Narrow Results

Framework for a general discussion of environmentally induced classical properties, like superselection rules, privileged basis and classical behavior, in quantum systems with both finite and infinite number of degrees of freedom is proposed. A number of examples showing that classical properties do not have to be postulated as an independent ingredient are given. In particular, it is shown that infinite open quantum systems in some cases may behave like simple classical dynamical systems.

The structure of uniformly continuous quantum Markov semigroups with atomic decoherence-free subalgebra is established providing a natural decomposition of a Markovian open quantum system into its noiseless (decoherence-free) and irreducible (ergodic) components. This leads to a new characterization of the structure of invariant states and a new method for finding decoherence-free subsystems and subspaces. Examples are presented to illustrate these results.

The question: whether quantum coherent states can sustain decoherence, heating and dissipation over time scales comparable to the dynamical timescales of brain neurons, has been actively discussed in the last years. A positive answer on this question is crucial, in particular, for consideration of brain neurons as quantum computers. This discussion was mainly based on theoretical arguments. In the present paper nonlinear statistical properties of the Ventral Tegmental Area (VTA) of genetically depressive limbic brain are studied in vivo on the Flinders Sensitive Line of rats (FSL). VTA plays a key role in the generation of pleasure and in the development of psychological drug addiction. We found that the FSL VTA (dopaminergic) neuron signals exhibit multifractal properties for interspike frequencies on the scales where healthy VTA dopaminergic neurons exhibit bursting activity. For high moments the observed multifractal (generalized dimensions) spectrum coincides with the generalized dimensions spectrum calculated for a spectral measure of a quantum system (so-called kicked Harper model, actively used as a model of quantum chaos). This observation can be considered as a first experimental (in vivo) indication in the favor of the quantum (at least partially) nature of brain neurons activity.

A complementarity relation is shown between the visibility of interference and bipartite entanglement in a two qubit interferometric system when the parameters of the quantum operation change for a given input state. The entanglement measure is a decreasing function of the visibility of interference. The implications for quantum computation are briefly discussed.

Rank-varying computational complexity describes those computations in which the complexity of executing each step is not a constant, but evolves throughout the computation as a function of the order of execution of each step [2]. This paper identifies practical instances of this computational paradigm in the procedures for computing the quantum Fourier transform and its inverse. It is shown herein that under the constraints imposed by quantum decoherence, only a parallel approach can guarantee a reliable solution or, alternatively, improve scalability.

The quantum jump method for the calculation of geometric phase is reviewed. This is an operational method to associate a geometric phase to the evolution of a quantum system subjected to decoherence in an open system. The method is general and can be applied to many different physical systems, within the Markovian approximation. As examples, two main source of decoherence are considered: dephasing and spontaneous decay. It is shown that the geometric phase is to very large extent insensitive to the former, i.e. it is independent of the number of jumps determined by the dephasing operator.

We have studied the topological expression of the reduced quantum trajectory using ϕ-mapping topological current theory and reduced density matrix theory. Moreover, we have proposed a new topological expression called the reduced quantum topological trajectory. Ignoring the coefficients of the winding number, we have found that the expression for the reduced quantum topological trajectory is the same for coherence as it is for decoherence. Under certain conditions, the vorticity of the reduced quantum topological trajectory is a topological invariant.

One of the challenges of the Environment-Induced Decoherence (EID) approach is to provide a simple general definition of the moving pointer basis or moving preferred basis. In this paper we prove that the study of the poles that produce the decaying modes in non-unitary evolution, could yield a general definition of the relaxation, the decoherence times, and the moving preferred basis. These are probably the most important concepts in the theory of decoherence, one of the most relevant chapters of theoretical (and also practical) quantum mechanics. As an example we solved the Omnès (or Lee–Friedrich) model using our theory.

I give a brief introduction to many worlds or "no wave function collapse" quantum mechanics, suitable for non-specialists. I then discuss the origin of probability in such formulations, distinguishing between objective and subjective notions of probability.

Quantum gravitational effects suggest a minimal length, or spacetime interval, of order of the Planck length. This in turn suggests that Hilbert space itself may be discrete rather than continuous. One implication is that quantum states with norm below some very small threshold do not exist. The exclusion of what Everett referred to as maverick branches is necessary for the emergence of the Born Rule in no collapse quantum mechanics. We discuss this in the context of quantum gravity, showing that discrete models (such as simplicial or lattice quantum gravity) indeed suggest a discrete Hilbert space with minimum norm. These considerations are related to the ultimate level of fine-graining found in decoherent histories (of spacetime geometry plus matter fields) produced by quantum gravity.

Two-dimensional quantum walks using a two-state coin have simpler experimental implementation than two-dimensional quantum walks using a four-state coin. However, decoherence occurs inevitably during the evolution of quantum walks due to the coupling between the quantum systems and their environment. Thus, it is interesting to investigate the robustness against decoherence for two- and four-state two-dimensional quantum walks. Here, we investigate the effects of the decoherence on two- and four-state two-dimensional quantum walks produced by the broken-link-type noise and compare their robustness against the broken-link-type noise. Specifically, we analyze the quantum correlation between the two spatial dimensions x and y by using measurement-induced disturbance for the two-state quantum walks, i.e. the alternate walk and the Pauli walk, and the four-state quantum walks, i.e. the Grover, Hadamard and Fourier walks, respectively. Our analysis shows that the two-state walks are more robust against the broken-link-type noise than the four-state walks.

High-dimensional quantum communication plays an important role in long-distance quantum communication. It is shown that two-qubit quantum entanglement can be protected from amplitude damping decoherence. We study the effect of amplitude damping decoherence on two-qubit high-dimensional quantum entanglement. The negativity for high-dimensional quantum entanglement with or without quantum weak measurement and the reversal in amplitude damping decoherence are presented. We found that nonmaximally entangled state may have better performance than maximally entangled state in amplitude damping decoherence. Moreover, we show that arbitrary high-dimensional quantum entanglement can be protected from amplitude damping decoherence by weak measurement and the reversal. The results of our protocol are in agreement with previous analysis for the case of qubits and qutrits.

In this paper, the bidirectional steering between two accelerated partners sharing initially different classes of entangled states is discussed. Due to the decoherence, the steerability and its degree decrease either as the acceleration increases or the partners share initially a small amount of quantum correlations. The possibility of increasing the steerability is investigated by applying the filtering process. Our results show that by increasing the filtering strength, one can improve the upper bounds of the steerability and the range of acceleration at which the steerability is possible. Steering large coherent states is much better than steering less coherent ones.

In this paper, we explore the dynamics of nonlocal correlations in a two-qubit system, that is, first prepared in a Gisin state and then interacts with a bosonic non-Markovian environment. We employ uncertainty-induced nonlocality (UIN) and the Horodecki measure (Bell function) to characterize the degree of nonclassical correlations and quantum nonlocality in the system, taking into account the influence of the non-Markovian reservoir. The dynamics of the UIN and the Bell nonlocality are next examined using the various parameters that define the non-Markovian reservoir and the initial Gisin state. Our results show that the amount of nonlocal correlations and the degree of violation of Bell’s inequality can be modulated by varying the physical parameters characterizing the non-Markovian reservoir and the initial Gisin state. We also show that in some specific cases, the system exhibits nonclassical correlations while the evolved Gisin state does not violate Bell’s inequality. Our results also confirm that UIN is robust than Bell’s nonlocality in the presence of decoherence induced by the interaction with the non-Markovian reservoir.

With the development of lab technology, the low-order correlation function can no longer describe the main effect of decoherence in the quantum many-body system, so it is imperative to study the higher-order correlation function of the system. In this paper, the higher-order correlation function is discussed analytically in the 1D transverse Ising model, and it is searched when the third-order or higher correlation functions play a key role in the decoherence effect. Under the cases of strong coupling and long coherence time, it is indicated that the effect of high-order correlation functions cannot be ignored, and the approximation of the classical Markov process is limited. But the low-order correlation function can describe well in the case of weak coupling and short coherence time.

This work reports on the stationary evolution of three different kinds of quantum correlations between two distant magnon modes. The system at hand consists of two spatially separated cavities, where each cavity has a microwave (MW) cavity and a magnon mode. The two cavities are coupled to each other via the photon-tunneling process, and both are exposed to the output field of a squeezed vacuum MW fields source. By calculating the covariance matrix fully describing the state of the two magnon modes, we give the explicit expressions of the measures of correlations defined via the Rényi-2 entropy, i.e. the Gaussian quantum steering ${𝒢}$, Gaussian Rényi-2 entanglement $E_R$ and Gaussian Rényi-2 mutual information $I_R$. We find that, the quantum steering is always upper bounded by the entanglement, which is in turn always upper bounded by half of the total correlations. The obtained results are consistent with the hierarchical Rényi-2 quantum correlations established in [L. Lami, C. Hirche, G. Adesso and A. Winter, Phys. Rev. Lett. 117, 220502 (2016)], i.e. they fulfill the hierarchical inequality $(1/2)I_R\ge E_R\ge {𝒢}$. The influences of the squeezing parameter, the environmental temperature, the cavity–magnon coupling and the cavity–cavity coupling on the correlations are studied in detail.

We discuss the various manifestations of quantum decoherence in the forms of dephasing, entanglement with the environment, and revelation of "which-path" information. As a specific example, we consider an electron interference experiment. The coupling of the coherent electrons to the quantized electromagnetic field illustrates all of these versions of decoherence. This decoherence has two equivalent interpretations, in terms of photon emission or in terms of Aharonov-Bohm phase fluctuations. We consider the case when the coherent electrons are coupled to photons in a squeezed vacuum state. The time-averaged result is increased decoherence. However, if only electrons which are emitted during selected periods are counted, the decoherence can be suppressed below the level for the photon vacuum. This is the phenomenon of recoherence. This effect is closely related to the quantum violations of the weak energy condition, and is restricted by similar inequalities. We give some estimates of the magnitude of the recoherence effect and discuss prospects for observing it in an electron interferometry experiment.

Newton’s force law $\frac{dP}{dt}=F$ is derived from the Schrödinger equation for isolated macroscopic bodies, composite states of e.g. $N\sim 10^{25},10^{51},\dots$ atoms and molecules, at finite body temperatures. We first review three aspects of quantum mechanics (QM) in this context: (i) Heisenberg’s uncertainty relations for their center of mass (CM), (ii) the diffusion of the CM wave packet, and (iii) a finite body temperature which implies a metastable (mixed-) state of the body: photon emissions and self-decoherence. They explain the origin of the classical trajectory for a macroscopic body. The ratio between the range $R_q$ over which the quantum fluctuations of its CM are effective, and the body’s (linear) size $L_0$, $R_q∕L_0\lesssim 1$ or $R_q∕L_0\gg 1$, tells whether the body’s CM behaves classically or quantum mechanically, respectively. In the first case, Newton’s force law for its CM follows from the Ehrenfest theorem. We illustrate this for weak gravitational forces, a harmonic-oscillator potential, and for constant external electromagnetic fields slowly varying in space. The derivation of the canonical Hamilton equations for many-body systems is also discussed. Effects due to the body’s finite size such as the gravitational tidal forces appear in perturbation theory. Our work is consistent with the well-known idea that the emergence of classical physics in QM is due to the environment-induced decoherence, but complements and completes it, by clarifying the conditions under which Newton’s equations follow from QM, and by deriving them explicitly.

Using the kinetic equation of subdynamics and the suitable time ordering rule we present a type of irreversible Liouville equation and nonlinear Liouville equation for open quantum systems. We also found a spectral relation for obtaining the non-equilibrium statistical distribution based on the boundary conditions which consistent with H theorem. Furthermore, a formalism of non-equilibrium project Green functions is given, and a non-perturbative method to solve the irreversible Liouville equation is studied. Finally, we give a model of spin-based quantum computing to show that the decoherence free states can be constructed using the non-perturbative approach.

We study an electrostatic qubit monitored by a point-contact detector. Projecting an entire qubit-detector wave function on the detector eigenstates we determine the precision limit for the qubit measurements, allowed by quantum mechanics. We found that this quantity is determined by qubit dynamics as well as decoherence, generated by the measurement. Our results show how the quantum precision limit can be improved by a proper design of a measurement procedure.