In the study of quantum chaos diagnostics, considerable attention has been attributed to the Krylov complexity and the spectral form factor (SFF) for systems at infinite temperature. These investigations have unveiled universal properties of quantum chaotic systems. By extending the analysis to include the finite-temperature effects on the Krylov complexity and SFF, we demonstrate that the Lanczos coefficients b_{n}, which are associated with the Wightman inner product, display consistency with the universal hypothesis presented in Parker et al. [Phys. Rev. X 9, 041017 (2019)2160-330810.1103/PhysRevX.9.041017]. This result contrasts with the behavior of Lanczos coefficients associated with the standard inner product. Our results indicate that the slope α of the b_{n} is bounded by πk_{B}T, where k_{B} is the Boltzmann constant and T is the temperature. We also investigate the SFF, which characterizes the two-point correlation of the spectrum and encapsulates an indicator of ergodicity denoted by g in chaotic systems. Our analysis demonstrates that as the temperature decreases, the value of g decreases as well. Considering that α also represents the operator growth rate, we establish a quantitative relationship between the ergodicity indicator and the Lanczos coefficients' slope. To support our findings, we provide evidence using the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble and a random spin model. Our work deepens the understanding of the finite-temperature effects on the Krylov complexity, the SFF, and the connection between ergodicity and operator growth.
In the study of quantum chaos diagnostics, considerable attention has been attributed to the Krylov complexity and spectrum form factor (SFF) for systems at infinite temperature. These investigations have unveiled universal properties of quantum chaotic systems. By extending the analysis to include the finite temperature effects on the Krylov complexity and SFF, we demonstrate that the Lanczos coefficients
bn, which are associated with the Wightman inner product, display consistency with the universal hypothesis presented in PRX 9, 041017 (2019). This result contrasts with the behavior of Lanczos coefficients associated with the standard inner product. Our results indicate that the slope
α of the
bn is bounded by
πkBT, where
kB is the Boltzmann constant and
T the temperature. We also investigate the SFF, which characterizes the two-point correlation of the spectrum and encapsulates an indicator of ergodicity denoted by
g in chaotic systems. Our analysis demonstrates that as the temperature decreases, the value of
g decreases as well. Considering that
α also represents the operator growth rate, we establish a quantitative relationship between ergodicity indicator and Lanczos coefficients slope. To support our findings, we provide evidence using the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble and a random spin model. Our work deepens the understanding of the finite temperature effects on Krylov complexity, SFF, and the connection between ergodicity and operator growth.
Krylov complexity, as a novel measure of operator complexity under Heisenberg evolution, exhibits many interesting universal behaviors and also bounds many other complexity measures. In this work, we study Krylov complexity
K(t) in Random Matrix Theory (RMT). In large
N limit: (1) For infinite temperature, we analytically show that the Lanczos coefficient
{bn} saturate to constant plateau
n→∞limbn=b, rendering a linear growing complexity
K(t)∼t, in contrast to the exponential-in-time growth in chaotic local systems in thermodynamic limit. After numerically comparing this plateau value
b to a large class of chaotic local quantum systems, we find that up to small fluctuations, it actually bounds the
{bn} in chaotic local quantum systems. Therefore we conjecture that in chaotic local quantum systems after scrambling time, the speed of linear growth of Krylov complexity cannot be larger than that in RMT. (2) For low temperature, we analytically show that
bn will first exhibit linear growth with
n, whose slope saturates the famous chaos bound. After hitting the same plateau
b,
bn will then remain constant. This indicates
K(t)∼e2πt/β before scrambling time
t∗∼O(βlogβ), and after that it will grow linearly in time, with the same speed as in infinite temperature. We finally remark on the effect of finite
N corrections.
Quantum chaotic systems are conjectured to display a spectrum whose fine-grained features (gaps and correlations) are well described by random matrix theory (RMT). We propose and develop a complementary version of this conjecture: quantum chaotic systems display a Lanczos spectrum whose local means and covariances are well described by RMT. To support this proposal, we first demonstrate its validity in examples of chaotic and integrable systems. We then show that for Haar-random initial states in RMTs the mean and covariance of the Lanczos spectrum suffice to produce the full long-time behavior of general survival probabilities including the spectral form factor, as well as the spread complexity. In addition, for initial states with continuous overlap with energy eigenstates, we analytically find the long-time averages of the probabilities of Krylov basis elements in terms of the mean Lanczos spectrum. This analysis suggests a notion of eigenstate complexity, the statistics of which differentiate integrable systems and classes of quantum chaos. Finally, we clarify the relation between spread complexity and the universality classes of RMT by exploring various values of the Dyson index and Poisson distributed spectra.
A bstract We study Krylov complexity in Schrödinger field theory in the grand canonical ensemble with chemical potential μ , with an emphasis on the qualitatively new features that arise for μ > 0. In this regime the fermionic Wightman power spectrum is effectively single-sided and sharply truncated at ω = μ , which induces a crossover in the Lanczos coefficients and signals a dynamical transition from a bulk-dominated regime to a spectral-edge-dominated regime: b n displays a two-stage linear growth (from an early-time slope π/β to an asymptotic slope 2 /β ), while a n bends from near-zero values to a linear descent with slope −4 /β . We provide analytic support for the resulting complexity growth from three complementary viewpoints: (i) using an SL(2 , ℝ) algebraic construction matched to the asymptotic Lanczos data, we show that the late-time Krylov complexity must grow quadratically, K ( t ) ∝ t 2 ; (ii) by analyzing engineered Wightman spectra with controlled decay and truncation, we identify single-sided exponential decay as the key spectral feature responsible for the quadratic asymptotics, while an approximately even two-sided exponential spectrum explains the early-time K ( t ) ~ sinh 2 ( πt/β ) behavior at large μ ; (iii) we formulate the problem in terms of orthogonal polynomials and estimate the crossover scale separating the early- and late-stage regimes. Overall, our results help clarify the role of chemical potential and spectral truncation in shaping operator growth and Krylov complexity in this non-relativistic quantum field theory setting.
Krylov complexity has recently emerged as a new paradigm to characterize quantum chaos in many-body systems. However, which features of Krylov complexity are a prerogative of quantum chaotic systems and how they relate to more standard probes, such as spectral statistics or out-of-time-order correlators (OTOCs), remain open questions. Recent insights have revealed that in quantum chaotic systems Krylov state complexity exhibits a distinct peak during time evolution before settling into a well-understood late-time plateau. In this work we propose that this Krylov complexity peak (KCP) is a hallmark of quantum chaotic systems and suggest that its height could serve as an order parameter for quantum chaos. We demonstrate that the KCP effectively identifies chaotic-integrable transitions in two representative quantum-mechanical models at both infinite and finite temperature: the mass-deformed Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model and the sparse Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model. Our findings align with established results from spectral statistics and OTOCs while introducing an operator-independent diagnostic for quantum chaos, offering more universal insights and a deeper understanding of the general properties of quantum chaotic systems.
Recently, a novel measure for the complexity of operator growth is proposed based on Lanczos algorithm and Krylov recursion method. We study this Krylov complexity in quantum mechanical systems derived from some well-known local toric Calabi–Yau geometries, as well as some nonrelativistic models. We find that for the Calabi–Yau models, the Lanczos coefficients grow slower than linearly for small [Formula: see text]’s, consistent with the behavior of integrable models. On the other hand, for the nonrelativistic models, the Lanczos coefficients initially grow linearly for small [Formula: see text]’s, then reach a plateau. Although this looks like the behavior of a chaotic system, it is mostly likely due to saddle-dominated scrambling effects instead, as argued in the literature. In our cases, the slopes of linearly growing Lanczos coefficients almost saturate a bound by the temperature. During our study, we also provide an alternative general derivation of the bound for the slope.