Efficient Diagonalization of Kicked Quantum Systems

We show that the time evolution operator of kicked quantum systems, although a full matrix of size NxN, can be diagonalized with the help of a new method based on a suitable combination of fast Fourier transform and Lanczos algorithm in just N^2 ln(N) operations. It allows the diagonalization of matrizes of sizes up to N\approx 10^6 going far beyond the possibilities of standard diagonalization techniques which need O(N^3) operations. We have applied this method to the kicked Harper model revealing its intricate spectral properties.