Continuous unitary transformations using tensor network representations access the full many-body localized spectrum
Disordered Systems and Neural Networks
2026-03-16 v1
Abstract
We develop variational continuous unitary transformations (VCUTs), which integrate Wegner-Wilson flow equations with tensor network techniques to approximately diagonalize many-body localized (MBL) Hamiltonians. The diagonalizing unitary is represented as a matrix product operator whose bond dimension controls the accuracy. For the disordered Heisenberg chain, VCUTs accurately reproduces the full spectrum across the ergodic-to-MBL crossover at small system sizes and scales to sites. Beyond eigenenergies, the method can track the spatial entanglement structure of the diagonalizing unitary at each flow step, enabling identification of local integrals of motion deep in the MBL phase.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2603.12851,
title = {Continuous unitary transformations using tensor network representations access the full many-body localized spectrum},
author = {Qiyu Liu and Jan-Niklas Herre and Dante M. Kennes and Christoph Karrasch},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2603.12851},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
10 pages, 7 figures