40 research outputs found
Periodic orbit analysis of an elastodynamic resonator using shape deformation
We report the first definitive experimental observation of periodic orbits
(POs) in the spectral properties of an elastodynamic system. The Fourier
transform of the density of flexural modes show peaks that correspond to stable
and unstable POs of a clover shaped quartz plate. We change the shape of the
plate and find that the peaks corresponding to the POs that hit only the
unperturbed sides are unchanged proving the correspondence. However, an exact
match to the length of the main POs could be made only after a small rescaling
of the experimental results. Statistical analysis of the level dynamics also
shows the effect of the stable POs.Comment: submitted to Europhysics Letter
Resonance- and Chaos-Assisted Tunneling
We consider dynamical tunneling between two symmetry-related regular islands
that are separated in phase space by a chaotic sea. Such tunneling processes
are dominantly governed by nonlinear resonances, which induce a coupling
mechanism between ``regular'' quantum states within and ``chaotic'' states
outside the islands. By means of a random matrix ansatz for the chaotic part of
the Hamiltonian, one can show that the corresponding coupling matrix element
directly determines the level splitting between the symmetric and the
antisymmetric eigenstates of the pair of islands. We show in detail how this
matrix element can be expressed in terms of elementary classical quantities
that are associated with the resonance. The validity of this theory is
demonstrated with the kicked Harper model.Comment: 25 pages, 5 figure
Signatures of chaotic tunnelling
Recent experiments with cold atoms provide a significant step toward a better
understanding of tunnelling when irregular dynamics is present at the classical
level. In this paper, we lay out numerical studies which shed light on the
previous experiments, help to clarify the underlying physics and have the
ambition to be guidelines for future experiments.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. E. Figures of better
quality can be found at http://www.phys.univ-tours.fr/~mouchet
Resonance-assisted tunneling in near-integrable systems
Dynamical tunneling between symmetry related invariant tori is studied in the
near-integrable regime. Using the kicked Harper model as an illustration, we
show that the exponential decay of the wave functions in the classically
forbidden region is modified due to coupling processes that are mediated by
classical resonances. This mechanism leads to a substantial deviation of the
splitting between quasi-degenerate eigenvalues from the purely exponential
decrease with 1 / hbar obtained for the integrable system. A simple
semiclassical framework, which takes into account the effect of the resonance
substructure on the KAM tori, allows to quantitatively reproduce the behavior
of the eigenvalue splittings.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, gzipped tar file, to appear in Phys. Rev. Lett,
text slightly condensed compared to first versio
Symplectic evolution of Wigner functions in markovian open systems
The Wigner function is known to evolve classically under the exclusive action
of a quadratic hamiltonian. If the system does interact with the environment
through Lindblad operators that are linear functions of position and momentum,
we show that the general evolution is the convolution of the classically
evolving Wigner function with a phase space gaussian that broadens in time. We
analyze the three generic cases of elliptic, hyperbolic and parabolic
Hamiltonians. The Wigner function always becomes positive in a definite time,
which is shortest in the hyperbolic case. We also derive an exact formula for
the evolving linear entropy as the average of a narrowing gaussian taken over a
probability distribution that depends only on the initial state. This leads to
a long time asymptotic formula for the growth of linear entropy.Comment: this new version treats the dissipative cas
A realistic example of chaotic tunneling: The hydrogen atom in parallel static electric and magnetic fields
Statistics of tunneling rates in the presence of chaotic classical dynamics
is discussed on a realistic example: a hydrogen atom placed in parallel uniform
static electric and magnetic fields, where tunneling is followed by ionization
along the fields direction. Depending on the magnetic quantum number, one may
observe either a standard Porter-Thomas distribution of tunneling rates or, for
strong scarring by a periodic orbit parallel to the external fields, strong
deviations from it. For the latter case, a simple model based on random matrix
theory gives the correct distribution.Comment: Submitted to Phys. Rev.