Bausch J; Cubitt TS; Lucia A; Perez-Garcia D; Wolf MM
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2018[Jan]; 115 (1): 19-23 PMID29259107show ga
In this work we construct simple examples of 2D quantum spin-lattice models with small (?10) local state spaces which exhibit very unusual finite-size effects that we term ?size-driven phase transitions?: For all system sizes smaller than some threshold N, the low-energy physics are classical; for all sizes larger than N, the system exhibits topological quantum order. Most quantum many-body models are too complex to be solved analytically; our theoretical understanding comes from extrapolating numerical simulations of finite systems to the thermodynamic limit. However, this approach cannot work for the size-driven effects revealed here. We give explicit examples where the threshold size is beyond the capability of any foreseeable numerics (N>1036,000).