Renormalization Group Approach for the Wave Packet Dynamics in Golden-Mean and Silver-Mean Labyrinth Tilings

Stefanie Thiem, Michael Schreiber

Published 2012-04-18, updated 2012-10-08Version 2

We study the quantum diffusion in quasiperiodic tight-binding models in one, two, and three dimensions. First, we investigate a class of one-dimensional quasiperiodic chains, in which the atoms are coupled by weak and strong bonds aligned according to the metallic-mean sequences. The associated generalized labyrinth tilings in d dimensions are then constructed from the direct product of d such chains, which allows us to consider rather large systems numerically. The electronic transport is studied by computing the scaling behavior of the mean-square displacement of the wave packets with respect to the time. The results reveal the occurrence of anomalous diffusion in these systems. By extending a renormalization group approach, originally proposed for the golden-mean chain, we show also for the silver-mean chain as well as for the higher-dimensional labyrinth tilings that in the regime of strong quasiperiodic modulation the wave-packet dynamics are governed by the underlying quasiperiodic structure.