Experiments on quantum chaos using microwave cavities: Results for the pseudo-integrable L-billiard

We describe microwave experiments used to study billiard geometries as model problems of non-integrability in quantum or wave mechanics. The experiments can study arbitrary 2-D geometries, including chaotic and even disordered billiards. Detailed results on an L-shaped pseudo-integrable billiard are discussed as an example. The eigenvalue statistics are well-described by empirical formulae incorporating the fraction of phase space that is non-integrable. The eigenfunctions are directly measured, and their statistical properties are shown to be influenced by non-isolated periodic orbits, similar to that for the chaotic Sinai billiard. These periodic orbits are directly observed in the Fourier transform of the eigenvalue spectrum.     

Intermediate wave function statistics

We calculate statistical properties of the eigenfunctions of two quantum systems that exhibit intermediate spectral statistics: star graphs and Seba billiards. First, we show that these eigenfunctions are not quantum ergodic, and calculate the corresponding limit distribution. Second, we find that they can be strongly scarred, in the case of star graphs by short (unstable) periodic orbits and, in the case of Seba billiards, by certain families of orbits. We construct sequences of states which have such a limit. Our results are illustrated by numerical computations.     

Reduction of the semisimple 1:1 resonance

The method of “averaging” is often used in Hamiltonian systems of two degrees of freedom to find periodic orbits. Such periodic orbits can be reconstructed from the critical points of an associated “reduced” Hamiltonian on a “reduced space”. This paper details the construction of the reduced space and the reduced Hamiltonian for the semisimple 1:1 resonance case. The reduced space will be a 2-sphere in R³, and the reduced differential equations will be Euler's equations restricted to this sphere. The orbit projection from the energy surface in phase space to this sphere will be the Hopf map. The results of the paper are related to problems in physics on “degeneracies” due to symmetries of classical two-dimensional harmonic oscillators and their quantum analogues for the hydrogen atom.     

复杂势场量子弹球中疤痕态的量子化条件

量子疤痕是波函数在经典不稳定周期轨道周围反常凝聚的一种量子或波动现象.人们对疤痕态的量子化条件进行了大量研究,对深入理解半经典量子化起到了一定的促进作用.之前大部分研究工作主要集中在硬墙量子弹球上,即给定边界形状的无穷深量子势阱系统.本文研究具有光滑复杂势场的二维量子弹球系统,考察疤痕态的量子化条件及其重复出现的规律,得到了与硬墙弹球不一样的结果,对理解这类现象是一个有益的补充.这些结果将有助于理解具有无规长程杂质分布的二维电子系统的态密度谱和输运行为.     

The scar mechanism revisited

Unstable periodic orbits are known to originate scars on some eigen-functions of classically chaotic systems through recurrences causing that some part of an initial distribution of quantum probability in its vicinity returns periodically close to the initial point. In the energy domain, these recurrences are seen to accumulate quantum density along the orbit by a constructive interference mechanism when the appropriate quantization (on the action of the scarring orbit) is fulfilled. Other quantized phase space circuits, such as those defined by homoclinic tori, are also important in the coherent transport of quantum density in chaotic systems. The relationship of this secondary quantum transport mechanism with the standard mechanism for scarring is here discussed and analyzed.     

Origin of conductance oscillations in square electron billiards: A semi-classical approach

We perform semi-classical and quantum mechanical calculations on square billiards and provide a semi-classical interpretation of the conductance oscillations. We outline its relation to the Gutzwiller's picture of periodic orbits. The frequencies of the conductance oscillations are shown to be due to interference of pairs of long trajectories, which in the phase space are typically situated near the corresponding periodic orbit. We identify the pair of trajectories causing the pronounced peak in a recent experiment and from this directly extract the phase coherence length.     

Chaos in composite billiards

The mechanisms and features of the chaotic behavior in billiards with ray splitting (refraction) are considered. In contrast to ordinary billiards, the law of motion in composite billiards that is coded with a sequence of ray visits to different media is shown to be deterministically chaotic. The analysis is performed in terms of a geometrical-dynamical approach in which a symmetric phase space is used instead of the ordinary Hamiltonian phase space. The chaotization elements in composite billiards of a general position are studied. The dynamics of rays in ring billiards consisting of two concentric media with different refractive indices is considered.     

Quantum spectra and classical periodic orbit in the cubic billiard

Quantum billiards have attracted much interest in many fields. People have made a lot of researches on the two-dimensional (2D) billiard systems. Contrary to the 2D billiard, due to the complication of its classical periodic orbits, no one has studied the correspondence between the quantum spectra and the classical orbits of the three-dimensional (3D) billiards. Taking the cubic billiard as an example, using the periodic orbit theory, we find the periodic orbit of the cubic billiard and study the correspondence between the quantum spectra and the length of the classical orbits in 3D system. The Fourier transformed spectrum of this system has allowed direct comparison between peaks in such plot and the length of the periodic orbits, which verifies the correctness of the periodic orbit theory. This is another example showing that semiclassical method provides a bridge between quantum and classical mechanics.     

Classical projected phase space density of billiards and its relation to the quantum neumann spectrum

A comparison of classical and quantum evolution usually involves a quasiprobability distribution as a quantum analogue of the classical phase space distribution. In an alternate approach that we adopt here, the classical density is projected on to the configuration space. We show that for billiards, the eigenfunctions of the coarse-grained projected classical evolution operator are identical to a first approximation to the quantum Neumann eigenfunctions. However, even though there exists a correspondence between the respective eigenvalues, their time evolutions differ. This is demonstrated numerically for the stadium and lemon-shaped billiards.     

The Weyl representation in classical and quantum mechanics

The position representation of the evolution operator in quantum mechanics is analogous to the generating function formalism of classical mechanics. Similarly, the Weyl representation is connected to new generating functions described by chords and centres in phase space. Both classical and quantal theories relie on the group of translations and reflections through a point in phase space. The composition of small time evolutions leads to new versions of the classical variational principle and to path integrals in quantum mechanics. The strong resemblance between the two theories allows a clear derivation of the semiclassical limit in which observables evolve classically in the Weyl representation. The restriction of the motion to the energy shell in classical mechanics is the basis for a full review of the semiclassical Wigner function and the theory of scars of periodic orbits. By embedding the theory of scars in a fully uniform approximation, it is shown that the region in which the scar contribution is oscillatory is separated from a decaying region by a caustic that touches the shell along the periodic orbit and widens quadratically within the energy shell.     

周期轨道与求迹公式–可积系统

选择二维无关联四次振子系统作为理论模型来验证Berry–Tabor公式的有效性.在有理环面上积分Hamiltonian运动方程得到一系列的周期轨道,细致构造有理环面附近的轨道得到能量面上的曲率,并应用Berry–Tabor求迹公式经过Fourier变换得到的作用量函数,在作用量S<30的区间上,与得到的相应量子作用量函数进行了比较,其结果的一致性验证了求迹公式的有效性.最后,对量子作用量函数RQM(S,E)–S图上经典周期轨道作用量处出现的δ峰进行了讨论.     

Signatures of homoclinic motion in quantum chaos

Homoclinic motion plays a key role in the organization of classical chaos in Hamiltonian systems. In this Letter, we show that it also imprints a clear signature in the corresponding quantum spectra. By numerically studying the fluctuations of the widths of wave functions localized along periodic orbits we reveal the existence of an oscillatory behavior that is explained solely in terms of the primary homoclinic motion. Furthermore, our results indicate that it survives the semiclassical limit.     

Quantum effects of periodic orbits for the kicked top

We analyze traces of powers of the time evolution operator of a periodically kicked top. Semiclassically, such traces are related to periodic orbits of the classical map. We derive the semiclassical traces in a coherent state basis and show how the periodic orbits can be recovered via a Fourier transform. A breakdown of the stationary phase approximation is detected. The quasi energy spectrum remains elusive due to lack of knowledge of sufficiently many periodic orbits. Divergencies of periodic orbit formulas are avoided by appealing to the finiteness of the quantum mechanical Hilbert space. The traces also enter the coefficients of the characteristic polynominal of the Floquet operator. Statistical properties of these coefficients give rise to a new criterion for the distinction of chaos and regular motion.     

Quantum transport and classical dynamics in open billiards

We report numerical results of an investigation of quantum transport for a weakly opened integrable circle and chaotic stadium billiards with a pair of conducting leads. While the statistics of spacings of resonance energies commonly follow the Wigner (GOE)-like distribution, the electric conductance as a function of the Fermi wavenumber shows characteristic noisy fluctuations associated with a typical set of classical orbits unique for both billiards. The wavenumber autocorrelation for the conductance is stronger in the stadium than the circle billiard, which we show is related to the length spectrum of classical short orbits. We propose an explanation of these contrasts in terms of the effect of phase decoherence due to the underlying chaotic dynamics.     

Phase space scars and quantum billiards

A semiclassical expression is derived for the spectral Wigner function of ergodic billiards in terms of a sum over contributions from classical periodic orbits. It represents a generalization of a similar formula by Berry, which does not immediately apply to billiard systems. These results are a natural generalization of Gutzwiller's trace formula for the density of states. Our theory clarifies the origin of scars in the eigenfunctions of billiard systems. However, in its present form, it is unable to predict what states will be dominated by individual periodic orbits. Finally, we compare some of the predictions of our theory with numerical results from the stadium. Within the limitations of numerical resolution, we find agreement between the two.     

Compact invariant sets of the Bianchi VIII and Bianchi IX Hamiltonian systems

In this Letter we prove that all compact invariant sets of the Bianchi VIII Hamiltonian system are contained in the set described by several simple linear equalities and inequalities. Moreover, we describe invariant domains in which the phase flow of this system has no recurrence property and show that there are no periodic orbits and neither homoclinic, nor heteroclinic orbits contained in the zero level set of its Hamiltonian. Similar results are obtained for the Bianchi IX Hamiltonian system.     

Big islands in dispersing billiard-like potentials

We derive a rigorous estimate of the size of islands (in both phase space and parameter space) appearing in smooth Hamiltonian approximations of scattering billiards. The derivation includes the construction of a local return map near singular periodic orbits for an arbitrary scattering billiard and for the general smooth billiard potentials. Thus, universality classes for the local behavior are found. Moreover, for all scattering geometries and for many types of natural potentials which limit to the billiard flow as a parameter ε→0, islands of polynomial size in ε appear. This suggests that the loss of ergodicity via the introduction of the physically relevant effect of smoothening of the potential in modeling, for example, scattering molecules, may be of physically noticeable effect.     

Drift of slow variables in slow-fast Hamiltonian systems

We study the drift of slow variables in a slow-fast Hamiltonian system with several fast and slow degrees of freedom. Keeping the slow variables frozen, for any periodic trajectory of the fast subsystem we define an action. For a family of periodic orbits, the action is a scalar function of the slow variables and can be considered as a Hamiltonian function which generates some slow dynamics. These dynamics depend on the family of periodic orbits.Assuming that for the frozen slow variables the fast system has a pair of hyperbolic periodic orbits connected by two transversal heteroclinic trajectories, we prove that for any path composed of a finite sequence of slow trajectories generated by action Hamiltonians, there is a trajectory of the full system whose slow component shadows the path.     

Evolution of classical projected phase space density in billiards

The classical phase space density projected on to the configuration space offers a means of comparing classical and quantum evolution. In this alternate approach that we adopt here, we show that for billiards, the eigenfunctions of the coarse-grained projected classical evolution operator are identical to a first approximation to the quantum Neumann eigenfunctions. Moreover, there exists a correspondence between the respective eigenvalues although their time evolutions differ.