SCIENCE SPIN-OFFS

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Entanglement Transitions from Holographic Random Tensor Networks

Romain Vasseur, Andrew C. Potter, Yi-Zhuang You, Andreas W. W. Ludwig
(Submitted on 18 Jul 2018)

We introduce a novel class of phase transitions separating quantum states with different entanglement features. An example of such an "entanglement phase transition" is provided by the many-body localization transition in disordered quantum systems, as it separates highly entangled thermal states at weak disorder from many-body localized states with low entanglement at strong disorder. In the spirit of random matrix theory, we describe a simple model for such transitions where a physical quantum many-body system lives at the "holographic" boundary of a bulk random tensor network. Using a replica trick approach, we map the calculation of the entanglement properties of the boundary system onto the free energy cost of fluctuating domain walls in a classical statistical mechanics model. This allows us to interpret transitions between volume-law and area-law scaling of entanglement as ordering transitions in this statistical mechanics model. Our approach allows us to get an analytic handle on the field theory of these entanglement transitions.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1807.07082


So my question is... there is energy in entanglement?