arXiv subjects

Amit Vikram

Publications and source records attributed to Amit Vikram.

16 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Aperiodicity is sufficient for macroscopic thermalization

We identify a general mechanism for the finite-time thermalization of macroscopic observables, such as coarse-grained charge densities, in terms of elementary forms of the quantum dynamics of initial states: (1) aperiodicity, which provides a computable measure of (2) a dynamical partially ergodic exploration of the Hilbert space. Specifically, this mechanism predicts the equilibration of all (concentrated) macroscopic observables, in almost all states in an initial ensemble and almost all times within finite and longer intervals, given only the observable-independent information that the return probability of the ensemble of initial states is small over a finite time range. As a special case, it also accesses standard results on equilibration over infinitely long times in terms of (stronger versions of) the effective dimension of initial state delocalization in the energy eigenbasis. Our results incorporate macroscopic thermalization into the domain of operational quantum statistical mechanics, recently developed to provide finitely computable criteria for microscopic thermalization. We discuss an overall characterization of this approach as establishing connections between (1) the decay of a (theoretically or experimentally) computable probe indicating memorylessness, (2) a fundamental invariant mechanism in terms of the alignment of observables or states in the Hilbert space, and (3) predicting different natural forms of (classical and) quantum thermalization, most of which rigorously recover conventional eigenstate-based descriptions of infinite-time thermalization as a special case but provide stronger accessible predictions over finite observation times in the thermodynamic limit.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2026

Non-perturbative saturation of Krylov complexity, and its implications in quantum gravity

We study the dynamics of Krylov state complexity in finite-dimensional quantum systems. Orthogonal polynomials built on a discrete energy spectrum crowd away from regions where the density of states is low at large Krylov index. The physical implication of this result is that, even using a minimalist Krylov state complexity which is defined over the entire spectrum, the Krylov complexity provably stops growing a little past the Heisenberg length in every low-energy state. This has interesting implications for the proposal that Krylov complexity is related to the wormhole length in 2D quantum gravity.

hep-th↗

arXiv2026

Provable quantum thermalization without statistical averages

We develop a rigorous system-agnostic method to predict quantum thermalization in an overwhelming fraction of accessible pure states in a many-body system, entirely in terms of certain out-of-time-ordered correlators of few-body observables. In contrast to previous rigorous results on thermalization with semiclassical counterparts, our method is not limited to statistical averages of observables, such as time averages in ergodicity or state averages in mixing. Moreover, consistent with such approaches, we retain the advantage of not requiring a detailed knowledge of energy eigenstate structure or thermodynamically large times, which can become intractable for systems with more than a handful of particles. Our approach is centered on a geometric result that connects thermalization to the alignment of high dimensional subspaces in a Hilbert space, which is determined by the saturation of "controllably nonlocal" out-of-time-ordered correlators. This formalism reduces the problem of establishing pure state quantum thermalization at finite times in almost all complex many-body states to a theoretically or experimentally accessible study of few-body correlators, even in thermodynamically large systems.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2026

Bidirectional teleportation using scrambling dynamics: a practical protocol

We show that quantum information scrambling can enable a generic SWAP gate between collective degrees of freedom in systems without universal local control. Our protocol combines the Hayden-Preskill recovery scheme, associated with the black hole information paradox, with quantum teleportation and runs them in parallel and in opposite directions, enabling bidirectional exchange of quantum states through global interactions alone. This approach cleanly distinguishes the roles of information spreading, entanglement, and chaos for enabling both coherent state transfer and recovery. We propose an experimental realization using the Dicke model, which can be realized in cavity-QED and trapped-ion platforms, highlighting the utility of holography in designing practical quantum gates.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

Enhanced entanglement from quantum ergodicity

The quantum chaos conjecture associates the spectral statistics of a quantum system with abstract notions of quantum ergodicity. Such associations are taken to be of fundamental and sometimes defining importance for quantum chaos, but their practical relevance has been challenged by theoretical and experimental developments. Here, in counterpoint, we show that ergodic dynamics can be directly utilized for the preparation of quantum states with parametrically higher entanglement than generated by maximally scrambling dynamics such as in random unitary circuits. Our setting involves quantum systems coupled via a "non-demolition" interaction of conserved charges. We derive an exact relation between the evolving entanglement of an initial product state and a measure of spectral statistics of the interacting charges in this state. This connection is explained via a notion of Krylov vector ergodicity, tied to the ability of quantum dynamics to generate orthonormal states over time. We consider exploiting this phenomenon for the preparation of approximate Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) states between complex systems, a crucial resource for tasks such as quantum teleportation. We quantitatively show that the transfer of operators between entangled systems, which underlies the utility of the EPR state, can be performed with parametrically larger capacity for entanglement generated via ergodic dynamics than with maximal scrambling. Our analysis suggests a direct application of "ergodic" spectral statistics as a potential resource for quantum information tasks.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

On the reconstruction map in JT gravity

An open question in AdS/CFT is how to reconstruct semiclassical bulk operators precisely enough that non-perturbative quantum effects can be computed. We propose a set of physically-motivated requirements for such a reconstruction map, and explicitly construct a map satisfying these requirements in Jackiw-Teitelboim (JT) gravity. Our map is found by canonically quantizing "action-angle" variables for JT gravity, which are chosen to ensure that the spectrum of the fundamental quantum theory matches known results from the gravitational path integral. We then study unitary quantum dynamics in this theory, and obtain analytical predictions for the dynamics of the wormhole length, including its quantum fluctuations, leveraging techniques from quantum ergodicity theory. Level repulsion in the non-perturbative JT spectrum implies that the average wormhole length is non-monotonic in time, that fluctuations in wormhole length are non-perturbatively suppressed until nearly the Heisenberg time, and that the late-time-evolved Hartle-Hawking state has a heavy-tailed distribution of lengths. We discuss the implications of our results for the "complexity = volume" conjecture.

hep-th↗

arXiv2025

A discrete Fourier transform based quantum circuit for modular multiplication in Shor's algorithm

Shor's algorithm for the prime factorization of numbers provides an exponential speedup over the best known classical algorithms. However, nontrivial practical applications have remained out of reach due to experimental limitations. The bottleneck of the experimental realization of the algorithm is the modular exponentiation operation. In this paper, based on a relation between the modular multiplication operator and generalizations of discrete Fourier transforms, we propose a quantum circuit for modular exponentiation. A distinctive feature of our proposal is that our circuit can be entirely implemented in terms of the standard quantum circuit for the discrete Fourier transform and its variants. The gate-complexity of our proposal is $O(L^3)$ where L is the number of bits required to store the number being factorized. It is possible that such a proposal may provide easier avenues for near-term generic implementations of Shor's algorithm, in contrast to existing realizations which have often explicitly adapted the circuit to the number being factorized.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

Bypassing eigenstate thermalization with experimentally accessible quantum dynamics

Eigenstate thermalization has played a prominent role as a determiner of the validity of quantum statistical mechanics since von Neumann's early works on quantum ergodicity. However, its connection to the dynamical process of quantum thermalization relies sensitively on nondegeneracy properties of the energy spectrum, as well as detailed features of individual eigenstates that are effective only over correspondingly large timescales, rendering it generically inaccessible given practical timescales and finite experimental resources. Here, we introduce the notion of energy-band thermalization to address these limitations, by coarse-graining over energy level spacings with a finite energy resolution. We show that energy-band thermalization implies the thermalization of an observable in almost all states (in any orthonormal basis) over accessible timescales without relying on microscopic properties of the energy eigenvalues or eigenstates, and conversely, can be efficiently accessed in experiments via the dynamics of a single mixed state (for a given observable) with only polynomially many resources in the system size. This allows us to directly determine thermalization, including in the presence of conserved charges, from this state: Most strikingly, if an observable thermalizes in this initial state over a finite range of times, then it must thermalize in almost all physical initial states over all longer timescales. As applications, we derive a finite-time Mazur-Suzuki inequality for quantum transport with approximately conserved charges, and establish the thermalization of local observables over finite timescales in almost all accessible states in (generally inhomogeneous) dual-unitary quantum circuits. We also propose measurement protocols for general many-qubit systems. This work initiates a rigorous treatment of quantum thermalization in terms of experimentally accessible quantities.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2024

Proof of a Universal Speed Limit on Fast Scrambling in Quantum Systems

We prove that the time required for sustained information scrambling in any Hamiltonian quantum system is universally at least logarithmic in the entanglement entropy of scrambled states. This addresses two foundational problems in nonequilibrium quantum dynamics. (1) It sets the earliest possible time for the applicability of equilibrium statistical mechanics in a quantum system coupled to a bath at a finite temperature. (2) It proves a version of the fast scrambling conjecture, originally motivated in models associated with black holes, as a fundamental property of quantum mechanics itself. Our result builds on a refinement of the energy-time uncertainty principle in terms of the infinite temperature spectral form factor in quantum chaos. We generalize this formulation to arbitrary initial states of the bath, including finite temperature states, by mapping Hamiltonian dynamics with any initial state to nonunitary dynamics at infinite temperature. A regularized spectral form factor emerges naturally from this procedure, whose decay is universally constrained by analyticity in complex time. This establishes an exact speed limit on information scrambling by the most general quantum mechanical Hamiltonian, without any restrictions on locality or the nature of interactions.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2023

Spectral anomalies and broken symmetries in maximally chaotic quantum maps

Spectral statistics such as the level spacing statistics and spectral form factor (SFF) are widely expected to accurately identify ``ergodicity'', including the presence of underlying macroscopic symmetries, in generic quantum systems ranging from quantized chaotic maps to interacting many-body systems. By studying various quantizations of maximally chaotic maps that break a discrete classical symmetry upon quantization, we demonstrate that this approach can be misleading and fail to detect macroscopic symmetries. Notably, the same classical map can exhibit signatures of different random matrix symmetry classes in short-range spectral statistics depending on the quantization. While the long-range spectral statistics encoded in the early time ramp of the SFF are more robust and correctly identify macroscopic symmetries in several common quantizations, we also demonstrate analytically and numerically that the presence of Berry-like phases in the quantization leads to spectral anomalies, which break this correspondence. Finally, we provide numerical evidence that long-range spectral rigidity remains directly correlated with ergodicity in the quantum dynamical sense of visiting a complete orthonormal basis.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2023

Chaotic Roots of the Modular Multiplication Dynamical System in Shor's Algorithm

Shor's factoring algorithm, believed to provide an exponential speedup over classical computation, relies on finding the period of an exactly periodic quantum modular multiplication operator. This exact periodicity is the hallmark of an integrable system, which is paradoxical from the viewpoint of quantum chaos, given that the classical limit of the modular multiplication operator is a highly chaotic system that occupies the "maximally random" Bernoulli level of the classical ergodic hierarchy. In this work, we approach this apparent paradox from a quantum dynamical systems viewpoint, and consider whether signatures of ergodicity and chaos may indeed be encoded in such an "integrable" quantization of a chaotic system. We show that Shor's modular multiplication operator, in specific cases, can be written as a superposition of quantized A-baker's maps exhibiting more typical signatures of quantum chaos and ergodicity. This work suggests that the integrability of Shor's modular multiplication operator may stem from the interference of other "chaotic" quantizations of the same family of maps, and paves the way for deeper studies on the interplay of integrability, ergodicity and chaos in and via quantum algorithms.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Exact universal bounds on quantum dynamics and fast scrambling

Quantum speed limits such as the Mandelstam-Tamm or Margolus-Levitin bounds offer a quantitative formulation of the energy-time uncertainty principle that constrains dynamics over short times. We show that the spectral form factor, a central quantity in quantum chaos, sets a universal state-independent bound on the quantum dynamics of a complete set of initial states over arbitrarily long times, which is tighter than the corresponding state-independent bounds set by known speed limits. This bound further generalizes naturally to the real-time dynamics of time-dependent or dissipative systems where no energy spectrum exists. We use this result to constrain the scrambling of information in interacting many-body systems. For Hamiltonian systems, we show that the fundamental question of the fastest possible scrambling time -- without any restrictions on the structure of interactions -- maps to a purely mathematical property of the density of states involving the non-negativity of Fourier transforms. We illustrate these bounds in the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model, where we show that despite its "maximally chaotic" nature, the sustained scrambling of sufficiently large fermion subsystems via entanglement generation requires an exponentially long time in the subsystem size.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Dynamical quantum ergodicity from energy level statistics

Ergodic theory provides a rigorous mathematical description of chaos in classical dynamical systems, including a formal definition of the ergodic hierarchy. How ergodic dynamics is reflected in the energy levels and eigenstates of a quantum system is the central question of quantum chaos, but a rigorous quantum notion of ergodicity remains elusive. Closely related to the classical ergodic hierarchy is a less-known notion of cyclic approximate periodic transformations [see, e.g., I. Cornfield, S. Fomin, and Y. Sinai, Ergodic Theory (Springer-Verlag New York, 1982)], which maps any "ergodic" dynamical system to a cyclic permutation on a circle and arguably represents the most elementary form of ergodicity. This paper shows that cyclic ergodicity generalizes to quantum dynamical systems, and provides a rigorous observable-independent definition of quantum ergodicity. It implies the ability to construct an orthonormal basis, where quantum dynamics transports any initial basis vector to have a sufficiently large overlap with each of the other basis vectors in a cyclic sequence. It is proven that the basis, maximizing the overlap over all such quantum cyclic permutations, is obtained via the discrete Fourier transform of the energy eigenstates. This relates quantum cyclic ergodicity to energy level statistics. The level statistics of Wigner-Dyson random matrices, usually associated with quantum chaos on empirical grounds, is derived as a special case of this general relation. To demonstrate generality, we prove that irrational flows on a 2D torus are classical and quantum cyclic ergodic, with spectral rigidity distinct from Wigner-Dyson. Finally, we motivate a quantum ergodic hierarchy of operators and discuss connections to eigenstate thermalization. This work provides a general framework for transplanting some rigorous concepts of ergodic theory to quantum dynamical systems.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Probing many-body quantum chaos with quantum simulators

The spectral form factor (SFF), characterizing statistics of energy eigenvalues, is a key diagnostic of many-body quantum chaos. In addition, partial spectral form factors (PSFFs) can be defined which refer to subsystems of the many-body system. They provide unique insights into energy eigenstate statistics of many-body systems, as we show in an analysis on the basis of random matrix theory and of the eigenstate thermalization hypothesis. We propose a protocol that allows the measurement of the SFF and PSFFs in quantum many-body spin models, within the framework of randomized measurements. Aimed to probe dynamical properties of quantum many-body systems, our scheme employs statistical correlations of local random operations which are applied at different times in a single experiment. Our protocol provides a unified testbed to probe many-body quantum chaotic behavior, thermalization and many-body localization in closed quantum systems which we illustrate with numerical simulations for Hamiltonian and Floquet many-body spin-systems.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2020

Many-body level statistics of single-particle quantum chaos

We consider a non-interacting many-fermion system populating levels of a unitary random matrix ensemble (equivalent to the q=2 complex Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model) - a generic model of single-particle quantum chaos. We study the corresponding many-particle level statistics by calculating the spectral form factor analytically using algebraic methods of random matrix theory, and match it with an exact numerical simulation. Despite the integrability of the theory, the many-body spectral rigidity is found to have a surprisingly rich landscape. In particular, we find a residual repulsion of distant many-body levels stemming from single-particle chaos, together with islands of level attraction. These results are encoded in an exponential ramp in the spectral form-factor, which we show to be a universal feature of non-ergodic many-fermion systems embedded in a chaotic medium.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2019

Quantum Correlators in Friedmann Spacetimes -The omnipresent de Sitter and the invariant vacuum noise

We discuss several aspects of quantum field theory of a scalar field in a Friedmann universe, clarifying and highlighting several conceptual and technical issues. (A) We show that one can map the dynamics of (1) a massless scalar field in a universe with power law expansion to (2) a massive scalar field in the de Sitter spacetime, which allows us to understand several features of either system and clarifies several issues related to the massless limit. (B) We obtain a useful integral representation for the Euclidean Green's function for the de Sitter spacetime, by relating it to the solution of a hypothetical electrostatic problem in five dimensions. This is helpful in the study of several relevant limits. (C) We recover that in any Friedmann universe, sourced by a negative pressure fluid, the Wightman function for a massless scalar field is divergent. This shows that the divergence of Wightman function for the massless field in the de Sitter spacetime is just a special, limiting, case of this general phenomenon. (D) We provide a generally covariant procedure for defining the power spectrum of vacuum fluctuations in terms of the different Killing vectors present in the spacetime. This allows one to study the interplay of the choice of vacuum state and the nature of the power spectrum in different coordinate systems, in the de Sitter universe, in a unified manner. (Truncated Abstract; see the paper for full Abstract.)

gr-qc↗