Planck’s Quantum-Driven Integer Quantum Hall Effect in Chaos

Abstract

We find in a canonical chaotic system, the kicked spin-1/2 rotor, a Planck's quantum(he)-driven phenomenon bearing a close analogy to the integer quantum Hall effect but of chaos origin. Specifically, the rotor's energy growth is unbounded ("metallic" phase) for a discrete set of critical values of he, but otherwise bounded ("insulating" phase). The latter phase is topological and characterized by a quantum number ("quantized Hall conductance"). The number jumps by unity whenever he passes through each critical value as it decreases. Our findings indicate that rich topological quantum phenomena can emerge from chaos.