Quantum adiabatic cycles and their breakdown

The assumption that quasi-static transformations do not quantitatively alter the equilibrium expectation of observables is at the heart of thermodynamics and, in the quantum realm, its validity may be confirmed by the application of adiabatic perturbation theory. Yet, this scenario does not straightforwardly apply to Bosonic systems whose excitation energy is slowly driven through the zero. Here, we prove that the universal slow dynamics of such systems is always non-adiabatic and the quantum corrections to the equilibrium observables become rate independent for any dynamical protocol in the slow drive limit. These findings overturn the common expectation for quasi-static processes as they demonstrate that a system as simple and general as the quantum harmonic oscillator, does not allow for a slow-drive limit, but it always displays sudden quench dynamics.

Deformations of Poisson structures on fibered manifolds and adiabatic slow–fast systems

In the context of normal forms, we study a class of slow–fast Hamiltonian systems on general Poisson fiber bundles with symmetry. Our geometric approach is motivated by a link between the deformation theory for Poisson structures on fibered manifolds and the adiabatic perturbation theory. We present some normalization results which are based on the averaging theorem for horizontal 2-cocycles on Poisson fiber bundles.

APPLICATIONS OF MAGNETIC ΨDO TECHNIQUES TO SAPT

In this review, we show how advances in the theory of magnetic pseudodifferential operators (magnetic ΨDO) can be put to good use in space-adiabatic perturbation theory (SAPT). As a particular example, we extend results of [24] to a more general class of magnetic fields: we consider a single particle moving in a periodic potential which is subjected to a weak and slowly-varying electromagnetic field. In addition to the semiclassical parameter ε ≪ 1 which quantifies the separation of spatial scales, we explore the influence of an additional parameter λ that allows us to selectively switch off the magnetic field. We find that even in the case of magnetic fields with components in [Formula: see text], e.g., for constant magnetic fields, the results of Panati, Spohn and Teufel hold, i.e to each isolated family of Bloch bands, there exists an associated almost invariant subspace of L2(ℝd) and an effective hamiltonian which generates the dynamics within this almost invariant subspace. In case of an isolated non-degenerate Bloch band, the full quantum dynamics can be approximated by the hamiltonian flow associated to the semiclassical equations of motion found in [24].