Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:2305.02666 · SciPost Physics

Weak vs. strong breaking of integrability in interacting scalar quantum field theories

B. Fitos, G. Takács

Published Oct 5, 2023• 1 citation
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

The recently proposed classification of integrability-breaking perturbations according to their strength is studied in the context of quantum field theories. Using random matrix methods to diagnose the resulting quantum chaotic behaviour, we investigate the \phi^4 ϕ 4 and \phi^6 ϕ 6 interactions of a massive scalar, by considering the crossover between Poissonian and Wigner-Dyson distributions in systems truncated to a finite-dimensional Hilbert space. We find that a naive extension of the scaling of crossover coupling with the volume observed in spin chains does not give satisfactory results for quantum field theory. Instead, we demonstrate that considering the scaling of the crossover coupling with the number of particles yields robust signatures, and is able to distinguish between the strengths of integrability breaking in the \phi^4 ϕ 4 and \phi^6 ϕ 6 quantum field theories.

DOI
10.21468/scipostphys.15.4.137

Related papers

Weak integrability breaking and level spacing distribution

D. Szász-Schagrin, Pozsgai, Balázs, G. Takács

Recently it was suggested that certain perturbations of integrable spin chains lead to a weak breaking of integrability in the sense that integrability is preserved at the first order in the coupling. Here we examine this claim using level spacing distribution. We find that the volume dependent crossover between integrable and chaotic level spacing statistics which marks the onset of quantum chaotic behaviour, is markedly different for weak vs. strong breaking of integrability. In particular, for the gapless case we find that the crossover coupling as a function of the volume $L$ scales with a $1/L^2$ law for weak breaking as opposed to the $1/L^3$ law previously found for the strong case.

•Jan 1, 2021•24 citations

Weak integrability breaking and level spacing distribution

Dávid Szász-Schagrin, Balázs Pozsgay, Gábor Takács

Recently it was suggested that certain perturbations of integrable spin chains lead to a weak breaking of integrability in the sense that integrability is preserved at the first order in the coupling. Here we examine this claim using level spacing distribution. We find that the volume dependent crossover between integrable and chaotic level spacing statistics {which marks the onset of quantum chaotic behaviour, is markedly different for weak vs. strong breaking of integrability. In particular}, for the gapless case we find that the crossover coupling as a function of the volume L L scales with a 1/L^{2} 1 / L 2 law for weak breaking as opposed to the 1/L^{3} 1 / L 3 law previously found for the strong case.

arXiv:2103.06308•SciPost Physics•Aug 23, 2021•28 citations

Crossover from Poisson to Wigner-Dyson level statistics in spin chains with integrability breaking

David A. Rabson, B. N. Narozhny, Andrew J. Millis

We study numerically the evolution of energy-level statistics as an integrability-breaking term is added to the XXZ Hamiltonian. For finite-length chains, physical properties exhibit a crossover from behavior corresponding to the Poisson level statistics characteristic of integrable models to behavior corresponding to the Wigner-Dyson statistics characteristic of the random-matrix theory used to describe chaotic systems. Different measures of the level statistics are observed to follow different crossover patterns. The range of numerically accessible system sizes is too small to establish with certainty the scaling with system size, but the evidence suggests that in a thermodynamically large system an infinitesimal integrability breaking would lead to Wigner-Dyson behavior.

arXiv:cond-mat/0308089•Physical Review B•Feb 9, 2004•92 citations

Probing weak chaos in $\mathcal N=4$ super Yang-Mills and long-range spin chains

Pawel Caputa, Brian Creed, Rathindra Nath Das +2 more

We study signatures of quantum chaos in finite-loop truncations of the planar dilatation operator in the $\mathfrak{su}(2)$ sector of $\mathcal N=4$ super Yang-Mills and its $β$-deformation. These truncations define holographically motivated long-range deformations of the nearest-neighbour XXX spin chain. At one-loop the model is integrable, while the all-loop planar theory is expected to again be integrable. Finite-loop truncations therefore provide a natural setting for investigating how chaotic behaviour emerges between these two integrable limits. We analyse this question using spectral statistics, eigenvector diagnostics and spread complexity. We find that the two- and four-loop truncations develop GOE-like level statistics at sufficiently large coupling but with features characteristic of weak integrability breaking. The integrability breaking at four-loops is weaker than at two-loops and the critical coupling at which chaos occurs is larger, at least for long spin chains. The three-loop truncation does not show the same onset of chaos in the range studied. Eigenvector diagnostics show that the corresponding eigenstates remain less random than GOE vectors, indicating weak ergodicity and multifractality. Finally, we can identify signatures of the eigenvalue and eigenvector chaos in the Krylov-space data. Namely, we demonstrate a correlation of the level spacing statistics with the peak of spread complexity and disorder on the Krylov chain. The delocalisation of the initial state in the Hamiltonian eigenbasis is shown to strongly affect the saturation of complexity. Our results suggest that finite-loop dilatation operators are not generic long-range spin chain Hamiltonians, but already display patterns consistent with the restoration of integrability in the all-loop planar theory.

hep-thCross-listedarXiv:2606.18351•Jun 18, 2026•0 citations

Signatures of Chaos in Nonintegrable Models of Quantum Field Theories

Miha Srdinšek, Tomaž Prosen, Spyros Sotiriadis

We study signatures of quantum chaos in (1+1)D quantum field theory (QFT) models. Our analysis is based on the method of Hamiltonian truncation, a numerical approach for the construction of low-energy spectra and eigenstates of QFTs that can be considered as perturbations of exactly solvable models. We focus on the double sine-Gordon, also studying the massive sine-Gordon and ϕ^{4} model, all of which are nonintegrable and can be studied by this method with sufficiently high precision from small to intermediate perturbation strength. We analyze the statistics of level spacings and of eigenvector components, which are expected to follow random matrix theory predictions. While level spacing statistics are close to the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble (GOE) as expected, on the contrary, the eigenvector components follow a distribution markedly different from the expected Gaussian. Unlike in the typical quantum chaos scenario, the transition of level spacing statistics to chaotic behavior takes place already in the perturbative regime. Moreover, the distribution of eigenvector components does not appear to change or approach Gaussian behavior, even for relatively large perturbations. Our results suggest that these features are independent of the choice of model and basis.

arXiv:2012.08505•Physical Review Letters•Mar 22, 2021•32 citations

Transition from integrable to chaotic domain in spectra of spin chains

Moreno Tarquino, Juan Nicolas

In this thesis we present an approach, similar to random matrix ensembles, in order to study the integrable-chaotic transition in the Heisenberg spin model. We consider three ways to break the integrability: presence on an external field on a single spin, coupling of an external random field with each spin in the chain and next nearest neighbor interaction between spins. We propose a transition described by a power law in the spectral density, i.e. S(k) ∝ 1/kα, where α = 2 for the integrable case and α = 1 for the chaotic case, with 1 < α < 2 for systems in the crossover regime. The transition is also described by the behavior of the "burstiness" B and the Kullback–Leibler divergence DLK(PW−D(s)|Pdata(s)), where PW−D(s) and Pdata(s) are the Wigner-Dyson and the system’s spacing distribution respectively. The B coefficient is associated to a sequence of events in the system. The Kullback–Leibler divergence provides information on how two distributions differ from each other. From analyzing the behavior of these three quantities, we obtain a universal description of integrable-chaotic transition in the spin chains.

•Aug 31, 2016•0 citations
The recently proposed classification of integrability-breaking perturbations according to their strength is studied in the context of quantum field theories. Using random matrix methods to diagnose the resulting quantum chaotic behaviour, we investigate the \phi^4 ϕ 4 and \phi^6 ϕ 6 interactions of a massive scalar, by considering the crossover between Poissonian and Wigner-Dyson distributions in systems truncated to a finite-dimensional Hilbert space. We find that a naive extension of the scaling of crossover coupling with the volume observed in spin chains does not give satisfactory results for quantum field theory. Instead, we demonstrate that considering the scaling of the crossover coupling with the number of particles yields robust signatures, and is able to distinguish between the strengths of integrability breaking in the \phi^4 ϕ 4 and \phi^6 ϕ 6 quantum field theories.
Recently it was suggested that certain perturbations of integrable spin chains lead to a weak breaking of integrability in the sense that integrability is preserved at the first order in the coupling. Here we examine this claim using level spacing distribution. We find that the volume dependent crossover between integrable and chaotic level spacing statistics which marks the onset of quantum chaotic behaviour, is markedly different for weak vs. strong breaking of integrability. In particular, for the gapless case we find that the crossover coupling as a function of the volume LLL scales with a 1/L21/L^21/L2 law for weak breaking as opposed to the 1/L31/L^31/L3 law previously found for the strong case.
Recently it was suggested that certain perturbations of integrable spin chains lead to a weak breaking of integrability in the sense that integrability is preserved at the first order in the coupling. Here we examine this claim using level spacing distribution. We find that the volume dependent crossover between integrable and chaotic level spacing statistics {which marks the onset of quantum chaotic behaviour, is markedly different for weak vs. strong breaking of integrability. In particular}, for the gapless case we find that the crossover coupling as a function of the volume L L scales with a 1/L^{2} 1 / L 2 law for weak breaking as opposed to the 1/L^{3} 1 / L 3 law previously found for the strong case.
We study numerically the evolution of energy-level statistics as an integrability-breaking term is added to the XXZ Hamiltonian. For finite-length chains, physical properties exhibit a crossover from behavior corresponding to the Poisson level statistics characteristic of integrable models to behavior corresponding to the Wigner-Dyson statistics characteristic of the random-matrix theory used to describe chaotic systems. Different measures of the level statistics are observed to follow different crossover patterns. The range of numerically accessible system sizes is too small to establish with certainty the scaling with system size, but the evidence suggests that in a thermodynamically large system an infinitesimal integrability breaking would lead to Wigner-Dyson behavior.
Probing weak chaos in N=4\mathcal N=4N=4 super Yang-Mills and long-range spin chains
We study signatures of quantum chaos in finite-loop truncations of the planar dilatation operator in the su(2)\mathfrak{su}(2)su(2) sector of N=4\mathcal N=4N=4 super Yang-Mills and its βββ-deformation. These truncations define holographically motivated long-range deformations of the nearest-neighbour XXX spin chain. At one-loop the model is integrable, while the all-loop planar theory is expected to again be integrable. Finite-loop truncations therefore provide a natural setting for investigating how chaotic behaviour emerges between these two integrable limits. We analyse this question using spectral statistics, eigenvector diagnostics and spread complexity. We find that the two- and four-loop truncations develop GOE-like level statistics at sufficiently large coupling but with features characteristic of weak integrability breaking. The integrability breaking at four-loops is weaker than at two-loops and the critical coupling at which chaos occurs is larger, at least for long spin chains. The three-loop truncation does not show the same onset of chaos in the range studied. Eigenvector diagnostics show that the corresponding eigenstates remain less random than GOE vectors, indicating weak ergodicity and multifractality. Finally, we can identify signatures of the eigenvalue and eigenvector chaos in the Krylov-space data. Namely, we demonstrate a correlation of the level spacing statistics with the peak of spread complexity and disorder on the Krylov chain. The delocalisation of the initial state in the Hamiltonian eigenbasis is shown to strongly affect the saturation of complexity. Our results suggest that finite-loop dilatation operators are not generic long-range spin chain Hamiltonians, but already display patterns consistent with the restoration of integrability in the all-loop planar theory.
We study signatures of quantum chaos in (1+1)D quantum field theory (QFT) models. Our analysis is based on the method of Hamiltonian truncation, a numerical approach for the construction of low-energy spectra and eigenstates of QFTs that can be considered as perturbations of exactly solvable models. We focus on the double sine-Gordon, also studying the massive sine-Gordon and ϕ^{4} model, all of which are nonintegrable and can be studied by this method with sufficiently high precision from small to intermediate perturbation strength. We analyze the statistics of level spacings and of eigenvector components, which are expected to follow random matrix theory predictions. While level spacing statistics are close to the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble (GOE) as expected, on the contrary, the eigenvector components follow a distribution markedly different from the expected Gaussian. Unlike in the typical quantum chaos scenario, the transition of level spacing statistics to chaotic behavior takes place already in the perturbative regime. Moreover, the distribution of eigenvector components does not appear to change or approach Gaussian behavior, even for relatively large perturbations. Our results suggest that these features are independent of the choice of model and basis.
In this thesis we present an approach, similar to random matrix ensembles, in order to study the integrable-chaotic transition in the Heisenberg spin model. We consider three ways to break the integrability: presence on an external field on a single spin, coupling of an external random field with each spin in the chain and next nearest neighbor interaction between spins. We propose a transition described by a power law in the spectral density, i.e. S(k) ∝ 1/kα, where α = 2 for the integrable case and α = 1 for the chaotic case, with 1 < α < 2 for systems in the crossover regime. The transition is also described by the behavior of the "burstiness" B and the Kullback–Leibler divergence DLK(PW−D(s)|Pdata(s)), where PW−D(s) and Pdata(s) are the Wigner-Dyson and the system’s spacing distribution respectively. The B coefficient is associated to a sequence of events in the system. The Kullback–Leibler divergence provides information on how two distributions differ from each other. From analyzing the behavior of these three quantities, we obtain a universal description of integrable-chaotic transition in the spin chains.