in a certain strength range a moderate nonlinearity generates a dynamical thermalization process which drives the system to the quantum Gibbs distribution of probabilities, or average oscillation amplitudes. The effective dynamical temperature of the lattice varies from large positive to large negative values depending on the energy of the initially excited modes. This quantum Gibbs distribution is drastically different from the usually expected energy equipartition over linear modes corresponding to a regime of classical thermalization. Possible experimental observations of this dynamical thermalization are discussed for cold atoms in optical lattices, nonlinear photonic lattices and optical fiber arrays.
The statistics of gaps between quantum energy levels is a hallmark criterion in quantum chaos and quantum integrability studies. The relevant distributions corresponding to exactly integrable vs. fully chaotic systems are universal and described by the Poisson vs. Wigner-Dyson curves. In the transitional regime between integrability and chaos, the distributions are much less universal and have not been understood quantitatively until now. We point out that the relevant statistics that controls these distributions is that of the matrix elements of the nonintegrable perturbation Hamiltonian in the energy eigenbasis of the unperturbed integrable system. With this insight, we formulate a simple random matrix ensemble that correctly reproduces the level spacing distributions in a variety of test systems. For the distribution of matrix elements appearing in our construction, we furthermore discover surprising universal features: across a variety of physical systems with diverse degrees of freedom, these distributions are dominated by simple power laws.
We study numerically time evolution in classical lattices with weak or moderate nonlinearity which leads to interactions between linear modes. Our results show that in a certain strength range a moderate nonlinearity generates a dynamical thermalization process which drives the system to the quantum Gibbs distribution of probabilities, or average oscillation amplitudes. The effective dynamical temperature of the lattice varies from large positive to large negative values depending on the energy of the initially excited modes. This quantum Gibbs distribution is drastically different from the usually expected energy equipartition over linear modes corresponding to a regime of classical thermalization. Possible experimental observations of this dynamical thermalization are discussed for cold atoms in optical lattices, nonlinear photonic lattices and optical fiber arrays.
Using the ergodicity principle for the expectation values of several types of observables, we investigate the thermalization process in isolated fermionic systems.These are described by the two-body random ensemble, which is a paradigmatic model to study quantum chaos and especially the dynamical transition from integrability to chaos.By means of exact diagonalizations we analyze the relevance of the eigenstate thermalization hypothesis as well as the influence of other factors, such as the energy and structure of the initial state, or the dimension of the Hilbert space.We also obtain analytical expressions linking the degree of thermalization for a given observable with the so-called number of principal components for transition strengths originating at a given energy, with the dimensions of the whole Hilbert space and microcanonical energy shell, and with the correlations generated by the observable.As the strength of the residual interaction is increased, an order-to-chaos transition takes place, and we show that the onset of Wigner spectral fluctuations, which is the standard signature of chaos, is not sufficient to guarantee thermalization in finite systems.When all the signatures of chaos are fulfilled, including the quasicomplete delocalization of eigenfunctions, the eigenstate thermalization hypothesis is the mechanism responsible for the thermalization of certain types of observables, such as (linear combinations of) occupancies and strength function operators.Our results also suggest that fully chaotic systems will thermalize relative to most observables in the thermodynamic limit.
Equilibrium properties of many-body systems with a large number of degrees of freedom are generally expected to be described by statistical mechanics. Such expectations are closely tied to the observation of thermalization, as manifested through equipartition in time-dependent observables, which takes place both in quantum and classical systems but may look very different in comparison. By studying the dynamics of individual lattice site populations in ultracold bosonic gases, we show that the process of relaxation toward equilibrium in a quantum system can be orders of magnitude faster than in its classical counterpart. Classical chaos quantifiers reveal that this is due to a wave packet in a quantum system being able to escape regions of inefficient classical transport by a mechanism akin to tunneling. Since the presented phenomenon takes place in a broad parameter range and persists in weakly disordered systems, we expect that it occurs in a variety of many-body systems and is amenable to direct experimental verification in state-of-the-art quantum simulation platforms.
Using the key properties of chaos, i.e. ergodicity and exponential instability, as a resource to control classical dynamics has a long and considerable history. However, in the context of controlling "chaotic" quantum unitary dynamics, the situation is far more tenuous. The classical concepts of exponential sensitivity to trajectory initial conditions and ergodicity do not directly translate into quantum unitary evolution. Nevertheless properties inherent to quantum chaos can take on those roles: i) the dynamical sensitivity to weak perturbations, measured by the fidelity decay, serves a similar purpose as the classical sensitivity to initial conditions; and ii) paired with the fact that quantum chaotic systems are conjectured to be statistically described by random matrix theory, implies a method to translate the ergodic feature into the control of quantum dynamics. With those two properties, it can be argued that quantum chaotic dynamical systems, in principle, allow for full controllability beyond a characteristic time that scales only logarithmically with system size and ℏ−1\hbar^{-1}ℏ−1. In the spirit of classical targeting, it implies that it is possible to fine tune the immense quantum interference with weak perturbations and steer the system from any initial state into any desired target state, subject to constraints imposed by conserved quantities. In contrast, integrable dynamics possess neither ergodicity nor exponential instability, and thus the weak perturbations apparently must break the integrability for control purposes. The main ideas are illustrated with the quantum kicked rotor. The production of revivals, cat-like entangled states, and the transition from any random state to any other random state is possible as demonstrated.