Spin and the thermal equilibrium distribution of wave functions

DOI10.1007/S10955-013-0849-YzbMATH Open1291.82014arXiv1306.1659OpenAlexW1967999576WikidataQ62036713 ScholiaQ62036713MaRDI QIDQ2016532FDOQ2016532

Authors: Viraj Pandya, Roderich Tumulka 

Publication date: 20 June 2014

Published in: Journal of Statistical Physics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: Consider a quantum system $S$ weakly interacting with a very large but finite system $B$ called the heat bath, and suppose that the composite $ScupB$ is in a pure state $Psi$ with participating energies between $E$ and $E+delta$ with small $delta$. Then, it is known that for most $Psi$ the reduced density matrix of $S$ is (approximately) equal to the canonical density matrix. That is, the reduced density matrix is universal in the sense that it depends only on $S$'s Hamiltonian and the temperature but not on $B$'s Hamiltonian, on the interaction Hamiltonian, or on the details of $Psi$. It has also been pointed out that $S$ can also be attributed a random wave function $psi$ whose probability distribution is universal in the same sense. This distribution is known as the "Scrooge measure" or "Gaussian adjusted projected (GAP) measure"; we regard it as the thermal equilibrium distribution of wave functions. The relevant concept of the wave function of a subsystem is known as the "conditional wave function". In this paper, we develop analogous considerations for particles with spin. One can either use some kind of conditional wave function or, more naturally, the "conditional density matrix", which is in general different from the reduced density matrix. We ask what the thermal equilibrium distribution of the conditional density matrix is, and find the answer that for most $Psi$ the conditional density matrix is (approximately) deterministic, in fact (approximately) equal to the canonical density matrix.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/1306.1659

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zbMATH Keywords

conditional wave functioncanonical ensemble in quantum theoryconditional density matrixGaussian adjusted projected (GAP) measuresscrooge measurestypicality theorems

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Statistical thermodynamics (82B30) Quantum equilibrium statistical mechanics (general) (82B10)

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Cited In (10)

• Thermodynamic calculation of spin scaling functions
• Universal probability distribution for the wave function of a quantum system entangled with its environment
• Spin tensor and its role in non-equilibrium thermodynamics
• On the distribution of the wave function for systems in thermal equilibrium
• Thermodynamics of the model of equal spin-spin interactions
• Phase space equilibrium distribution function for spins
• Thermal equilibrium distribution in infinite-dimensional Hilbert spaces
• Quantum spin probabilities at positive temperature are Hölder Gibbs probabilities
• On the statistics of quantum expectations for systems in thermal equilibrium
• Title not available (Why is that?)

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