Operator Noncommutativity and Irreversibility in Quantum Chaos

Ryusuke Hamazaki, Kazuya Fujimoto, Masahito Ueda

Published 2018-07-06Version 1

The degree of irreversibility of initially localized states in a time-reversal test is argued to be equivalent to the growth of noncommutativity of two unequal-time operators in quantum chaotic dynamics. This conjecture is tested for a quantum kicked rotor and interacting many-body systems. Our results show the dominance of three- rather than four-point out-of-time-ordered correlators for the growth of the squared commutator.