Finite-temperature dynamical correlations using the microcanonical ensemble and the Lanczos algorithm

We show how to generalize the zero-temperature Lanczos method for calculating dynamical correlation functions to finite temperatures. The key is the microcanonical ensemble which allows us to replace the involved canonical ensemble with a single appropriately chosen state; in the thermodynamic limit it provides the same physics as the canonical ensemble but with the evaluation of a single expectation value. We can employ the same system sizes as for zero temperature but, whereas the statistical fluctuations present in small systems are prohibitive, the spectra of the largest system sizes are surprisingly smooth. We investigate, as a test case, the spin conductivity of the spin-1/2 anisotropic Heisenberg model and in particular we present a comparison of spectra obtained by the canonical and microcanonical ensemble methods.