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Breaking the Entanglement-Structure Trade-off: Many-Body Localization Protects Emergent Holographic Geometry in Random Tensor Networks

Disordered Systems and Neural Networks 2026-04-07 v1 High Energy Physics - Theory Quantum Physics

Abstract

We present a systematic numerical investigation of the "entanglement geometry gravity" chain in random tensor networks (RTN) established by the ER EPR conjecture and Jacobson's thermodynamic derivation. First, we verify the kinematic foundation: the entanglement first law δK=δS\delta\langle K\rangle=\delta S (slope=1.000), the encoding of geometry by mutual information (correlation=0.92), and the locality of holographic perturbations (3.3x). We also confirm that gravitational dynamics (JT gravity) does not emerge, identifying a sharp kinematics-dynamics boundary. Second, and more importantly, we discover that many-body localization (MBL) is the mechanism that protects emergent holographic geometry from thermalization. Replacing Haar-random evolution (geometry lifetime t6t\sim6) with an XXZ Hamiltonian plus on-site disorder, we observe a finite-size crossover at disorder strength Wc1012W_c\approx10-12 above which mutual-information-lattice correlations persist indefinitely (r>0.5r>0.5 for t>50t>50). We map the full parameter space: the optimal regime is a near-Ising anisotropy Δ50\Delta\approx50 with W=30W=30 yielding r=0.779±0.002r=0.779\pm0.002 (confirmed by a fine scan over Δ[30,70]\Delta\in[30,70]); only holographic (RTN) initial states sustain geometry, while product, N\'eel, and Bell-pair states do not. MBL preserves the spatial structure of entanglement (adjacent/non-adjacent MI ratio ~2.6-4.2x vs. 1.0x in the thermal phase), rather than its total amount. A comparison with classical cellular automata reveals that MBL uniquely breaks the entanglement-structure trade-off imposed by quantum monogamy: classical systems achieve spatial structure only at the cost of negligible mutual information, while MBL sustains both.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2604.04596,
  title  = {Breaking the Entanglement-Structure Trade-off: Many-Body Localization Protects Emergent Holographic Geometry in Random Tensor Networks},
  author = {Zhihua Liang},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2604.04596},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

9 pages, 6 figures, 9 tables