HOWTO /
TDVPIn this tutorial, we will introduce the tools used to perform time evolution simulations using the time-dependent variational principle (TDVP) algorithm for matrix product states. The main advantage of using TDVP instead of the time-evolving block decimation (TEBD) algorithm is that TDVP work with Hamiltonian with any arbitrary interaction lengths, while TEBD can only normally handle nearest-neighbour interactions For our example calculation, we will look at a chain of spin-1/2s, where we have a domain wall of spins pointing up and down in {$z$} direction. {$$|\Psi(t=0)\rangle = |\cdots\uparrow\uparrow\uparrow\uparrow\uparrow\downarrow\downarrow\downarrow\downarrow\downarrow\cdots\rangle.$$} We then time evolve this state under the XX Hamiltonian, which is a version of the anisotropic Heisenberg model where the spin coupling in the {$z$} dimension is zero, and the couplings in the {$x$} and {$y$} dimensions have equal magnitude, {$$H_\text{XX} = \sum_j (S^x_j S^x_{j+1} + S^y_j S^y_{j+1}) = \frac{1}{2} \sum_j (S^-_j S^+_{j+1} + S^+_j S^-_{j+1}).$$} From the second form of this Hamiltonian, we can see that its effect is to swap neighbouring up and down spins (this model is mathematically equivalent to a free fermion model on a lattice, where up and down spins map to occupied and unoccupied sites respectively). In fact, the dynamics of this magnetisation of this state under this Hamiltonian is known exactly [1], placing the domain wall between sites {$-1$} and {$0$}, we have {$$S^z(t, x) = -\frac{1}{2} \sum_{n=-x}^x J^2_n(t), \qquad x \geq 0,$$} {$$S^z(t, x) = -S^z(t, -x-1), \qquad x < 0,$$} where {$J_n(t)$} is a Bessel function of the first kind. For this simulation, we use the spin chain lattice file with {$U(1)$} symmetry (the Hamiltonian and initial state break the full {$SU(2)$} symmetry, so we have to use a smaller symmetry group), and we can generate the initial state for a lattice of 20 sites using spinchain-u1 -o lattice mp-construct -l lattice -o psi.t0.0 --finite 0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5:-0.5 Now we are ready to perform time evolution on our state using mp-tdvp -H lattice:H_J1t -w psi.t0.0 -o psi -t 0.1 -n 100 here, the for t in $(seq 0.0 0.1 10.0); do echo -n "$t "; mp-expectation psi.t$t lattice:"Sz(9)" -r; done however, if we have access to multiple CPU cores, then we can speed this up by calculating each expectation value in parallel using GNU Parallel: parallel -k 'echo -n "{} "; mp-expectation psi.t{} lattice:"Sz(9)" -r' ::: $(seq 0.0 0.1 10.0) the
Now, assuming you have run the above commands correctly, you should get an expectation value of 0.5 for each timestep. Why is this? Well, the TDVP algorithm is designed to calculate the optimal time evolution for a fixed bond dimension. We started with a product state, which has a bond dimension 1, and so by default, the program performs the time evolution simulation with bond dimension 1, where the optimal result is to not change the wavefunction! Sometimes, when the initial wavefunction has a bond dimension much larger than 1, then the time evolution with a fixed bond dimension works fine. However the best solution in general is to use an adaptively expanding bond dimension: this is since the entanglement in the state generally increases in time evolution, and we need to increase the bond dimension to compensate for this. To enable the use of an adaptively expanding bond dimension, we can use the mp-tdvp -H lattice:H_J1t -w psi.t0.0 -o psi -t 0.1 -n 100 -d 1e-6 Here we can see that the the maximum bond dimension in the chain (shown as the plot "data.dat", 0.5*besj0(x)**2 As we can see, the numerical results lie right on top of the exact results. Another thing to note is that the energy (shown as To calculate the expectation values for the full chain, we can use a double loop, which can be done easily using GNU Parallel parallel -k 'echo -n "{1} {2} "; mp-expectation psi.t{1} lattice:"Sz({2})" -r' ::: $(seq 0.0 0.1 10.0) ::: $(seq 0 19) > data-full.dat We can then plot this in gnuplot using plot "data-full.dat" using 2:1:3 with image If we continued to evolve for further times, the wavefront will reflect off the boundary, which will interfere with the results. Hence, if we wanted to look at the evolution for further times, we would need to redo the time evolution with a larger system size. A better alternative is to use infinite boundary condition (IBC) wavefunctions, where we work with an infinite-size system, but only perturb a finite-sized region, which can be dynamically expanded during the time evolution simulation as the wavefront spreads outwards. Infinite TDVPWe can also consider a similar quench with a translation-invariant initial state
{$$|\Psi(t=0)\rangle = |\cdots\uparrow\downarrow\uparrow\downarrow\uparrow\downarrow\uparrow\downarrow\uparrow\downarrow\cdots\rangle.$$}
In this case, the expectation value of {$S^z$} is given by [2]
{$$S^z(t, x) = -\frac{1}{2} J_0(2t).$$}
We can generate this state as an iMPS with a two-site unit cell using mp-construct -l lattice -o psi-inf.t0.0 0.5:-0.5 We can then evolve this state using mp-itdvp -H lattice:H_J1t -w psi-inf.t0.0 -o psi-inf -t 0.1 -n 80 -d 1e-6 parallel -k 'echo -n "{} "; mp-expectation psi-inf.t{} lattice:"Sz(0)" -r' ::: $(seq 0.0 0.1 8.0) > data-inf.dat We can plot the results in gnuplot with plot "data-inf.dat", 0.5*besj0(2*x) Something to note here is that the growth of the entanglement is much greater in the translation-invariant state than the domain wall state. This is since the domain wall is the only part of the latter state which is nonstationary in time evolution, while the state is close to an eigenstate far away from the domain wall wavefront. On the other hand, the translation-invariant state essentially has a domain wall between every nearest neighbour, and so the state is nonstationary at every point at the lattice right from the beginning, and the entanglement increases even more as the domain wall wavefronts move through the chain. As a result, the domain wall state has a linear growth of bond dimension in time evolution, while the translation-invariant state has an exponential growth of bond dimension. Exercises
set logscale y plot "data-inf.dat" using 1:(abs($2-0.5*besj0(2*$1)) with lines The two main contributions to the error are the finite bond dimension and the size of the timestep. Try to assess how the error changes as you vary the bond expansion cutoff ( -d ) and the timestep (-t ). When is the error dominated by the timestep, and when is it dominated by the finite bond dimension?
(You may also want to decrease the number of timesteps ( -n ) as you adjust these parameters, to stop the calculation from taking way too long. Alternatively, you can set the number of timesteps to be quite large, and abort the simulation (by pressing Ctrl+C ) once it starts to take too long to perform a timestep, or once the tool has been running for a certain period of time, e.g. 1 minute.)
References[1] T. Antal, Z. Rácz, A. Rákos and G. M. Schütz, Transport in the XX chain at zero temperature: Emergence of flat magnetization profiles, Phys. Rev. E 59, 4912 (1999), doi:10.1103/PhysRevE.59.4912.
[2] P. Barmettler, M. Punk, V. Gritsev, E. Demler and E. Altman, Quantum quenches in the anisotropic spin-{$\frac{1}{2}$} Heisenberg chain: different approaches to many-body dynamics far from equilibrium, New J. Phys. 12, 055017 (2012), doi:10.1088/1367-2630/12/5/055017.
|