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:2501.06183 · Physical review. E

Theory of irreversibility in quantum many-body systems

Takato Yoshimura, Lucas Sá

Published Jun 5, 2025• 13 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We address the longstanding challenge in quantum many-body theory of reconciling unitary dynamics with irreversible relaxation. In classical chaos, the unitary evolution operator develops Ruelle-Pollicott (RP) resonances inside the unit circle in the continuum limit, leading to mixing. In the semiclassical limit, chaotic single-particle quantum systems relax with the same RP resonances. In contrast, the theory of quantum many-body RP resonances and their link to irreversibility remain underdeveloped. Here, we relate the spectral form factor to the sum of autocorrelation functions and, in generic many-body lattice systems without conservation laws, we argue that all quantum many-body RP resonances converge inside the unit disk, highlighting the role of nonunitary and the thermodynamic limit. While we conjecture this picture to be general, we analytically prove the emergence of irreversibility in the random phase model (RPM), a paradigmatic Floquet quantum circuit model, in the limit of large local Hilbert space dimension. To this end, we couple it to local environments and compute the exact time evolution of autocorrelation functions, the dissipative form factor, and out-of-time-order correlation functions (OTOCs). Although valid for any dissipation strength, we then focus on weak dissipation to clarify the origin of irreversibility in unitary systems. When the dissipationless limit is taken after the thermodynamic limit, the unitary quantum map develops an infinite tower of decaying RP resonances-chaotic systems display so-called anomalous relaxation. We identify the exact RP resonances in the RPM and prove that the same RP resonances are obtained from operator truncation. We also show that the OTOC in the RPM can undergo a two-stage relaxation, and that during the second stage, the approach to the stationary value is again controlled by the leading RP resonance. Finally, we demonstrate how conservation laws, many-body localization, and nonlocal interactions merge the leading RP resonance into the unit circle, thereby suppressing anomalous relaxation. Our findings clarify the microscopic origin of macroscopic relaxation in quantum systems and emphasize the role of RP resonances as a largely unexplored signature of many-body quantum chaos.

DOI
10.1103/82f6-qdyd

Related papers

Quantum many-body operator cascade as a route to chaos

Urban Duh, Marko Žnidarič

We describe a chaos scenario valid for chaotic many-body quantum systems, the simulation of which is one of the prime candidates for demonstrating quantum advantage, and clarify its importance for classical truncation-based simulations. By studying the spectral properties of the truncated propagator, we, for the first time, identify fractal structures responsible for many-body quantum chaos, analogous to the fractality in classical chaos emerging from the time evolution of initially smooth long-wavelength densities into ever finer short-wavelength densities. Namely, we show that the leading slowest-decaying Ruelle-Pollicott eigenoperators have a non-trivial fractal dimension quantifying their non-locality, visible also in the divergence of their condition numbers. Furthermore, we find that unitarity imposes an asymptotic equality between the temporal decay rate of local correlations and this many-body fractal dimension. With this insight, the scenario for many-body quantum chaos becomes clear: over time, local operators evolve toward increasingly non-local ones with a quantifiable fractal structure, thereby naturally leading to effective non-unitary relaxation on the subspace of local operators -- a kind of many-body Kolmogorov cascade in the space of operators -- which enables accurate truncation-based simulations. Our predictions are demonstrated numerically in various one- and two-dimensional quantum circuits, with and without conservation laws, as well as by exact results in dual-unitary circuits.

cond-mat.stat-mechCross-listedarXiv:2604.16720•Apr 21, 2026•0 citations

Thermalization rates and quantum Ruelle-Pollicott resonances: Insights from operator hydrodynamics

Carolyn Zhang, Laimei Nie, Curt W. von Keyserlingk

In thermalizing many-body quantum systems without conservation laws, such as ergodic Floquet and random unitary circuits, local expectation values are predicted to decay to their equilibrium values exponentially quickly. In this work, we derive a relationship between said exponential decay rate g ¯ and the operator spreading properties of a local unitary evolution. A hydrodynamical picture for operator spreading allows us to argue that, for random unitary circuits, g ¯ is encoded by the leading eigenvalue of a dynamical map obtained by enriching unitary dynamics with dissipation, in the limit of weak dissipation. We argue that the size of the eigenvalue does not depend on the details of this weak dissipation (given mild assumptions on properties of the ergodic dynamics), so long as it only suppresses large operators significantly. Our calculations are based on analytical results for random unitary circuits, but we argue that similar results hold for ergodic Floquet systems. These conjectures are in accordance with existing results that numerically obtain quantum many-body analogs of classical Ruelle-Pollicott resonances [Prosen, ; Mori, ] by studying unitary evolutions subject to weak dissipation.

arXiv:2409.17251•Physical Review Research•Jun 10, 2026•4 citations

Ruelle-Pollicott decay of out-of-time-order correlators in many-body systems

Jerónimo Duarte, Ignacio García-Mata, Diego A. Wisniacki

The out-of-time-order correlator (OTOC) quantifies information scrambling in quantum systems and serves as a key diagnostic of quantum chaos. In one-body systems with a classical counterpart, the relaxation of the OTOC is governed by Ruelle-Pollicott resonances. For many-body systems lacking a semiclassical limit, recent studies have identified an analogous role played by the Liouvillian spectrum of weakly open extensions of the dynamics, where the slowest decay rate-the Liouvillian gap-encodes relaxation. Here we study the kicked Ising spin chain and show that the long-time exponential decay of the OTOC in the isolated system occurs at a rate equal to twice this intrinsic gap. This correspondence is demonstrated across parameter regions exhibiting distinct level spacing statistics, indicating that the Liouvillian spectrum provides a robust framework for characterizing relaxation and irreversibility in closed many-body quantum systems.

arXiv:2510.14886•Physical review. E•Jan 29, 2026•2 citations

Many-Body Quantum Chaos At All Time Scales

Antonio M. García-García, Lucas Sá, Jacobus J. M. Verbaarschot +1 more

We describe the dynamics of many-body quantum chaotic systems at all time scales by studying the Green's and out-of-time order correlation (OTOC) functions of the four-body, $N$-Majorana Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model. By combining the scramblon formalism and random-matrix-theory techniques, we obtain analytical expressions for these functions at all times. The early exponential growth of the OTOC is followed by an exponential decay at a rate governed by that of the Green's function (the real part of the leading complex Ruelle-Pollicott resonances). For late times that scale exponentially with $N$, both functions have a dip-ramp-plateau pattern for $N \mathrm{mod}8 = 2, 6$ that deviates substantially from the ergodic prediction due to local-in-energy correlations of matrix elements and eigenvalues, even after the Heisenberg time.

hep-thCross-listedarXiv:2605.27512•May 28, 2026•0 citations

Dynamics of Loschmidt echoes from operator growth in noisy quantum many-body systems

Takato Yoshimura, Lucas Sá

We study the dynamics of Loschmidt echoes in noisy quantum many-body systems without conservation laws. We first show that the operator Loschmidt echo in noisy unitary dynamics is equivalent to the operator norm of the corresponding dissipative dynamics upon noise averaging. We then analyze this quantity in two complementary ways, revealing universal dynamical behavior. First, we develop a heuristic picture for generic Floquet systems that connects Loschmidt echoes, out-of-time-order correlators, and operator growth, which is valid at any dissipation strength. We assert that the Loschmidt echo has two dynamical regimes depending on the time t and the strength of the noise p : Gaussian decay for p t ≪ 1 and exponential decay (with a noise-independent decay rate) for p t ≫ 1 . Lastly, we rigorously prove all our results for a solvable chaotic many-body quantum circuit, the dissipative random phase model—thus providing exact insight into dissipative quantum chaos.

arXiv:2509.01585•Physical review. B./Physical review. B•Feb 25, 2026•1 citation

Solvable relaxation in discrete unitary systems: Ruelle-Pollicott resonances and CMV matrices

Urban Duh, Friedrich Hübner, Marko Žnidarič

Leading eigenvalues of the truncated propagator, known as Ruelle-Pollicott (RP) resonances, are an elegant way of addressing the dynamics of unitary many-body systems. We study unitary propagators in their canonical form, known in the mathematical literature as the CMV matrices, and obtain a number of exact results for RP resonances and the associated norm-diverging eigenvectors. For the simplest CMV class describing a unilateral shift with an impurity, motivated by operator dynamics in dual-unitary circuits, we obtain closed-form results and in particular show that the three independent ways of obtaining RP resonances -- the truncated propagator, analytic continuation of the resolvent, and the rigged Hilbert space approach -- all give the same results. In more realistic CMV matrices, in which shift-like operator dynamics characteristic of chaotic systems is only asymptotic, we rely on the rich theory of orthogonal polynomials on the unit circle and identify two phases. In the first phase, relaxation occurs due to local operators effectively evolving into increasingly nonlocal ones with negligible backflow. Especially interesting is the second phase, which, surprisingly, exhibits faster relaxation because of contributions from the backflow of large operators. Additionally, in the second phase, RP resonances are not equal to the eigenvalues of the truncated propagator, instead, they are ``hidden'' within a ring of ill-conditioned eigenvalues.

cond-mat.stat-mechCross-listedarXiv:2608.28575•Aug 31, 2026•0 citations
We address the longstanding challenge in quantum many-body theory of reconciling unitary dynamics with irreversible relaxation. In classical chaos, the unitary evolution operator develops Ruelle-Pollicott (RP) resonances inside the unit circle in the continuum limit, leading to mixing. In the semiclassical limit, chaotic single-particle quantum systems relax with the same RP resonances. In contrast, the theory of quantum many-body RP resonances and their link to irreversibility remain underdeveloped. Here, we relate the spectral form factor to the sum of autocorrelation functions and, in generic many-body lattice systems without conservation laws, we argue that all quantum many-body RP resonances converge inside the unit disk, highlighting the role of nonunitary and the thermodynamic limit. While we conjecture this picture to be general, we analytically prove the emergence of irreversibility in the random phase model (RPM), a paradigmatic Floquet quantum circuit model, in the limit of large local Hilbert space dimension. To this end, we couple it to local environments and compute the exact time evolution of autocorrelation functions, the dissipative form factor, and out-of-time-order correlation functions (OTOCs). Although valid for any dissipation strength, we then focus on weak dissipation to clarify the origin of irreversibility in unitary systems. When the dissipationless limit is taken after the thermodynamic limit, the unitary quantum map develops an infinite tower of decaying RP resonances-chaotic systems display so-called anomalous relaxation. We identify the exact RP resonances in the RPM and prove that the same RP resonances are obtained from operator truncation. We also show that the OTOC in the RPM can undergo a two-stage relaxation, and that during the second stage, the approach to the stationary value is again controlled by the leading RP resonance. Finally, we demonstrate how conservation laws, many-body localization, and nonlocal interactions merge the leading RP resonance into the unit circle, thereby suppressing anomalous relaxation. Our findings clarify the microscopic origin of macroscopic relaxation in quantum systems and emphasize the role of RP resonances as a largely unexplored signature of many-body quantum chaos.
We describe a chaos scenario valid for chaotic many-body quantum systems, the simulation of which is one of the prime candidates for demonstrating quantum advantage, and clarify its importance for classical truncation-based simulations. By studying the spectral properties of the truncated propagator, we, for the first time, identify fractal structures responsible for many-body quantum chaos, analogous to the fractality in classical chaos emerging from the time evolution of initially smooth long-wavelength densities into ever finer short-wavelength densities. Namely, we show that the leading slowest-decaying Ruelle-Pollicott eigenoperators have a non-trivial fractal dimension quantifying their non-locality, visible also in the divergence of their condition numbers. Furthermore, we find that unitarity imposes an asymptotic equality between the temporal decay rate of local correlations and this many-body fractal dimension. With this insight, the scenario for many-body quantum chaos becomes clear: over time, local operators evolve toward increasingly non-local ones with a quantifiable fractal structure, thereby naturally leading to effective non-unitary relaxation on the subspace of local operators -- a kind of many-body Kolmogorov cascade in the space of operators -- which enables accurate truncation-based simulations. Our predictions are demonstrated numerically in various one- and two-dimensional quantum circuits, with and without conservation laws, as well as by exact results in dual-unitary circuits.
In thermalizing many-body quantum systems without conservation laws, such as ergodic Floquet and random unitary circuits, local expectation values are predicted to decay to their equilibrium values exponentially quickly. In this work, we derive a relationship between said exponential decay rate g ¯ and the operator spreading properties of a local unitary evolution. A hydrodynamical picture for operator spreading allows us to argue that, for random unitary circuits, g ¯ is encoded by the leading eigenvalue of a dynamical map obtained by enriching unitary dynamics with dissipation, in the limit of weak dissipation. We argue that the size of the eigenvalue does not depend on the details of this weak dissipation (given mild assumptions on properties of the ergodic dynamics), so long as it only suppresses large operators significantly. Our calculations are based on analytical results for random unitary circuits, but we argue that similar results hold for ergodic Floquet systems. These conjectures are in accordance with existing results that numerically obtain quantum many-body analogs of classical Ruelle-Pollicott resonances [Prosen, ; Mori, ] by studying unitary evolutions subject to weak dissipation.
The out-of-time-order correlator (OTOC) quantifies information scrambling in quantum systems and serves as a key diagnostic of quantum chaos. In one-body systems with a classical counterpart, the relaxation of the OTOC is governed by Ruelle-Pollicott resonances. For many-body systems lacking a semiclassical limit, recent studies have identified an analogous role played by the Liouvillian spectrum of weakly open extensions of the dynamics, where the slowest decay rate-the Liouvillian gap-encodes relaxation. Here we study the kicked Ising spin chain and show that the long-time exponential decay of the OTOC in the isolated system occurs at a rate equal to twice this intrinsic gap. This correspondence is demonstrated across parameter regions exhibiting distinct level spacing statistics, indicating that the Liouvillian spectrum provides a robust framework for characterizing relaxation and irreversibility in closed many-body quantum systems.
We describe the dynamics of many-body quantum chaotic systems at all time scales by studying the Green's and out-of-time order correlation (OTOC) functions of the four-body, NNN-Majorana Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model. By combining the scramblon formalism and random-matrix-theory techniques, we obtain analytical expressions for these functions at all times. The early exponential growth of the OTOC is followed by an exponential decay at a rate governed by that of the Green's function (the real part of the leading complex Ruelle-Pollicott resonances). For late times that scale exponentially with NNN, both functions have a dip-ramp-plateau pattern for Nmod8=2,6N \mathrm{mod}8 = 2, 6Nmod8=2,6 that deviates substantially from the ergodic prediction due to local-in-energy correlations of matrix elements and eigenvalues, even after the Heisenberg time.
We study the dynamics of Loschmidt echoes in noisy quantum many-body systems without conservation laws. We first show that the operator Loschmidt echo in noisy unitary dynamics is equivalent to the operator norm of the corresponding dissipative dynamics upon noise averaging. We then analyze this quantity in two complementary ways, revealing universal dynamical behavior. First, we develop a heuristic picture for generic Floquet systems that connects Loschmidt echoes, out-of-time-order correlators, and operator growth, which is valid at any dissipation strength. We assert that the Loschmidt echo has two dynamical regimes depending on the time t and the strength of the noise p : Gaussian decay for p t ≪ 1 and exponential decay (with a noise-independent decay rate) for p t ≫ 1 . Lastly, we rigorously prove all our results for a solvable chaotic many-body quantum circuit, the dissipative random phase model—thus providing exact insight into dissipative quantum chaos.
Leading eigenvalues of the truncated propagator, known as Ruelle-Pollicott (RP) resonances, are an elegant way of addressing the dynamics of unitary many-body systems. We study unitary propagators in their canonical form, known in the mathematical literature as the CMV matrices, and obtain a number of exact results for RP resonances and the associated norm-diverging eigenvectors. For the simplest CMV class describing a unilateral shift with an impurity, motivated by operator dynamics in dual-unitary circuits, we obtain closed-form results and in particular show that the three independent ways of obtaining RP resonances -- the truncated propagator, analytic continuation of the resolvent, and the rigged Hilbert space approach -- all give the same results. In more realistic CMV matrices, in which shift-like operator dynamics characteristic of chaotic systems is only asymptotic, we rely on the rich theory of orthogonal polynomials on the unit circle and identify two phases. In the first phase, relaxation occurs due to local operators effectively evolving into increasingly nonlocal ones with negligible backflow. Especially interesting is the second phase, which, surprisingly, exhibits faster relaxation because of contributions from the backflow of large operators. Additionally, in the second phase, RP resonances are not equal to the eigenvalues of the truncated propagator, instead, they are ``hidden'' within a ring of ill-conditioned eigenvalues.