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arXiv · 2212.09327

Spontaneous symmetry breaking in non-steady modes of open quantum many-body systems

Abstract

In a quantum many-body system coupled to the environment, its steady state can exhibit spontaneous symmetry breaking when a control parameter exceeds a critical value. In this study, we consider spontaneous symmetry breaking in non-steady modes of an open quantum many-body system. Assuming that the time evolution of the density matrix of the system is described by a Markovian master equation, the dynamics of the system is fully characterized by the eigenmodes and spectrum of the corresponding time evolution superoperator. Among the non-steady eigenmodes with finite lifetimes, we focus on the eigenmodes with the highest frequency, which we call the most coherent mode. For a dissipative spin model, it is shown that the most coherent mode exhibits a transition from a disordered phase to a symmetry-broken ordered phase, even if the steady state does not show singular behavior. We further argue that the phase transition of the most coherent mode induces a qualitative change in the decoherence dynamics of highly entangled states, i.e., the Schrödinger's cat states.

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Taiki Haga. 2023-05-11. Spontaneous symmetry breaking in non-steady modes of open quantum many-body systems. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreva.107.052208

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