Thermal entanglement in the nanotubular system Na_2V_3O_7

Macroscopic entanglement witnesses have been put forward recently to reveal nonlocal quantum correlations between individual constituents of the solid at nonzero temperatures. Here we apply a recently proposed universal entanglement witness, the magnetic susceptibility [New J. Phys. {\bf 7}, 258 (2005)] for the estimation of the critical temperature $T_c$ in the nanotubular system ${\rm Na_2V_3O_7}$ below which thermal entanglement is present. As a result of an analysis based on the experimental data for dc-magnetic susceptibility, we show that $T_c \approx 365$ K, which is approximately three times higher than the critical temperature corresponding to the bipartite entanglement.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, REVTeX

Fast partial decoherence of a superconducting flux qubit in a spin bath

The superconducting flux qubit has two quantum states with opposite magnetic flux. Environment of nuclear spins can find out the direction of the magnetic flux after a decoherence time $\tau_0$ inversely proportional to the magnitude of the flux and the square root of the number of spins. When the Hamiltonian of the qubit drives fast coherent Rabi oscillations between the states with opposite flux, then flux direction is flipped at a constant rate $\omega$ and the decoherence time $\tau=\omega\tau_0^2$ is much longer than $\tau_0$. However, on closer inspection decoherence actually takes place on two timescales. The long time $\tau$ is a time of full decoherence but a part of quantum coherence is lost already after the short time $\tau_0$. This fast partial decoherence biases coherent flux oscillations towards the initial flux direction and it can affect performance of the superconducting devices as qubits.Comment: 7 page

Dimension minimization of a quantum automaton

A new model of a Quantum Automaton (QA), working with qubits is proposed. The quantum states of the automaton can be pure or mixed and are represented by density operators. This is the appropriated approach to deal with measurements and dechorence. The linearity of a QA and of the partial trace super-operator, combined with the properties of invariant subspaces under unitary transformations, are used to minimize the dimension of the automaton and, consequently, the number of its working qubits. The results here developed are valid wether the state set of the QA is finite or not. There are two main results in this paper: 1) We show that the dimension reduction is possible whenever the unitary transformations, associated to each letter of the input alphabet, obey a set of conditions. 2) We develop an algorithm to find out the equivalent minimal QA and prove that its complexity is polynomial in its dimension and in the size of the input alphabet.Comment: 26 page

Mixed State Entanglement of Assistance and the Generalized Concurrence

We consider the maximum bipartite entanglement that can be distilled from a single copy of a multipartite mixed entangled state, where we focus mostly on $d\times d\times n$-dimensional tripartite mixed states. We show that this {\em assisted entanglement}, when measured in terms of the generalized concurrence (named G-concurrence) is (tightly) bounded by an entanglement monotone, which we call the G-concurrence of assistance. The G-concurrence is one of the possible generalizations of the concurrence to higher dimensions, and for pure bipartite states it measures the {\em geometric mean} of the Schmidt numbers. For a large (non-trivial) class of $d\times d$-dimensional mixed states, we are able to generalize Wootters formula for the concurrence into lower and upper bounds on the G-concurrence. Moreover, we have found an explicit formula for the G-concurrence of assistance that generalizes the expression for the concurrence of assistance for a large class of $d\times d\times n$ dimensional tripartite pure states.Comment: 7 page

Maintaining Quantum Coherence in the Presence of Noise through State Monitoring

Unsharp POVM measurements allow the estimation and tracking of quantum wavefunctions in real-time with minimal disruption of the dynamics. Here we demonstrate that high fidelity state monitoring, and hence quantum control, is possible even in the presence of classical dephasing and amplitude noise, by simulating such measurements on a two-level system undergoing Rabi oscillations. Finite estimation fidelity is found to persist indefinitely long after the decoherence times set by the noise fields in the absence of measurement.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

An observable entanglement measure for unknown mixed quantum states

We show how an unknown mixed quantum state's entanglement can be quantified by a suitable, local parity measurement on its two-fold copy.Comment: in press in PR

Precision measurement with an optical Josephson junction

We study a new type of Josephson device, the so-called "optical Josephson junction" as proposed in Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 95}, 170402 (2005). Two condensates are optically coupled through a waveguide by a pair of Bragg beams. This optical Josephson junction is analogous to the usual Josephson junction of two condensates weakly coupled via tunneling. We discuss the use of this optical Josephson junction, for making precision measurements.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figur

Scattering fidelity in elastodynamics

The recent introduction of the concept of scattering fidelity, causes us to revisit the experiment by Lobkis and Weaver [Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 254302 (2003)]. There, the ``distortion'' of the coda of an acoustic signal is measured under temperature changes. This quantity is in fact the negative logarithm of scattering fidelity. We re-analyse their experimental data for two samples, and we find good agreement with random matrix predictions for the standard fidelity. Usually, one may expect such an agreement for chaotic systems only. While the first sample, may indeed be assumed chaotic, for the second sample, a perfect cuboid, such an agreement is more surprising. For the first sample, the random matrix analysis yields a perturbation strength compatible with semiclassical predictions. For the cuboid the measured perturbation strength is much larger than expected, but with the fitted values for this strength, the experimental data are well reproduced.Comment: 4 page

A simple formula for pooling knowledge about a quantum system

When various observers obtain information in an independent fashion about a classical system, there is a simple rule which allows them to pool their knowledge, and this requires only the states-of-knowledge of the respective observers. Here we derive an equivalent quantum formula. While its realm of applicability is necessarily more limited, it does apply to a large class of measurements, and we show explicitly for a single qubit that it satisfies the intuitive notions of what it means to pool knowledge about a quantum system. This analysis also provides a physical interpretation for the trace of the product of two density matrices.Comment: 5 pages, Revtex