Signatures of homoclinic motion in quantum chaos

Abstract

Homoclinic motion plays a key role in the organization of classical chaos in Hamiltonian systems. In this Letter, we show that it also imprints a clear signature in the corresponding quantum spectra. By numerically studying the fluctuations of the widths of wave functions localized along periodic orbits we reveal the existence of an oscillatory behavior that is explained solely in terms of the primary homoclinic motion. Furthermore, our results indicate that it survives the semiclassical limit. © 2005 The American Physical Society.