2026/03/13 by Devjyoti Tripathy, Federico Centrone, Sebastian Deffner · 1 voice
Physics and Astronomy · #quant-ph #cond-mat.stat-mech
arxiv published 2026/03/13 · arxiv updated 2026/03/30
In this work, we develop a quantum metrological framework for quantum chaos by showing that local subsystems of information scrambling systems naturally function as quantum stopwatches. The reduced quantum state of a subsystem encodes the passage of time through its growing distinguishability from the initial preparation. Treating time as the estimation parameter, we then derive a generalized quantum Cramer-Rao bound that directly relates the precision of time estimation to the decay of out-of-time ordered correlators (OTOCs) and subsystem quantum Fisher information (QFI). As a main result, we obtain continuity bounds for quantum Lyapunov exponent in terms of the subsystem QFI in quantumly chaotic dynamics. Furthermore, using a scaling analysis based on imaginary-time correlators, we show that the subsystem QFI exhibits universal critical amplification near quantum phase transitions. Our results are demonstrated and verified by a numerical analysis of the dynamics of a chaotic Ising chain.