Many-body localization in the thermodynamic limit

ORAL

Abstract

We use thermalization indicators and numerical linked cluster expansions to probe the onset of many-body localization in a disordered one-dimensional hard-core boson model in the thermodynamic limit. We show that after equilibration following a quench, the momentum distribution indicates a freezing of one-particle correlations at higher values than if the system were in thermal equilibrium. The position of the delocalization to localization transition, identified by the breakdown of thermalization with increasing disorder strength, is found to be consistent with the value from the level statistics obtained via full exact diagonalization of finite chains. Our results strongly support the existence of a many-body localized phase in the thermodynamic limit.

Authors

  • Deepak Iyer

    Pennsylvania State Univ

  • Baoming Tang

    Pennsylvania State Univ

  • Marcos Rigol

    Pennsylvania State University, The Pennsylvania State University, Pennsylvania State Univ