Universality of Shallow Global Quenches in Critical Spin Chains

• URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2509.22773v1
• Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2025 18:00:00 GMT
• Title: Universality of Shallow Global Quenches in Critical Spin Chains
• Authors: Julia Wei, Méabh Allen, Jack Kemp, Chenbing Wang, Zixia Wei, Joel E. Moore, Norman Y. Yao,
• Abstract summary: We study the dynamics of local observables from two types of readily-accessible initial conditions.<n>We identify universal scaling collapses and scaling functions in both cases.<n>For the finite-temperature quenches, we determine a regime in which the conformal field theory results are recovered.
• Score: 0.039089069256361735
• License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Abstract: Measuring universal data in the strongly correlated regime of quantum critical points remains a fundamental objective for quantum simulators. In foundational work, Calabrese and Cardy demonstrated how this data governs the dynamics of certain global quenches to 1+1-dimensional conformal field theories. While the quasiparticle picture they introduce has been widely successful in both theory and experiment, their seminal prediction that the critical exponents are simply encoded in the relaxation rates of local observables is more challenging to investigate experimentally; in particular, the specific initial state required for their analysis is generated via imaginary time evolution. In this work, we examine the critical quench dynamics of local observables from two types of readily-accessible initial conditions: ground states and finite-temperature ensembles. We identify universal scaling collapses and scaling functions in both cases, utilizing a combination of conformal perturbation theory and tensor network numerics. For the finite-temperature quenches, we determine a regime in which the conformal field theory results are recovered, thereby allowing universal quantum critical data to be extracted from realistic quenches.

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