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Universal equilibrium magic in quantum many-body systems

arXiv
Authors: Soumyadeep Sarma, Tobias Haug, John Preskill, Wai-Keong Mok

Year

2026

Paper ID

76458

Status

Preprint

Abstract Read

~2 min

Abstract Words

224

Citations

N/A

Abstract

Thermalization conventionally describes local properties of isolated many-body systems at equilibrium. Magic, or nonstabilizerness unicode{x2013} the resource enabling universal quantum computation unicode{x2013} is by contrast encoded in the global structure of the many-body wavefunction. We show that, despite its global nature, the magic of equilibrium pure states of chaotic many-body systems, including late-time evolved states and energy eigenstates, is universal: it is captured by the thermal Scrooge ensemble, the minimally informative ensemble of pure states consistent with the Gibbs state at the same effective temperature. Therefore, for systems with no conserved quantities other than the total energy, equilibrium magic is a function of temperature alone, independent of the initial state and other microscopic features of the equilibrium state. This yields concrete universal predictions for the stabilizer Rényi entropies (SREs). At infinite temperature, the SRE is set by Haar-like fluctuations of the Pauli spectrum, while at finite temperature energy conservation induces a volume-law thermodynamic correction controlled by the thermal Pauli spectrum. We support these predictions with analytical arguments and extensive numerical simulations. We further show that chaotic many-body systems at high temperatures possess long-range magic and entanglement that cannot be removed by finite-depth local quantum circuits. Our results establish magic as a thermodynamic property of chaotic many-body systems and suggest that Scrooge ensembles may provide a unified framework for quantum many-body resources.

Why This Paper Matters

  • This paper contributes to the Quantum Simulation research area in the Quantum Articles archive.
  • It adds a 2026 reference point for readers tracking recent quantum research.
  • Thermalization conventionally describes local properties of isolated many-body systems at equilibrium.

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