Infinite Time Limit Research Articles

Quantifying nonergodicity in nonautonomous dissipative dynamical systems: An application to climate change.

In nonautonomous dynamical systems, like in climate dynamics, an ensemble of trajectories initiated in the remote past defines a unique probability distribution, the natural measure of a snapshot attractor, for any instant of time, but this distribution typically changes in time. In cases with an aperiodic driving, temporal averages taken along a single trajectory would differ from the corresponding ensemble averages even in the infinite-time limit: ergodicity does not hold. It is worth considering this difference, which we call the nonergodic mismatch, by taking time windows of finite length for temporal averaging. We point out that the probability distribution of the nonergodic mismatch is qualitatively different in ergodic and nonergodic cases: its average is zero and typically nonzero, respectively. A main conclusion is that the difference of the average from zero, which we call the bias, is a useful measure of nonergodicity, for any window length. In contrast, the standard deviation of the nonergodic mismatch, which characterizes the spread between different realizations, exhibits a power-law decrease with increasing window length in both ergodic and nonergodic cases, and this implies that temporal and ensemble averages differ in dynamical systems with finite window lengths. It is the average modulus of the nonergodic mismatch, which we call the ergodicity deficit, that represents the expected deviation from fulfilling the equality of temporal and ensemble averages. As an important finding, we demonstrate that the ergodicity deficit cannot be reduced arbitrarily in nonergodic systems. We illustrate via a conceptual climate model that the nonergodic framework may be useful in Earth system dynamics, within which we propose the measure of nonergodicity, i.e., the bias, as an order-parameter-like quantifier of climate change.

A Memory of Majorana Modes through Quantum Quench.

We study the sudden quench of a one-dimensional p-wave superconductor through its topological signature in the entanglement spectrum. We show that the long-time evolution of the system and its topological characterization depend on a pseudomagnetic field Reff(k). Furthermore, Reff(k) connects both the initial and the final Hamiltonians, hence exhibiting a memory effect. In particular, we explore the robustness of the Majorana zero-mode and identify the parameter space in which the Majorana zero-mode can revive in the infinite-time limit.

Real-time dynamics in a strongly interacting bosonic hopping model: global quenches and mapping to the XX chain

.We study the time evolution of an integrable many-particle system, described by the q-boson Hamiltonian in the limit of strong bosonic interactions . It is shown that, for a particular class of pure initial states, the analytical calculation of certain observables simplifies considerably. Namely, we provide exact formulas for the calculation of the Loschmidt-echo and the emptiness formation probability, where the computational time scales polynomially with the particle number. Moreover, we construct a non-local mapping of the q -boson model to the XX spin chain, and show how this can be utilized to obtain the time evolution of various local bosonic observables for translationally invariant initial states. The results obtained via the bosonic and fermionic picture show perfect agreement. In the infinite volume and large time limits, we rigorously verify the prediction of the generalized Gibbs ensemble for homogeneous initial Fock states.

The distribution of heat fluctuations in resistively-coupled dual temperature heat baths

.A path integral approach used earlier to calculate the exact heat distribution function of a harmonically trapped Brownian oscillator at a fixed temperature (Chatterjee and Cherayil 2010 Phys. Rev. E 82 051104) is extended in this paper to a consideration of heat fluctuations in a dual temperature system. Our new calculations complement recent experimental data obtained by Ciliberto et al (2013 J. Stat. Mech. P12014) on the stochastic thermodynamics of an electrical circuit made up of coupled resistors maintained at two distinct temperatures. Measurements of various thermodynamic quantities in this system, including the heat, work and energy, reveal trends that represent interesting generalizations of results for the single temperature case. In particular, the measured distribution of the heat exchanged at one of the reservoirs is found to agree qualitatively with a fluctuation relation applicable at long times. In the present work, we exploit the formal equivalence between the electrical circuit and a system of coupled Brownian oscillators to derive, within the path integral formalism and for a special set of parameter values, an exact integral representation—valid for all times—of the total heat distribution function of the system. We find that the infinite-time limit of this distribution shows interesting departures from its expected behavior.

Entanglement Generation in Two-Mode Gaussian Systems in a Thermal Environment

We describe the evolution of the quantum entanglement in a system composed of two interacting bosonic modes immersed in a thermal reservoir, in the framework of the theory of open systems based on completely positive quantum dynamical semigroups. The evolution of entanglement is described in terms of the covariance matrix for Gaussian initial states. We calculate the logarithmic negativity and show that for separable initial squeezed thermal states entanglement generation may take place, for definite values of squeezing parameter, average photon numbers, temperature of the thermal bath, dissipation constant and the strength of interaction between the two modes. After its generation one can observe temporary suppressions and revivals of the entanglement. For entangled initial squeezed thermal states, entanglement suppression takes place, for all temperatures of the reservoir, and temporary revivals and suppressions of entanglement can be observed too. In the limit of infinite time the system evolves asymptotically to an equilibrium state which may be entangled or separable.

Localization, delocalization, and topological phase transitions in the one-dimensional split-step quantum walk

Quantum walks are promising for information processing tasks because on regular graphs they spread quadratically faster than random walks. Static disorder, however, can turn the tables: unlike random walks, quantum walks can suffer Anderson localization, whereby the spread of the walker stays within a finite region even in the infinite time limit. It is therefore important to understand when we can expect a quantum walk to be Anderson localized and when we can expect it to spread to infinity even in the presence of disorder. In this work we analyze the response of a generic one-dimensional quantum walk -- the split-step walk -- to different forms of static disorder. We find that introducing static, symmetry-preserving disorder in the parameters of the walk leads to Anderson localization. In the completely disordered limit, however, a delocalization sets in, and the walk spreads subdiffusively. Using an efficient numerical algorithm, we calculate the bulk topological invariants of the disordered walk, and interpret the disorder-induced Anderson localization and delocalization transitions using these invariants.

Unitary-Feedback-Improved Qubit Initialization in the Dispersive Regime

In quantum information processing one strives for quantum nondemolition (QND) measurements, which are least likely to perturb the subsequent evolution of the system. The authors show, however, that common superconducting-qubit readout schemes are in fact not QND. They identify a mechanism that induces an effective coherent rotation of the qubit, which means that such a scheme is QND only in the limit of infinite measurement time. This affects any protocol where measurement is used during computation, and therefore is of immediate importance to contemporary experiments. Thankfully, the authors also explain how to fix the problem.

Dynamics of Vortex Rossby Waves in Tropical Cyclones, Part 1: Linear Time‐Dependent Evolution on an f‐Plane

Analyses of observational data on hurricanes in the tropical atmosphere indicate the existence of spiral rainbands which propagate outward from the eye and affect the structure and intensity of the hurricane. These disturbances may be described as vortex Rossby waves. This paper describes the evolution of barotropic vortex Rossby waves in a cyclonic vortex in a two‐dimensional configuration where the variation of the Coriolis force with latitude is ignored. The waves are forced by a constant‐amplitude boundary condition at a fixed radius from the center of the vortex and propagate outward. The mean flow angular velocity profile is taken to be a quadratic function of the radial distance from the center of the vortex and there is a critical radius at which it is equal to the phase speed of the waves. For the case of waves with steady amplitude, an exact solution is derived for the steady linearized equations in terms of hypergeometric functions; this solution is valid in the outer region away from the critical radius. For the case of waves with time‐dependent amplitude, asymptotic solutions of the linearized equations, valid for late time, are obtained in the outer and inner regions. It is found that there are strong qualitative similarities between the conclusions on the evolution of the vortex waves in this configuration and those obtained in the case of Rossby waves in a rectangular configuration where the latitudinal gradient of the Coriolis parameter is taken into account. In particular, the amplitude of the steady‐state outer solution is greatly attenuated and there is a phase change of across the critical radius, and in the linear time‐dependent configuration, the outer solution approaches a steady state in the limit of infinite time, while the amplitude of the inner solution grows on a logarithmic time scale and the width of the critical layer approaches zero.

Asymptotic work statistics of periodically driven Ising chains

We study the work statistics of a periodically-driven integrable closed quantum system, addressing in particular the role played by the presence of a quantum critical point. Taking the example of a one-dimensional transverse Ising model in the presence of a spatially homogeneous but periodically time-varying transverse field of frequency , we arrive at the characteristic cumulant generating function G(u), which is then used to calculate the work distribution function P(W). By applying the Floquet theory we show that, in the infinite time limit, P(W) converges, starting from the initial ground state, towards an asymptotic steady state value whose small-W behaviour depends only on the properties of the small-wave-vector modes and on a few important ingredients: the time-averaged value of the transverse field, h0, the initial transverse field, , and the equilibrium quantum critical point , which we find to generate a sequence of non-equilibrium critical points , with l integer. When , we find a ‘universal’ edge singularity in P(W) at a threshold value of which is entirely determined by . The form of that singularity—Dirac delta derivative or square root—depends on h0 being or not at a non-equilibrium critical point h*l. On the contrary, when , G(u) decays as a power-law for large u, leading to different types of edge singularity at . Generalizing our calculations to the case in which we initialize the system in a finite temperature density matrix, the irreversible entropy generated by the periodic driving is also shown to reach a steady state value in the infinite time limit.

Some exact expressions for the temporal evolution of long Rossby waves on a beta-plane

Some exact expressions are derived to describe the temporal evolution of forced Rossby waves in a two-dimensional beta-plane configuration where the background flow has constant zonal-mean velocity. The meridional length scale of the problem is assumed to be small relative to the zonal length scale and so the long-wave limit of zero aspect ratio is taken. In the case where the background flow velocity is zero, an exact solution is obtained in terms of generalized hypergeometric functions. A late-time asymptotic approximation is obtained and it shows that the solution oscillates with time and its amplitude goes to zero in the limit of infinite time. In the case of a non-zero background flow velocity, the solution is evaluated using two different procedures which give two equivalent expressions in terms of different generalized hypergeometric functions. The late-time asymptotic behaviour is investigated and it is found that the solution approaches a steady state in the limit of infinite time.We also derive a solution in the form of an asymptotic series expansion for the more general situation where a Rossby wave packet is generated by a zonally-localized boundary condition comprising a continuous spectrum of wavenumbers or Fourier modes. The exact solutions found here can be used as leading-order solutions in weakly-nonlinear analyses and other studies involving more realistic configurations for time-dependent Rossby waves or wave packets.

Unruh effect without Rindler horizon

We investigate the Unruh effect for a massless scalar field in the two-dimensional Minkowski space in the presence of a uniformly accelerated perfect mirror, with the trajectory of the mirror chosen in such a way that the mirror completely masks the Rindler horizon from the space–time region of interest. We find that the characteristic thermodynamical properties of the effect remain unchanged, i.e. the response of a uniformly co-accelerated Unruh detector and the distribution of the Rindler particles retain their thermal form. However, since in this setup there are no unobserved degrees of freedom of the field, the thermal statistics of the Rindler particles are inconsistent with an initial pure vacuum, which leads us to reconsider the problem for the more physical case when the mirror is inertial in the past. In these conditions we find that the distribution of the Rindler particles is non-thermal even in the limit of infinite acceleration times, but effective thermal statistics can be recovered provided that one is restricted to the expectation values of smeared operators associated with finite norm Rindler states. We explain how the thermal statistics in our problem can be understood in analogy with those in the conventional version of the effect.

Time-dependent non-equilibrium dielectric response in QM/continuum approaches.

The Polarizable Continuum Models (PCMs) are some of the most inexpensive yet successful methods for including the effects of solvation in quantum-mechanical calculations of molecular systems. However, when applied to the electronic excitation process, these methods are restricted to dichotomously assuming either that the solvent has completely equilibrated with the excited solute charge density (infinite-time limit), or that it retains the configuration that was in equilibrium with the solute prior to excitation (zero-time limit). This renders the traditional PCMs inappropriate for resolving time-dependent solvent effects on non-equilibrium solute electron dynamics like those implicated in the instants following photoexcitation of a solvated molecular species. To extend the existing methods to this non-equilibrium regime, we herein derive and apply a new formalism for a general time-dependent continuum embedding method designed to be propagated alongside the solute's electronic degrees of freedom in the time domain. Given the frequency-dependent dielectric constant of the solvent, an equation of motion for the dielectric polarization is derived within the PCM framework and numerically integrated simultaneously with the time-dependent Hartree fock/density functional theory equations. Results for small molecular systems show the anticipated dipole quenching and electronic state dephasing/relaxation resulting from out-of-phase charge fluctuations in the dielectric and embedded quantum system.

Heat fluctuations and initial ensembles.

Time-integrated quantities such as work and heat increase incessantly in time during nonequilibrium processes near steady states. In the long-time limit, the average values of work and heat become asymptotically equivalent to each other, since they only differ by a finite energy change in average. However, the fluctuation theorem (FT) for the heat is found not to hold with the equilibrium initial ensemble, while the FT for the work holds. This reveals an intriguing effect of everlasting initial memory stored in rare events. We revisit the problem of a Brownian particle in a harmonic potential dragged with a constant velocity, which is in contact with a thermal reservoir. The heat and work fluctuations are investigated with initial Boltzmann ensembles at temperatures generally different from the reservoir temperature. We find that, in the infinite-time limit, the FT for the work is fully recovered for arbitrary initial temperatures, while the heat fluctuations significantly deviate from the FT characteristics except for the infinite initial-temperature limit (a uniform initial ensemble). Furthermore, we succeed in calculating finite-time corrections to the heat and work distributions analytically, using the modified saddle point integral method recently developed by us. Interestingly, we find noncommutativity between the infinite-time limit and the infinite-initial-temperature limit for the probability distribution function (PDF) of the heat.

Guaranteed energy-efficient bit reset in finite time.

Landauer's principle states that it costs at least kBTln2 of work to reset one bit in the presence of a heat bath at temperature T. The bound of kBTln2 is achieved in the unphysical infinite-time limit. Here we ask what is possible if one is restricted to finite-time protocols. We prove analytically that it is possible to reset a bit with a work cost close to kBTln2 in a finite time. We construct an explicit protocol that achieves this, which involves thermalizing and changing the system's Hamiltonian so as to avoid quantum coherences. Using concepts and techniques pertaining to single-shot statistical mechanics, we furthermore prove that the heat dissipated is exponentially close to the minimal amount possible not just on average, but guaranteed with high confidence in every run. Moreover, we exploit the protocol to design a quantum heat engine that works near the Carnot efficiency in finite time.

Finite-time interaction quench in a Luttinger liquid

We analyze the dynamics of a Luttinger model following a quench in the electron-electron interaction strength, where the change in the interaction strength occurs over a finite time scale $\tau$. We study the Loschmidt echo (the overlap between the initial and final state) as a function of time, both numerically and within a perturbation scheme, treating the change in the interaction as a small parameter, for all $\tau$. We derive the corrections appearing in, a.) the Loschmidt echo for a finite quench duration $\tau$, b.) the scaling of the echo following a sudden ($\tau \to 0$) quench, and c.) the scaling of the echo after an adiabatic ($\tau \to \infty$) quench. We study in detail, the limiting cases of the echo in the early time and infinite time limit, and provide scaling arguments to understand these in a general context. We also show that our perturbative results are in good agreement with the exact numerical ones.

Irrationality and quasiperiodicity in driven nonlinear systems.

We analyze the relationship between irrationality and quasiperiodicity in nonlinear driven systems. To that purpose, we consider a nonlinear system whose steady-state response is very sensitive to the periodic or quasiperiodic character of the input signal. In the infinite time limit, an input signal consisting of two incommensurate frequencies will be recognized by the system as quasiperiodic. We show that this is, in general, not true in the case of finite interaction times. An irrational ratio of the driving frequencies of the input signal is not sufficient for it to be recognized by the nonlinear system as quasiperiodic, resulting in observations which may differ by several orders of magnitude from the expected quasiperiodic behavior. Thus, the system response depends on the nature of the irrational ratio, as well as the observation time. We derive a condition for the input signal to be identified by the system as quasiperiodic. Such a condition also takes into account the sub-Fourier response of the nonlinear system.

Symmetries and conserved quantities in Lindblad master equations

This work is concerned with determination of the steady-state structure of time-independent Lindblad master equations, especially those possessing more than one steady state. The approach here is to treat Lindblad systems as generalizations of unitary quantum mechanics, extending the intuition of symmetries and conserved quantities to the dissipative case. We combine and apply various results to obtain an exhaustive characterization of the infinite-time behavior of Lindblad evolution, including both the structure of the infinite-time density matrix and its dependence on initial conditions. The effect of the environment in the infinite time limit can therefore be tracked exactly for arbitrary state initialization and without knowledge of dynamics at intermediate time. As a consequence, sufficient criteria for determining the steady state of a Lindblad master equation are obtained. These criteria are knowledge of the initial state, a basis for the steady-state subspace, and all conserved quantities. We give examples of two-qubit dissipation and single-mode $d$-photon absorption where all quantities are determined analytically. Applications of these techniques to quantum information, computation, and feedback control are discussed.

Evolutionary games on the lattice: best-response dynamics

The best-response dynamics is an example of an evolutionary game where players update their strategy in order to maximize their payoff. The main objective of this paper is to study a stochastic spatial version of this game based on the framework of interacting particle systems in which players are located on an infinite square lattice. In the presence of two strategies, and calling a strategy selfish or altruistic depending on a certain ordering of the coefficients of the underlying payoff matrix, a simple analysis of the nonspatial mean-field approximation of the spatial model shows that a strategy is evolutionary stable if and only if it is selfish, making the system bistable when both strategies are selfish. The spatial and nonspatial models agree when at least one strategy is altruistic. In contrast, we prove that in the presence of two selfish strategies and in any spatial dimension, only the most selfish strategy remains evolutionary stable. The main ingredients of the proof are monotonicity results and a coupling between the best-response dynamics properly rescaled in space with bootstrap percolation to compare the infinite time limits of both systems.

Precise algorithm to generate random sequential addition of hard hyperspheres at saturation

The study of the packing of hard hyperspheres in d-dimensional Euclidean space R^{d} has been a topic of great interest in statistical mechanics and condensed matter theory. While the densest known packings are ordered in sufficiently low dimensions, it has been suggested that in sufficiently large dimensions, the densest packings might be disordered. The random sequential addition (RSA) time-dependent packing process, in which congruent hard hyperspheres are randomly and sequentially placed into a system without interparticle overlap, is a useful packing model to study disorder in high dimensions. Of particular interest is the infinite-time saturation limit in which the available space for another sphere tends to zero. However, the associated saturation density has been determined in all previous investigations by extrapolating the density results for nearly saturated configurations to the saturation limit, which necessarily introduces numerical uncertainties. We have refined an algorithm devised by us [S. Torquato, O. U. Uche, and F. H. Stillinger, Phys. Rev. E 74, 061308 (2006)] to generate RSA packings of identical hyperspheres. The improved algorithm produce such packings that are guaranteed to contain no available space in a large simulation box using finite computational time with heretofore unattained precision and across the widest range of dimensions (2≤d≤8). We have also calculated the packing and covering densities, pair correlation function g(2)(r), and structure factor S(k) of the saturated RSA configurations. As the space dimension increases, we find that pair correlations markedly diminish, consistent with a recently proposed "decorrelation" principle, and the degree of "hyperuniformity" (suppression of infinite-wavelength density fluctuations) increases. We have also calculated the void exclusion probability in order to compute the so-called quantizer error of the RSA packings, which is related to the second moment of inertia of the average Voronoi cell. Our algorithm is easily generalizable to generate saturated RSA packings of nonspherical particles.

Quench dynamics of topological maximally entangled states

We investigate the quench dynamics of the one-particle entanglement spectra (OPES) for systems with topologically nontrivial phases. By using dimerized chains as an example, it is demonstrated that the evolution of OPES for the quenched bipartite systems is governed by an effective Hamiltonian which is characterized by a pseudospin in a time-dependent pseudomagnetic field S(k,t). The existence and evolution of the topological maximally entangled states (tMESs) are determined by the winding number of S(k,t) in the k-space. In particular, the tMESs survive only if nontrivial Berry phases are induced by the winding of S(k,t). In the infinite-time limit the equilibrium OPES can be determined by an effective time-independent pseudomagnetic field Seff(k). Furthermore, when tMESs are unstable, they are destroyed by quasiparticles within a characteristic timescale in proportion to the system size.