Semi-Poisson Statistics in Relativistic Quantum Billiards with Shapes of Rectangles

Entropy (Basel). 2023 May 6;25(5):762. doi: 10.3390/e25050762.

Abstract

Rectangular billiards have two mirror symmetries with respect to perpendicular axes and a twofold (fourfold) rotational symmetry for differing (equal) side lengths. The eigenstates of rectangular neutrino billiards (NBs), which consist of a spin-1/2 particle confined through boundary conditions to a planar domain, can be classified according to their transformation properties under rotation by π (π/2) but not under reflection at mirror-symmetry axes. We analyze the properties of these symmetry-projected eigenstates and of the corresponding symmetry-reduced NBs which are obtained by cutting them along their diagonal, yielding right-triangle NBs. Independently of the ratio of their side lengths, the spectral properties of the symmetry-projected eigenstates of the rectangular NBs follow semi-Poisson statistics, whereas those of the complete eigenvalue sequence exhibit Poissonian statistics. Thus, in distinction to their nonrelativistic counterpart, they behave like typical quantum systems with an integrable classical limit whose eigenstates are non-degenerate and have alternating symmetry properties with increasing state number. In addition, we found out that for right triangles which exhibit semi-Poisson statistics in the nonrelativistic limit, the spectral properties of the corresponding ultrarelativistic NB follow quarter-Poisson statistics. Furthermore, we analyzed wave-function properties and discovered for the right-triangle NBs the same scarred wave functions as for the nonrelativistic ones.

Keywords: quantum billiards; quantum chaos; relativistic quantum billiard; relativistic quantum chaos.

Grants and funding

BD acknowledges financial support from the Institute for Basic Science in Korea through the project IBS-R024-D1.