Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium

The quantum dynamics of interacting many-body systems has become a unique venue for the realization of novel states of matter. Here, we unveil a new class of nonequilibrium states that are eigenstates of an emergent local Hamiltonian. The latter is explicitly time dependent and, even though it does...

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Main Authors: Lev Vidmar, Deepak Iyer, Marcos Rigol
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: American Physical Society 2017-04-01
Series:Physical Review X
Online Access:http://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.7.021012
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author Lev Vidmar
Deepak Iyer
Marcos Rigol
author_facet Lev Vidmar
Deepak Iyer
Marcos Rigol
author_sort Lev Vidmar
collection DOAJ
description The quantum dynamics of interacting many-body systems has become a unique venue for the realization of novel states of matter. Here, we unveil a new class of nonequilibrium states that are eigenstates of an emergent local Hamiltonian. The latter is explicitly time dependent and, even though it does not commute with the physical Hamiltonian, it behaves as a conserved quantity of the time-evolving system. We discuss two examples of integrable systems in which the emergent eigenstate solution can be applied for an extensive (in system size) time: transport in one-dimensional lattices with initial particle (or spin) imbalance and sudden expansion of quantum gases in optical lattices. We focus on noninteracting spinless fermions, hard-core bosons, and the Heisenberg model. We show that current-carrying states can be ground states of emergent local Hamiltonians, and that they can exhibit a quasimomentum distribution function that is peaked at nonzero (and tunable) quasimomentum. We also show that time-evolving states can be highly excited eigenstates of emergent local Hamiltonians, with an entanglement entropy that does not exhibit volume-law scaling.
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spelling doaj.art-80b5cf0234f54293b98d8e1f1f539fa12022-12-21T18:35:40ZengAmerican Physical SocietyPhysical Review X2160-33082017-04-017202101210.1103/PhysRevX.7.021012Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from EquilibriumLev VidmarDeepak IyerMarcos RigolThe quantum dynamics of interacting many-body systems has become a unique venue for the realization of novel states of matter. Here, we unveil a new class of nonequilibrium states that are eigenstates of an emergent local Hamiltonian. The latter is explicitly time dependent and, even though it does not commute with the physical Hamiltonian, it behaves as a conserved quantity of the time-evolving system. We discuss two examples of integrable systems in which the emergent eigenstate solution can be applied for an extensive (in system size) time: transport in one-dimensional lattices with initial particle (or spin) imbalance and sudden expansion of quantum gases in optical lattices. We focus on noninteracting spinless fermions, hard-core bosons, and the Heisenberg model. We show that current-carrying states can be ground states of emergent local Hamiltonians, and that they can exhibit a quasimomentum distribution function that is peaked at nonzero (and tunable) quasimomentum. We also show that time-evolving states can be highly excited eigenstates of emergent local Hamiltonians, with an entanglement entropy that does not exhibit volume-law scaling.http://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.7.021012
spellingShingle Lev Vidmar
Deepak Iyer
Marcos Rigol
Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium
Physical Review X
title Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium
title_full Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium
title_fullStr Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium
title_full_unstemmed Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium
title_short Emergent Eigenstate Solution to Quantum Dynamics Far from Equilibrium
title_sort emergent eigenstate solution to quantum dynamics far from equilibrium
url http://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.7.021012
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AT deepakiyer emergenteigenstatesolutiontoquantumdynamicsfarfromequilibrium
AT marcosrigol emergenteigenstatesolutiontoquantumdynamicsfarfromequilibrium