Discrete time crystals in disordered anisotropic Heisenberg chains
Abstract
A discrete time crystal is an out-of-equilibrium phase of matter characterized by the spontaneous breaking of discrete time-translation symmetry. Using extensive numerical simulations based on matrix-product-state methods, we provide evidence for discrete time-crystalline behavior in strongly disordered spin chains with Heisenberg interactions, including the isotropic point, subject to periodic driving. Starting from a many-body localized regime, we observe that rotations induced by delta kicks produce a pronounced subharmonic response at half the drive frequency in spin observables. We investigate the stability of this response against rotation-angle errors through entanglement entropy, quantum Fisher information, short-range spin correlations, and restricted-control ergotropy. Increasing the rotation error reveals an intermediate dynamical regime separating the time-crystalline and Floquet-localized responses. In this regime, most observables exhibit signatures of weakly correlated dynamics reminiscent of Anderson localization.
Related
- Random spin-3/2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg chains revisited
- On the uniqueness of translation-invariant ground states of the S=1 Heisenberg and J--D antiferromagnetic chains
- Emergent Wigner magnon crystals in a fully frustrated Heisenberg four-leg tube
- Perfect resonance and fragile localization suppression in correlated disordered chains
- Quantum Otto engine powered by an anisotropic Heisenberg XYZ model under independent local magnetic fields
BibTeX
@misc{formicola2026discrete,
title = {{Discrete time crystals in disordered anisotropic Heisenberg chains}},
author = {Francesco Formicola and Grazia Di Bello and Antonio De Candia and Giulio De Filippis and Carmine Antonio Perroni},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.04037},
eprint = {2609.04037},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.04037},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Discrete time crystals in disordered anisotropic Heisenberg chains
AU - Francesco Formicola
AU - Grazia Di Bello
AU - Antonio De Candia
AU - Giulio De Filippis
AU - Carmine Antonio Perroni
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/03
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.04037
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.04037
AB - A discrete time crystal is an out-of-equilibrium phase of matter characterized by the spontaneous breaking of discrete time-translation symmetry. Using extensive numerical simulations based on matrix-product-state methods, we provide evidence for discrete time-crystalline behavior in strongly disordered spin chains with Heisenberg interactions, including the isotropic point, subject to periodic driving. Starting from a many-body localized regime, we observe that rotations induced by delta kicks produce a pronounced subharmonic response at half the drive frequency in spin observables. We investigate the stability of this response against rotation-angle errors through entanglement entropy, quantum Fisher information, short-range spin correlations, and restricted-control ergotropy. Increasing the rotation error reveals an intermediate dynamical regime separating the time-crystalline and Floquet-localized responses. In this regime, most observables exhibit signatures of weakly correlated dynamics reminiscent of Anderson localization.
ER -