First-Order Transition to Chaos with Critical Slowing Down

Abstract

Can the transition from integrability to chaos be discontinuous? We show that it can, and that the resulting first-order dynamical transition coexists with critical slowing down. Using an analytically tractable confined random walk and a deterministic stadium-like billiard, we find a finite jump of the stationary diffusive observable at the transition while the relaxation time diverges. Both systems display normal diffusion and the same exponent set $(\alpha ,\beta ,z)=(0,1/2,-2)$. We trace this agreement to a common coarse-grained mechanism: diffusion in a finite accessible domain with a diffusion coefficient that vanishes quadratically with the perturbation. The results identify a discontinuous route from integrability to chaos and provide evidence for a broader universality class of first-order dynamical transitions.