Condensed Matter

In this paper we develop a directional search-and-capture model of cytoneme-based morphogenesis. We consider a single cytoneme nucleating from a source cell and searching for a set of N target cells $\Omega_k\subset \R^d$, k=1,…,N , with d≥2 . We assume that each time the cytoneme nucleates, it grows in a random direction so that the probability of being oriented towards the k -th target is p k with ∑ N k=1 p k <1 . Hence, there is a non-zero probability of failure to find a target unless there is some mechanism for returning to the nucleation site and subsequently nucleating in a new direction. We model the latter as a one-dimensional search process with stochastic resetting, finite returns times and refractory periods. We use a renewal method to calculate the splitting probabilities and conditional mean first passage times (MFPTs) for the cytoneme to be captured by a given target cell. We then determine the steady-state accumulation of morphogen over the set of target cells following multiple rounds of search-and-capture events and morphogen degradation. This then yields the corresponding morphogen gradient across the set of target cells, whose steepness depends on the resetting rate. We illustrate the theory by considering a single layer of target cells, and discuss the extension to multiple cytonemes.

The effect of anharmonicity (coupling) in the field theory generally result in dissipation of plane waves. It has been appreciated that anharmonicity and ensuing dissipation of plane waves can be accompanied by the emergence of the gapped momentum state. Here, we show that the same effect can lead to a gapped energy state and a dispersion relation where the frequency (energy) gap emerges explicitly. We discuss several notable properties of gapped energy and momentum states and connections between them.

Complex systems can convert energy imparted by nonequilibrium forces to regulate how quickly they transition between long lived states. While such behavior is ubiquitous in natural and synthetic systems, currently there is no general framework to relate the enhancement of a transition rate to the energy dissipated, or to bound the enhancement achievable for a given energy expenditure. We employ recent advances in statistical thermodynamics to build such a framework, which can be used to gain mechanistic insight on transitions far from equilibrium. We show that under general conditions, there is a basic speed-limit relating the typical excess heat dissipated throughout a transition and the rate amplification achievable. We illustrate this trade-off in canonical examples of diffusive barrier crossings in systems driven with autonomous and deterministic external forcing protocols. In both cases, we find that our speed limit tightly constrains the rate enhancement.

We investigate the effects of dissipation on the quantum dynamics of many-body systems at quantum transitions, especially considering those of the first order. This issue is studied within the paradigmatic one-dimensional quantum Ising model. We analyze the out-of-equilibrium dynamics arising from quenches of the Hamiltonian parameters and dissipative mechanisms modeled by a Lindblad master equation, with either local or global spin operators acting as dissipative operators. Analogously to what happens at continuous quantum transitions, we observe a regime where the system develops a nontrivial dynamic scaling behavior, which is realized when the dissipation parameter u (globally controlling the decay rate of the dissipation within the Lindblad framework) scales as the energy difference Δ of the lowest levels of the Hamiltonian, i.e., u∼Δ . However, unlike continuous quantum transitions where Δ is power-law suppressed, at first-order quantum transitions Δ is exponentially suppressed with increasing the system size (provided the boundary conditions do not favor any particular phase).

There is a deep connection between the ground states of transverse-field spin systems and the late-time distributions of evolving viral populations -- within simple models, both are obtained from the principal eigenvector of the same matrix. However, that vector is the wavefunction amplitude in the quantum spin model, whereas it is the probability itself in the population model. We show that this seemingly minor difference has significant consequences: phase transitions which are discontinuous in the spin system become continuous when viewed through the population perspective, and transitions which are continuous become governed by new critical exponents. We introduce a more general class of models which encompasses both cases, and that can be solved exactly in a mean-field limit. Numerical results are also presented for a number of one-dimensional chains with power-law interactions. We see that well-worn spin models of quantum statistical mechanics can contain unexpected new physics and insights when treated as population-dynamical models and beyond, motivating further studies.

Even simply-defined, finite-state generators produce stochastic processes that require tracking an uncountable infinity of probabilistic features for optimal prediction. For processes generated by hidden Markov chains the consequences are dramatic. Their predictive models are generically infinite-state. And, until recently, one could determine neither their intrinsic randomness nor structural complexity. The prequel, though, introduced methods to accurately calculate the Shannon entropy rate (randomness) and to constructively determine their minimal (though, infinite) set of predictive features. Leveraging this, we address the complementary challenge of determining how structured hidden Markov processes are by calculating their statistical complexity dimension -- the information dimension of the minimal set of predictive features. This tracks the divergence rate of the minimal memory resources required to optimally predict a broad class of truly complex processes.

We study defect generation in a quantum XY-spin chain arising due to the linear drive of the many-body Hamiltonian in the presence of a time-dependent fast Gaussian noise. The main objective of this work is to quantify analytically the effects of noise on the defect density production. In the absence of noise, it is well known that in the slow sweep regime, the defect density follows the Kibble-Zurek (KZ) scaling behavior with respect to the sweep speed. We consider time-dependent fast Gaussian noise in the anisotropy of the spin-coupling term [ γ 0 =( J 1 ??J 2 )/( J 1 + J 2 ) ] and show via analytical calculations that the defect density exhibits anti-Kibble-Zurek (AKZ) scaling behavior in the slow sweep regime. In the limit of large chain length and long time, we calculate the entropy and magnetization density of the final decohered state and show that their scaling behavior is consistent with the AKZ picture in the slow sweep regime. We have also numerically calculated the sub-lattice spin correlators for finite separation by evaluating the Toeplitz determinants and find results consistent with the KZ picture in the absence of noise, while in the presence of noise and slow sweep speeds the correlators exhibit the AKZ behavior. Furthermore, by considering the large n -separation asymptotes of the Toeplitz determinants, we further quantify the effect of the noise on the spin-spin correlators in the final decohered state. We show that while the correlation length of the sub-lattice correlator scales according to the AKZ behavior, we obtain different scaling for the magnetization correlators.

We develop the `duality approach', that has been extensively studied for classical models of transport, for quantum systems in contact with a thermal `Lindbladian' bath. The method provides (a) a mapping of the original model to a simpler one, containing only a few particles and (b) shows that any dynamic process of this kind with generic baths may be mapped onto one with equilibrium baths. We exemplify this through the study of a particular model: the quantum symmetric exclusion process introduced in [D. Bernard, T. Jin, Phys. Rev. Lett. 123, 080601 (2019)]. As in the classical case, the whole construction becomes intelligible by considering the dynamical symmetries of the problem.

Open quantum many body systems describe a number of experimental platforms relevant for quantum simulations, ranging from arrays of superconducting circuits to ultracold atoms in optical lattices. Their theoretical understanding is hampered by their large Hilbert space and by their intrinsic nonequilibrium nature, limiting the applicability of many traditional approaches. In this work we extend the nonequilibrium bosonic Dynamical Mean Field Theory (DMFT) to Markovian open quantum systems. Within DMFT, a Lindblad master equation describing a lattice of dissipative bosonic particles is mapped onto an impurity problem describing a single site embedded in its Markovian environment and coupled to a self-consistent field and to a non-Markovian bath, where the latter accounts for finite lattice connectivity corrections beyond Gutzwiller mean-field theory. We develop a non-perturbative approach to solve this bosonic impurity problem, which treats the non-Markovian bath in a non-crossing approximation. As a first application, we address the steady-state of a driven-dissipative Bose-Hubbard model with two-body losses and incoherent pump. We show that DMFT captures hopping-induced dissipative processes, completely missed in Gutzwiller mean-field theory, which crucially determine the properties of the normal phase, including the redistribution of steady-state populations, the suppression of local gain and the emergence of a stationary quantum-Zeno regime. We argue that these processes compete with coherent hopping to determine the phase transition towards a non-equilibrium superfluid, leading to a strong renormalization of the phase boundary at finite-connectivity. We show that this transition occurs as a finite-frequency instability, leading to an oscillating-in-time order parameter, that we connect with a quantum many-body synchronization transition of an array of quantum van der Pol oscillators.

We study theoretically, experimentally and numerically the probability distribution F( t f | x 0 ,L) of the first passage times t f needed by a freely diffusing Brownian particle to reach a target at a distance L from the initial position x 0 , taken from a normalized distribution (1/?)g( x 0 /?) of finite width ? . We show the existence of a critical value b c of the parameter b=L/? , which determines the shape of F( t f | x 0 ,L) . For b> b c the distribution F( t f | x 0 ,L) has a maximum and a minimum whereas for b< b c it is a monotonically decreasing function of t f . This dynamical phase transition is generated by the presence of two characteristic times ? 2 /D and L 2 /D , where D is the diffusion coefficient. The theoretical predictions are experimentally checked on a Brownian bead whose free diffusion is initialized by an optical trap which determines the initial distribution g( x 0 /?) . The presence of the phase transition in 2d has also been numerically estimated using a Langevin dynamics.