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Abstract

We have studied the collective phenomena of multicomponent glasses at ultralow temperatures by taking into account the proper interaction between tunneling centers. We have considered both double- and triple- well potentials with different types of interactions. We show that a phase with coherent motion appears for a range of parameters when the path of tunneling is coursed by an interaction of the XY type, while the usual Ising-like interaction does not lead to the expected collective phenomena. In the phase of coherent motion, the dipole moment and the low-energy levels oscillate with a frequency proportional to the number of tunneling centers in the system. Simultaneous level crossing occurs between the ground and first excited states. The effects of long-range interactions and also of random couplings have been also studied for a one-and two-dimensional array of tunneling centers. We find that long-range interactions do not affect the coherent motion, while a wide distribution of random couplings destroys the collective effects.