Witness for initial system-environment correlations in open system dynamics

We study the evolution of a general open quantum system when the system and its environment are initially correlated. We show that the trace distance between two states of the open system can increase above its initial value, and derive tight upper bounds for the growth of the distinguishability of open system states. This represents a generalization of the contraction property of quantum dynamical maps. The obtained inequalities can be interpreted in terms of the exchange of information between the system and the environment, and lead to a witness for system-environment correlations which can be determined through measurements on the open system alone.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figur

New applications for phosphoric acid fuel cells

New applications for phosphoric acid fuel cells were identified and evaluated. Candidates considered included all possibilities except grid connected electric utility applications, on site total energy systems, industrial cogeneration, opportunistic use of waste hydrogen, space and military applications, and applications smaller than 10 kW. Applications identified were screened, with the most promising subjected to technical and economic evaluation using a fuel cell and conventional power system data base developed in the study. The most promising applications appear to be the underground mine locomotive and the railroad locomotive. Also interesting are power for robotic submersibles and Arctic villages. The mine locomotive is particularly attractive since it is expected that the fuel cell could command a very high price and still be competitive with the conventionally used battery system. The railroad locomotive's attractiveness results from the (smaller) premium price which the fuel cell could command over the conventional diesel electric system based on its superior fuel efficiency, and on the large size of this market and the accompanying opportunities for manufacturing economy

Initial state preparation with dynamically generated system-environment correlations

The dependence of the dynamics of open quantum systems upon initial correlations between the system and environment is an utterly important yet poorly understood subject. For technical convenience most prior studies assume factorizable initial states where the system and its environments are uncorrelated, but these conditions are not very realistic and give rise to peculiar behaviors. One distinct feature is the rapid build up or a sudden jolt of physical quantities immediately after the system is brought in contact with its environments. The ultimate cause of this is an initial imbalance between system-environment correlations and coupling. In this note we demonstrate explicitly how to avoid these unphysical behaviors by proper adjustments of correlations and/or the coupling, for setups of both theoretical and experimental interest. We provide simple analytical results in terms of quantities that appear in linear (as opposed to affine) master equations derived for factorized initial states.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure

Problems of operationalizing the concept of a cost-of-living index

The aim of our paper is to discuss the problems of operationalizing the concept of a .cost-of-living-index. (COLI). For this purpose we are first undertaking a theoretical analysis of Diewert’s theory of superlative index numbers as one possible approach to approximate a COLI. We show that Diewert.s superlative index approach is arguable in many points and that the approach requires restrictive assumptions which are not likely to be met in observed households behaviour. To get a better idea about the deviation of observed households behaviour from the neoclassical assumptions about utility maximizing behaviour, we are estimating an Almost Ideal Demand System and a Quadratic Almost Ideal Demand System with cross section micro data from the German income and expenditure survey. Using the results of the demand system estimations we calculate COLIs and compare them with superlative index numbers and the Laspeyres price index.cost-of-living index; superlative index numbers; Diewert; demand systems

PT-symmetric quantum Liouvillian dynamics

We discuss a combination of unitary and anti-unitary symmetry of quantum Liouvillian dynamics, in the context of open quantum systems, which implies a D2 symmetry of the complex Liovillean spectrum. For sufficiently weak system-bath coupling it implies a uniform decay rate for all coherences, i.e. off-diagonal elements of the system's density matrix taken in the eigenbasis of the Hamiltonian. As an example we discuss symmetrically boundary driven open XXZ spin 1/2 chains.Comment: Note [18] added with respect to a published version, explaining the symmetry of the matrix V [eq. (14)

Probing multipartite entanglement in a coupled Jaynes-Cummings system

We show how to probe multipartite entanglement in $N$ coupled Jaynes-Cummings cells where the degrees of freedom are the electronic energies of each of the $N$ atoms in separate single-mode cavities plus the $N$ single-mode fields themselves. Specifically we propose probing the combined system as though it is a dielectric medium. The spectral properties and transition rates directly reveal multipartite entanglement signatures. It is found that the Hilbert space of the $N$ cell system can be confined to the totally symmetric subspace of two states only that are maximally-entangled W states with 2N degrees of freedom

Phenomenological memory-kernel master equations and time-dependent Markovian processes

Do phenomenological master equations with memory kernel always describe a non-Markovian quantum dynamics characterized by reverse flow of information? Is the integration over the past states of the system an unmistakable signature of non-Markovianity? We show by a counterexample that this is not always the case. We consider two commonly used phenomenological integro-differential master equations describing the dynamics of a spin 1/2 in a thermal bath. By using a recently introduced measure to quantify non-Markovianity [H.-P. Breuer, E.-M. Laine, and J. Piilo, Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 210401 (2009)] we demonstrate that as far as the equations retain their physical sense, the key feature of non-Markovian behavior does not appear in the considered memory kernel master equations. Namely, there is no reverse flow of information from the environment to the open system. Therefore, the assumption that the integration over a memory kernel always leads to a non-Markovian dynamics turns out to be vulnerable to phenomenological approximations. Instead, the considered phenomenological equations are able to describe time-dependent and uni-directional information flow from the system to the reservoir associated to time-dependent Markovian processes.Comment: 5 pages, no figure

Jump-diffusion unravelling of a non Markovian generalized Lindblad master equation

The "correlated-projection technique" has been successfully applied to derive a large class of highly non Markovian dynamics, the so called non Markovian generalized Lindblad type equations or Lindblad rate equations. In this article, general unravellings are presented for these equations, described in terms of jump-diffusion stochastic differential equations for wave functions. We show also that the proposed unravelling can be interpreted in terms of measurements continuous in time, but with some conceptual restrictions. The main point in the measurement interpretation is that the structure itself of the underlying mathematical theory poses restrictions on what can be considered as observable and what is not; such restrictions can be seen as the effect of some kind of superselection rule. Finally, we develop a concrete example and we discuss possible effects on the heterodyne spectrum of a two-level system due to a structured thermal-like bath with memory.Comment: 23 page

Irreversible photon transfer in an ensemble of Λ\Lambda-type atoms and photon diode

We show that a pair of quantized cavity modes interacting with a spectrally broadened ensemble of Lambda-type atoms is analogous to an ensemble of two level systems coupled to a bosonic reservoir. This provides the possibility for an irreversible photon transfer between photon modes. The density of states as well as the quantum state of the reservoir can be engineered allowing the observation of effects such as the quantum Zeno- and anti-Zeno effect, the destructive interference of decay channels and the decay in a squeezed vacuum. As a particular application we discuss a photon diode, i.e. a device which directs a single photon from anyone of two input ports to a common output port.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure

Reduced density matrix hybrid approach: Application to electronic energy transfer

Electronic energy transfer in the condensed phase, such as that occurring in photosynthetic complexes, frequently occurs in regimes where the energy scales of the system and environment are similar. This situation provides a challenge to theoretical investigation since most approaches are accurate only when a certain energetic parameter is small compared to others in the problem. Here we show that in these difficult regimes, the Ehrenfest approach provides a good starting point for a dynamical description of the energy transfer process due to its ability to accurately treat coupling to slow environmental modes. To further improve on the accuracy of the Ehrenfest approach, we use our reduced density matrix hybrid framework to treat the faster environmental modes quantum mechanically, at the level of a perturbative master equation. This combined approach is shown to provide an efficient and quantitative description of electronic energy transfer in a model dimer and the Fenna-Matthews-Olson complex and is used to investigate the effect of environmental preparation on the resulting dynamics.Comment: 11 pages, 8 figure