Probing Equilibrium and Dynamical Criticality Through Single-Site Observables.

Extracting critical behavior in the wake of quantum quenches has recently been at the forefront of theoretical and experimental investigations in condensed matter physics and quantum synthetic matter, with particular emphasis on experimental feasibility. Here, we investigate the potential of single-site observables in probing equilibrium phase transitions and dynamical criticality in short-range transverse-field Ising chains. For integrable and near-integrable models, our exact and mean-field-theory analyses reveal a truly out-of-equilibrium universal scaling exponent in the vicinity of the transition that is independent of the initial state and the location of the probe site so long as the latter is sufficiently close to the edge of the chain. Signature of a dynamical crossover survives when integrability is strongly broken. Our work provides a robust scheme for the experimental detection of quantum critical points and dynamical scaling laws in short-range interacting models using modern ultracold-atom setups.