In this paper, we revisit collapse and revival oscillations in superfluids suddenly quenched by strong local interactions for the case of a one-dimensional Bose-Hubbard model. As the main result, we identify the inherent nonequilibrium quantum many-body character of these oscillations by revealing that they are controlled by a sequence of underlying dynamical quantum phase transitions in the real-time evolution after the quench, which manifest as temporal nonanalyticities in return probabilities or Loschmidt echos. Specifically, we find that the timescale of the collapse and revival oscillations is, first, set by the frequency at which dynamical quantum phase transitions appear, and is, second, of emergent nonequilibrium nature, since it is not only determined by the final Hamiltonian but also depends on the initial condition.

• Received 7 January 2019
• Revised 28 February 2019

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.99.121107