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:2502.01582 · SciPost Physics

Non-stabilizerness of Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model

Surajit Bera, Marco Schirò

Published Dec 18, 2025• 15 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We study the non-stabilizerness or quantum magic of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev ( \mathrm{SYK} S Y K ) model, a prototype example of maximally chaotic quantum matter. We show that the Majorana spectrum of its ground state, encoding the spreading of the state in the Majorana basis, displays a Gaussian distribution as expected for chaotic quantum many-body systems. We compare our results with the case of the \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 model, describing non-chaotic random free fermions, and show that the Majorana spectrum is qualitatively different in the two cases, featuring an exponential Laplace distribution for the \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 model rather than a Gaussian. From the spectrum we extract the Stabilizer Renyi Entropy (SRE) and show that for both models it displays a linear scaling with system size, with a prefactor that is larger for the SYK model, which has therefore higher magic. Finally, we discuss the spreading of quantun magic under unitary dynamics, as described by the evolution of the Majorana spectrum and the Stabilizer Renyi Entropy starting from a stabilizer state. We show that the SRE for the \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 model equilibrates rapidly, but that in the steady-state the interacting chaotic SYK model has more magic than the simple \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 . Our results suggest that the Majorana spectrum is qualitatively distinct in chaotic and non-chaotic many-body systems.

DOI
10.21468/scipostphys.19.6.159

Related papers

Multipartite Non-local Magic and SYK Model

Vinay Malvimat, Matthieu Sarkis, Yena Suk +1 more

We investigate the structure of quantum magic in interacting disordered fermionic systems, quantifying non-stabilizerness via the fermionic stabilizer Rényi entropy (SRE). To resolve the distribution of magic across different scales, we introduce a multipartite non-local magic functional, constructed from an inclusion-exclusion combination of subsystem contributions. This measure serves as a fine-grained diagnostic, isolating genuinely global contributions and revealing nontrivial interactions between local and collective supports of magic. We illustrate the measure on paradigmatic multipartite states and apply these diagnostics to the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model and its variants. Crucially, for thermal/typical ensembles, we observe a marked disparity between Thermal Pure Quantum (TPQ) states and the thermal density matrix. This reveals a concealed complexity: the immense computational hardness characterizing the unitary evolution is encoded in the specific microstructure of the black hole microstates, while being washed out in the coarse-grained thermodynamic description. Furthermore, in $\mathcal N=2$ supersymmetric SYK, we show that while fortuitous BPS states exhibit intermediate stabilizer complexity, the multipartite measure unveils a rich, sector-dependent pattern of global correlations, distinguishing them from generic chaotic states.

hep-thCross-listedarXiv:2601.03076•Jan 7, 2026•0 citations

Disorder-free Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev models: Integrability and a precursor of chaos

Soshun Ozaki, Hosho Katsura

We introduce two disorder-free variants of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model, demonstrate their integrability, and study their static and dynamical properties. Unlike diagrammatic techniques, the integrability of these models allows us to obtain dynamical correlation functions even when the number of Majorana fermions is finite. From the solutions, we find that out-of-time-order correlators (OTOCs) in these models exhibit exponential growth at early times, resembling that of many-body quantum chaotic systems, such as those with disorder or external kick terms, despite their large N behavior differing from that of typical chaotic systems. Conversely, our analysis shows no evidence of random-matrix behavior in level spacing statistics or the spectral form factor. Our findings illustrate that the clean versions of the SYK models represent simple but nontrivial examples of disorder-free quantum many-body systems displaying chaoslike behavior of OTOCs.

arXiv:2402.13154•Physical Review Research•Jan 23, 2025•3 citations

Nonstabilizerness in the unitary and monitored quantum dynamics of XXZ-staggered and Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev models

Angelo Russomanno, Gianluca Passarelli, Davide Rossini +1 more

We consider the quantum-state-diffusion dynamics of the XXZ-staggered spin chain, also focusing on its noninteracting XX-staggered limit, and of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model. We describe the process through quantum trajectories and evaluate the nonstabilizerness (also known as ``magic'') along the trajectories, quantified by the stabilizer R\'enyi entropy (SRE). In the absence of measurements, we find that the SYK model is the only one in which the time-averaged SRE saturates the random state bound and has a scaling with the system size that is well described by the theoretical prediction for quantum chaotic systems. In the presence of measurements, we numerically find that the steady-state SRE versus the coupling strength to the environment is well fitted by a generalized Lorentzian function. The scaling of the fitting parameters with the system size suggests that the steady-state SRE linearly increases with the system size in all the considered cases and displays no measurement-induced quantum transition, as confirmed by the curves of the steady-state SRE versus the system size.

arXiv:2502.01431•Physical review. B./Physical review. B•Aug 7, 2025•13 citations

Stabilizer entropy and entanglement complexity in the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model

Barbara Jasser, Jovan Odavić, Alioscia Hamma

The Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model is of paramount importance for the understanding of both strange metals and a microscopic theory of two-dimensional gravity. We study the interplay between stabilizer R\'enyi entropy and entanglement entropy in both the ground state and highly excited states of the $\mathrm{SYK}\ensuremath{-}4+\mathrm{SYK}\ensuremath{-}2$ model, interpolating the highly chaotic four-body interactions model with the integrable two-body interactions one. The interplay between these quantities is also assessed through universal statistics of the entanglement spectrum and its antiflatness. We find that SYK-4 is indeed characterized by a complex pattern of both entanglement and nonstabilizer resources, while SYK-2 is nonuniversal and not complex. We discuss the fragility and robustness of these features depending on the interpolation parameter.

arXiv:2502.03093•Physical review. B./Physical review. B•Nov 14, 2025•20 citations

Connecting Magic Dynamics in Thermofield Double States to Spectral Form Factors

Ning Sun, Pengfei Zhang

Under unitary evolution, chaotic quantum systems initialized in simple states rapidly develop high complexity, precluding any efficient classical description. Quantum chaos is traditionally characterized by spectral properties of the Hamiltonian, most notably through the spectral form factor, while the hardness of classical simulation within the stabilizer formalism, commonly referred to as quantum magic, can be quantified by the stabilizer Rényi entropy. In this Letter, we propose a relation between the dynamics of the stabilizer Rényi entropy for thermofield double states and the spectral form factor, based on general arguments for chaotic systems with all-to-all interactions. This relation implies that the saturation of the stabilizer Rényi entropy is governed by a first-order dynamical transition. We then demonstrate this relation explicitly in the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model, using an auxiliary-spin representation of the stabilizer Rényi entropy that exhibits an emergent $Z_2$ symmetry. We further find that, in the high-temperature regime of the SYK model, the transition occurs at a finite time, with the long-time phase marked by spontaneous $Z_2$ symmetry breaking. In contrast, at low temperatures, the transition is pushed to times exponentially long in the system size. Our results reveal an intriguing interplay between quantum chaos and quantum magic.

quant-pharXiv:2601.12787•Physical Review Letters•Jan 20, 2026•2 citations

Spread of entanglement in a Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev chain

Yingfei Gu, Andrew Lucas, Xiao-Liang Qi

We study the spread of Rényi entropy between two halves of a Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) chain of Majorana fermions, prepared in a thermofield double (TFD) state. The SYK chain model is a model of chaotic many-body systems, which describes a one-dimensional lattice of Majorana fermions, with spatially local random quartic interaction. We find that for integer Rényi index n > 1, the Rényi entanglement entropy saturates at a parametrically smaller value than expected. This implies that the TFD state of the SYK chain does not rapidly thermalize, despite being maximally chaotic: instead, it rapidly approaches a prethermal state. We compare our results to the signatures of thermalization observed in other quenches in the SYK model, and to intuition from nearly-AdS2 gravity.

arXiv:1708.00871•Journal of High Energy Physics•Sep 1, 2017•109 citations
We study the non-stabilizerness or quantum magic of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev ( \mathrm{SYK} S Y K ) model, a prototype example of maximally chaotic quantum matter. We show that the Majorana spectrum of its ground state, encoding the spreading of the state in the Majorana basis, displays a Gaussian distribution as expected for chaotic quantum many-body systems. We compare our results with the case of the \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 model, describing non-chaotic random free fermions, and show that the Majorana spectrum is qualitatively different in the two cases, featuring an exponential Laplace distribution for the \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 model rather than a Gaussian. From the spectrum we extract the Stabilizer Renyi Entropy (SRE) and show that for both models it displays a linear scaling with system size, with a prefactor that is larger for the SYK model, which has therefore higher magic. Finally, we discuss the spreading of quantun magic under unitary dynamics, as described by the evolution of the Majorana spectrum and the Stabilizer Renyi Entropy starting from a stabilizer state. We show that the SRE for the \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 model equilibrates rapidly, but that in the steady-state the interacting chaotic SYK model has more magic than the simple \mathrm{SYK_2} S Y K 2 . Our results suggest that the Majorana spectrum is qualitatively distinct in chaotic and non-chaotic many-body systems.
We investigate the structure of quantum magic in interacting disordered fermionic systems, quantifying non-stabilizerness via the fermionic stabilizer Rényi entropy (SRE). To resolve the distribution of magic across different scales, we introduce a multipartite non-local magic functional, constructed from an inclusion-exclusion combination of subsystem contributions. This measure serves as a fine-grained diagnostic, isolating genuinely global contributions and revealing nontrivial interactions between local and collective supports of magic. We illustrate the measure on paradigmatic multipartite states and apply these diagnostics to the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model and its variants. Crucially, for thermal/typical ensembles, we observe a marked disparity between Thermal Pure Quantum (TPQ) states and the thermal density matrix. This reveals a concealed complexity: the immense computational hardness characterizing the unitary evolution is encoded in the specific microstructure of the black hole microstates, while being washed out in the coarse-grained thermodynamic description. Furthermore, in N=2\mathcal N=2N=2 supersymmetric SYK, we show that while fortuitous BPS states exhibit intermediate stabilizer complexity, the multipartite measure unveils a rich, sector-dependent pattern of global correlations, distinguishing them from generic chaotic states.
We introduce two disorder-free variants of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model, demonstrate their integrability, and study their static and dynamical properties. Unlike diagrammatic techniques, the integrability of these models allows us to obtain dynamical correlation functions even when the number of Majorana fermions is finite. From the solutions, we find that out-of-time-order correlators (OTOCs) in these models exhibit exponential growth at early times, resembling that of many-body quantum chaotic systems, such as those with disorder or external kick terms, despite their large N behavior differing from that of typical chaotic systems. Conversely, our analysis shows no evidence of random-matrix behavior in level spacing statistics or the spectral form factor. Our findings illustrate that the clean versions of the SYK models represent simple but nontrivial examples of disorder-free quantum many-body systems displaying chaoslike behavior of OTOCs.
We consider the quantum-state-diffusion dynamics of the XXZ-staggered spin chain, also focusing on its noninteracting XX-staggered limit, and of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model. We describe the process through quantum trajectories and evaluate the nonstabilizerness (also known as ``magic'') along the trajectories, quantified by the stabilizer R\'enyi entropy (SRE). In the absence of measurements, we find that the SYK model is the only one in which the time-averaged SRE saturates the random state bound and has a scaling with the system size that is well described by the theoretical prediction for quantum chaotic systems. In the presence of measurements, we numerically find that the steady-state SRE versus the coupling strength to the environment is well fitted by a generalized Lorentzian function. The scaling of the fitting parameters with the system size suggests that the steady-state SRE linearly increases with the system size in all the considered cases and displays no measurement-induced quantum transition, as confirmed by the curves of the steady-state SRE versus the system size.
The Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model is of paramount importance for the understanding of both strange metals and a microscopic theory of two-dimensional gravity. We study the interplay between stabilizer R\'enyi entropy and entanglement entropy in both the ground state and highly excited states of the $\mathrm{SYK}\ensuremath{-}4+\mathrm{SYK}\ensuremath{-}2$ model, interpolating the highly chaotic four-body interactions model with the integrable two-body interactions one. The interplay between these quantities is also assessed through universal statistics of the entanglement spectrum and its antiflatness. We find that SYK-4 is indeed characterized by a complex pattern of both entanglement and nonstabilizer resources, while SYK-2 is nonuniversal and not complex. We discuss the fragility and robustness of these features depending on the interpolation parameter.
Under unitary evolution, chaotic quantum systems initialized in simple states rapidly develop high complexity, precluding any efficient classical description. Quantum chaos is traditionally characterized by spectral properties of the Hamiltonian, most notably through the spectral form factor, while the hardness of classical simulation within the stabilizer formalism, commonly referred to as quantum magic, can be quantified by the stabilizer Rényi entropy. In this Letter, we propose a relation between the dynamics of the stabilizer Rényi entropy for thermofield double states and the spectral form factor, based on general arguments for chaotic systems with all-to-all interactions. This relation implies that the saturation of the stabilizer Rényi entropy is governed by a first-order dynamical transition. We then demonstrate this relation explicitly in the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model, using an auxiliary-spin representation of the stabilizer Rényi entropy that exhibits an emergent Z2Z_2Z2​ symmetry. We further find that, in the high-temperature regime of the SYK model, the transition occurs at a finite time, with the long-time phase marked by spontaneous Z2Z_2Z2​ symmetry breaking. In contrast, at low temperatures, the transition is pushed to times exponentially long in the system size. Our results reveal an intriguing interplay between quantum chaos and quantum magic.
We study the spread of Rényi entropy between two halves of a Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) chain of Majorana fermions, prepared in a thermofield double (TFD) state. The SYK chain model is a model of chaotic many-body systems, which describes a one-dimensional lattice of Majorana fermions, with spatially local random quartic interaction. We find that for integer Rényi index n > 1, the Rényi entanglement entropy saturates at a parametrically smaller value than expected. This implies that the TFD state of the SYK chain does not rapidly thermalize, despite being maximally chaotic: instead, it rapidly approaches a prethermal state. We compare our results to the signatures of thermalization observed in other quenches in the SYK model, and to intuition from nearly-AdS2 gravity.