Symmetries and conservation laws in quantum trajectories: Dissipative freezing

C Sánchez Muñoz, B Buča, J Tindall… - Physical Review A, 2019 - APS
In driven-dissipative systems, the presence of a strong symmetry guarantees the existence
of several steady states belonging to different symmetry sectors. Here we show that when a
system with a strong symmetry is initialized in a quantum superposition involving several of
these sectors, each individual stochastic trajectory will randomly select a single one of them
and remain there for the rest of the evolution. Since a strong symmetry implies a
conservation law for the corresponding symmetry operator on the ensemble level, this …
In driven-dissipative systems, the presence of a strong symmetry guarantees the existence of several steady states belonging to different symmetry sectors. Here we show that when a system with a strong symmetry is initialized in a quantum superposition involving several of these sectors, each individual stochastic trajectory will randomly select a single one of them and remain there for the rest of the evolution. Since a strong symmetry implies a conservation law for the corresponding symmetry operator on the ensemble level, this selection of a single sector from an initial superposition entails a breakdown of this conservation law at the level of individual realizations. Given that such a superposition is impossible in a classical stochastic trajectory, this is a a purely quantum effect with no classical analog. Our results show that a system with a closed Liouvillian gap may exhibit, when monitored over a single run of an experiment, a behavior completely opposite to the usual notion of dynamical phase coexistence and intermittency, which are typically considered hallmarks of a dissipative phase transition. We discuss our results on a coherently driven spin ensemble with a squeezed superradiant decay, a simple model that presents a wealth of nonergodic dynamics.
American Physical Society