Exact metastability in a class of driven-dissipative quantum many-body systems

Abstract:Metastability in many-body quantum systems and its associated exponentially-long timescales have been the subject of considerable recent interest. Here, we focus on a class of driven-dissipative many-body open quantum systems described by a Lindbladian having hidden time-reversal symmetry (a form of quantum detailed balance). Examples include boundary-driven interacting spin chains, bosonic lattice models and driven-dissipative collective spin models. We suggest that for such systems, slow timescales in the vicinity of a dissipative first-order phase transition can be analytically predicted using a special purification of the non-equilibrium steady state. We show the accuracy of our conjecture through detailed studies of a dissipative transverse-field Ising model with collective and local decay, and a driven-dissipative nonlinear cavity model. Our results allow quantitative insights into metastability and slow dynamics for a range of systems, including cases where semiclassical or path-integral instanton approaches are intractable.

Quantum Physics (quant-ph); Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)

arXiv:2606.07736 [quant-ph]

(or arXiv:2606.07736v1 [quant-ph] for this version)

https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2606.07736 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)

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