Stability of the discrete time-crystalline order in spin-optomechanical and open cavity QED systems

TL;DR

This paper investigates how spin damping and dephasing affect the stability of discrete time crystal order in spin-optomechanical and cavity QED systems, revealing conditions for eternal, transient, or destroyed DTC phases.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of DTC stability considering spin damping and dephasing, and proposes an experimentally feasible model with hBN membranes for observing transient DTC behavior.

Findings

Dephasing destroys DTC coherence, leading to trivial steady states.

Eternal DTC exists in weak damping regimes without dephasing.

Transient DTC signatures are observable in realistic experimental parameters.

Abstract

Discrete time crystals (DTC) have been demonstrated experimentally in several different quantum systems in the past few years. Spin couplings and cavity losses have been shown to play crucial roles for realizing DTC order in open many-body systems out of equilibrium. Recently, it has been proposed that eternal and transient DTC can be present with an open Floquet setup in the thermodynamic limit and in the deep quantum regime with few qubits, respectively. In this work, we consider the effects of spin damping and spin dephasing on the DTC order in spin-optomechanical and open cavity systems in which the spins can be all-to-all coupled. In the thermodynamic limit, it is shown that the existence of dephasing can destroy the coherence of the system and finally lead the system to its trivial steady state. Without dephasing, eternal DTC is displayed in the weak damping regime, which may be destroyed by increasing the all-to-all spin coupling or the spin damping. By contrast, the all-to-all coupling is constructive to the DTC in the moderate damping regime. We also focus on a model which can be experimentally realized by a suspended hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) membrane with a few spin color centers under microwave drive and Floquet magnetic field. Signatures of transient DTC behavior are demonstrated in both weak and moderate dissipation regimes without spin dephasing. Relevant experimental parameters are also discussed for realizing transient DTC order in such an hBN optomechanical system.