Full coherent control and generation of superpositions of the quantum harmonic oscillator are not only of fundamental interest but are crucial for applications in quantum simulations, quantum-enhanced metrology and continuous-variable quantum computation. The extension of such superpositions to nonclassical states increases their power as a resource for such applications. Here, we create arbitrary superpositions of nonclassical and non-Gaussian states of a quantum harmonic oscillator using the motion of a trapped ion coupled to its internal spin states. We interleave spin-dependent nonlinear bosonic interactions and mid-circuit measurements of the spin that preserve the coherence of the oscillator. These techniques enable the creation of superpositions between squeezed, trisqueezed, and quadsqueezed states, which have never been demonstrated before, with independent control over the complex-valued squeezing parameter and the probability amplitude of each constituent, as well as their spatial separation. We directly observe the nonclassical nature of these states in the form of Wigner negativity following a full state reconstruction. Our methods apply to any system where a quantum harmonic oscillator is coupled to a spin.
We make a comparative study of quadrature squeezing, photon-number distribution and Wigner function in a decayed quantum system. Specifically, for a field mode prepared initially in cat states interacting with a zero-temperature environment, we show that the rate of reduction of the nonclassical effects in this system is proportional to the occurrence of the decoherence process.
Role of quantum interference in the origin of higher-order nonclassical characteristics of radiation field has been probed vis-a-vis a discrete and a continuous superposition of coherent states. Specifically, the possibilities of observing higher-order nonclassical properties (e.g., higher-order antibunching (HOA), higher-order sub-Poissonian photon statistics (HOSPS), higher-order squeezing (HOS) of Hong-Mandel type and Hillery type) have been investigated using a shifted symmetric cat state that reduces to Yurke-Stoler, even and odd coherent states at various limits. This shifted symmetric c…
We motivate and introduce a class of "hierarchical" quantum superposition states of $N$ coupled quantum oscillators. Unlike other well-known multimode photonic Schrödinger cat states such as entangled coherent states, the hierarchical superposition states are characterized as two-branch superpositions of tensor products of single-mode Schrödinger cat states. In addition to analyzing the photon statistics and quasiprobability distributions of prominent examples of these nonclassical states, we consider their usefulness for high-precision quantum metrology of nonlinear optical Hamiltonians and q…
We present several examples where prominent quantum properties are transferred from a microscopic superposition to thermal states at high temperatures. Our work is motivated by an analogy of Schrodinger's cat paradox, where the state corresponding to the virtual cat is a mixed thermal state with a large average photon number. Remarkably, quantum entanglement can be produced between thermal states with nearly the maximum Bell-inequality violation even when the temperatures of both modes approach infinity.
We consider an experimentally realizable scheme for manipulating quantum states using a general superposition of products of field annihilation ($\hat{a}$) and creation ($\hat{a}^†$) operators of the type ($s \hat{a}\hat{a}^†+ t \hat{a}^†\hat{a}$), with $s^2 + t^2 = 1$. Such an operation, when applied on states with classical features, is shown to introduce strong nonclassicality. We quantify the generated degree of nonclassicality by the negative volume of Wigner distribution in the phase space and investigate two other observable nonclassical features, sub-Poissonian statistics and squeezing…
Considering the concept of "{\it nonlinear coherent states}", we will study the interference effects by introducing the {\it "superposition of two classes of nonlinear coherent states"} which are $\fracπ{2}$ out of phase. The formalism has then been applied to a few physical systems as "harmonious states", "SU(1,1) coherent states" and "the center of mass motion of trapped ion". Finally, the nonclassical properties such as sub-Poissonian statistics, quadrature squeezing, amplitude-squared squeezing and Wigner distribution function of the superposed states have been investigated, numerically. E…
It is shown that a nonclassicality witness, whose expectation value can be measured for all quantum states, can be constructed from every nonclassicality filter. This finding leads to a set of universal witnesses, parameterized by only three real numbers, for the detection of nonclassicality of any quantum state of a harmonic oscillator. An explicit operator expression is given for such a universal witness. The application of the witnesses is demonstrated for a nontrivial example, and its experimental measurement is briefly considered.
A particle bounded in a potential with finite range is described by using an $f$-deformed quantum oscillator approach. Finite range of this potential can be considered as a controllable deformation parameter. The non-classical quantum statistical properties of this deformed oscillator can be manipulated by nonlinearities associated to the finite range.
A bosonic state is commonly considered nonclassical (or quantum) if its Glauber-Sudarshan $P$ function is not a classical probability density, which implies that only coherent states and their statistical mixtures are classical. We quantify the nonclassicality of a single qubit, defined by the vacuum and single-photon states, by applying the following four well-known measures of nonclassicality: (1) the nonclassical depth, $τ$, related to the minimal amount of Gaussian noise which changes a nonpositive $P$ function into a positive one; (2) the nonclassical distance $D$, defined as the Bures di…
Quantum nonclassicality is the basic building stone for the vast majority of quantum information applications and methods of its generation are at the forefront of research. One of the obstacles any method needs to clear is the looming presence of decohorence and noise which act against the nonclassicality and often erase it completely. In this paper we show that nonclassical states of a quantum harmonic oscillators initially in thermal equilibrium states can be deterministically created by coupling it to a single two level system. This can be achieved even in the absorption regime in which th…
The phase-space path-integral approach to the damped harmonic oscillator is analyzed beyond the Markovian approximation. It is found that pairs of nonclassical trajectories contribute to the path-integral representation of the Wigner propagating function. Due to the linearity of the problem, the sum coordinate of a pair still satisfies the classical equation of motion. Furthermore, it is shown that the broadening of the Wigner propagating function of the damped oscillator arises due to the time-nonlocal interaction mediated by the heat bath.
We study a coherent superposition of field annihilation and creation operator acting on continuous variable systems and propose its application for quantum state engineering. Specifically, it is investigated how the superposed operation transforms a classical state to a nonclassical one, together with emerging nonclassical effects. We also propose an experimental scheme to implement this elementary coherent operation and discuss its usefulness to produce an arbitrary superposition of number states involving up to two photons.
We construct even and odd nonlinear coherent states of a parametric oscillator and examine their nonclassical properties.It has been shown that these superpositions exhibit squeezing and photon antibunching which change with time.
We consider a system composed of a two-level system (i.e. a qubit) and a harmonic oscillator in the ultrastrong-coupling regime, where the coupling strength is comparable to the qubit and oscillator energy scales. Special emphasis is placed on the possibility of preparing nonclassical states in this system. These nonclassical states include squeezed states, Schrodinger-cat states and entangled states. We start by comparing the predictions of a number of analytical methods that can be used to describe the system under different assumptions, thus analyzing the properties of the system in various…
We show that the standard techniques that are utilized to study the classical like properties of the pure states for Hermitian systems can be adjusted to investigate the classicality of pure states for non-Hermitian systems. The method is applied to the states of complex-valued potentials that are generated by Darboux transformations and can model both non-PT-symmetric and PT-symmetric oscillators exhibiting real spectra.
A minimal energy quantum superposition of two maximally distinguishable, isoenergetic single mode Gaussian states is used to construct the system-environment representation of a class of linear bosonic quantum channels acting on a single bosonic mode. The quantum channels are further defined by unitary dynamics of the system and environment corresponding to either a passive linear optical element $U_{\text{BS}}$ or two-mode squeezing $U_{\text{TM}}$. The notion of nonclassicality distance is used to show that the initial environment superposition state becomes maximally nonclassical as the con…
In this paper we try to introduce the ladder operators associated with the pseudoharmonic oscillator, after solving the corresponding Schrödinger equation by using the factorization method. The obtained generalized raising and lowering operators naturally lead us to the Dirac representation space of the system which is very easier to work with, in comparison to the functional Hilbert space. The SU(1,1) dynamical symmetry group associated with the considered system is exactly established through investigating the fact that the deduced operators satisfy appropriate commutation relations. This re…
We propose two experimental schemes for producing coherent-state superpositions which approximate different nonclassical states conditionally in traveling optical fields. Although these setups are constructed of a small number of linear optical elements and homodyne measurements, they can be used to generate various photon number superpositions in which the number of constituent states can be higher than the number of measurements in the schemes. We determine numerically the parameters to achieve maximal fidelity of the preparation for a large variety of nonclassical states, such as amplitude …
We present a heralded state preparation scheme for driven nonlinear open quantum systems. The protocol is based on a continuous photon counting measurement of the system's decay channel. When no photons are detected for a period of time, the system has relaxed to a measurement-induced pseudo-steady state. We illustrate the protocol by the creation of states with a negative Wigner function in a Kerr oscillator, a system whose unconditional steady state is strictly positive.
We construct nonlinear coherent states or f-deformed coherent states for a nonpolynomial nonlinear oscillator which can be considered as placed in the middle between the harmonic oscillator and the isotonic oscillator (Cariñena J F et al, J. Phys. A: Math. Theor. 41, 085301 (2008)). The deformed annihilation and creation operators which are required to construct the nonlinear coherent states in the number basis are obtained from the solution of the Schrödinger equation. Using these operators, we construct generalized intelligent states, nonlinear coherent states, Gazeau-Klauder coherent states…
We study an optomechanical system for the purpose of generating a nonclassical mechanical state when a mechanical oscillator is quadratically coupled to a single-mode cavity field driven by a squeezed optical field. The system corresponds to a regime where the optical dissipation dominates both the mechanical damping and the optomechanical coupling. We identify that multi-phonon processes emerge in the optomechanical system and show that a mechanical oscillator prepared in the ground state will evolve into an amplitude-squared squeezed vacuum state. The Wigner distribution of the steady state …
Here we show that quantum states of a mechanical oscillator can be generated in an optomechanical analogue of the micromaser, in absence of any atom-like subsystem, thus exhibiting single-atom masing effects in a system composed solely of oscillator components. In the regime where the single-photon coupling strength is on the order of the cavity decay rate, a cavity mode with at most a single-excitation present gives rise to sub-Poissonian oscillator limit-cycles that generate quantum features in the steady state just above the renormalized cavity resonance frequency and mechanical sidebands. …
Born rule is key to understanding quantum mechanics based on the probability amplitude for the measurement process of a physical quantity. Based on a typical particle nature of a photon, the quantum feature of photon bunching on a beam splitter between two output photons can be explained by Born rule even without clear definition of the relative phase between two input photons. Unlike conventional understanding on this matter, known as the Hong-Ou-Mandel effect, here, we present a new interpretation based on the wave nature of a photon, where the quantum feature of photon bunching is explained…
Optomechanics and electromechanics have made it possible to prepare macroscopic mechanical oscillators in their quantum ground states, in quadrature squeezed states, and in entangled states of motion. In addition to coaxing ever larger and more tangible objects into a regime of quantum behavior, this new capability has encouraged ideas of using mechanical oscillators in the processing and communication of quantum information and as precision force sensors operating beyond the standard quantum limit. But the effectively linear interaction between motion and light or electricity precludes access…
The generation of nonclassical states of a radiation field has become increasingly important in the past years given its various applications in quantum communication. The feasibility of generating such nonclassical states has been established in several branches of physics such as cavity electrodynamics, trapped ions, quantum dots, atoms inside cavities and so on. In this sense, we will discuss the issue of the generation of nonclassical states in the context of a superconducting qubit in a microcavity. It has been recently proposed a way to engineer quantum states using a SQUID charge qubit …
The ability to produce nonclassical wave in a system is essential for advances in quantum communication and computation. Here, we propose a scheme to generate highly nonclassical phonon emission statistics -- antibunched wave in a quantum van der Pol (vdP) oscillator subject to an external driving, both single- and two-phonon losses. It is found that phonon antibunching depends significantly on the nonlinear two-phonon loss of the vdP oscillator, where the degree of the antibunching increases monotonically with the two-phonon loss and the distinguished parameter regimes with optimal antibunchi…
We present an efficient scheme to generate two-mode SU(2) macroscopic quantum superposition (Schrödinger cat) states, entangled number states and entangled coherent states for the vibrational motion of an ion trapped in a two-dimensional harmonic potential well. We also show that the same scheme can be used to realize a Fredkin gate operation.
We propose a scheme to generate nonclassical states of a quantum system, which is composed of the one-dimensional trapped ion motion and a single cavity field mode. We show that two-mode SU(2) Schrödinger-cat states, entangled coherent states, two-mode squeezed vacuum states and their superposition can be generated. If the vibration mode and the cavity mode are used to represent separately a qubit, a quantum phase gate can be implemented.
Nonclassicality is a key ingredient for quantum enhanced technologies and experiments involving macro- scopic quantum coherence. Considering various exactly-solvable quantum-oscillator systems, we address the role played by the anharmonicity of their potential in the establishment of nonclassical features. Specifically, we show that a monotonic relation exists between the the entropic nonlinearity of the considered potentials and their ground state nonclassicality, as quantified by the negativity of the Wigner function. In addition, in order to clarify the role of squeezing--which is not captu…
By analyzing the optical tomogram of a linear superposition of coherent states, we show that distinctive signatures of the macroscopic superposition states are displayed directly in the optical tomograms of the states. We also study the effect of decoherence on the optical tomograms of the macroscopic superposition states. Since the wave packet fractional revivals are associated with the generation of macroscopic superposition states, these signatures help in visualizing the revivals and fractional revivals occurring in a nonlinear medium directly in the optical tomogram of the time-evolved st…
We consider preparation of nonclassical oscillatory states in a degenerate parametric oscillator combined with phase modulation. In this scheme intracavity oscillatory mode is excited by train of Gaussian laser pulses through degenerate down-conversion process and phase modulation element inserted in a cavity leads to anharmonicity of oscillatory mode. We demonstrate production of nonclassical oscillatory states with two-fold symmetry in phase-space including the superposition of Fock states and quantum localized states on the level of few excitation numbers and in over-transient dissipative r…
We study a novel optical setup which is able to select a specific Fock component from a generic input state. The device allows to synthesize number states and superpositions of few number states, and to measure the photon distribution and the density matrix of a generic input signal.
We present controllable generation of various kinds of highly nonclassical states of light, including the single photon state and superposition states of mesoscopically distinct components. The high nonclassicality of the generated states is measured by the negativity of the Wigner function, which is largest ever observed to our knowledge. Our scheme is based on photon subtraction from a nearly pure squeezed vacuum, generated from an optical parametric oscillator with a periodically-poled KTiOPO$_4$ crystal as a nonlinear medium. This is an important step to realize basic elements of universal…
In this paper we define a non-unitary displacement operator, which by acting on the vacuum state of the pseudo harmonic oscillator (PHO), generates new class of generalized coherent states (GCSs). An interesting feature of this approach is that, contrary to the Klauder-Perelomov and Barut-Girardello approaches, it does not require the existence of dynamical symmetries associated with the system under consideration. These states admit a resolution of the identity through positive definite measures on the complex plane. We have shown that the realization of these states for different values of t…
We derive simple practical procedures revealing the quantum behavior of angular momentum variables by the violation of classical upper bounds on the statistics. Data analysis is minimum and definite conclusions are obtained without evaluation of moments, or any other more sophisticated procedures. These nonclassical tests are very general and independent of other typical quantum signatures of nonclassical behavior such as sub-Poissonian statistics, squeezing, or oscillatory statistics, being insensitive to the nonclassical behavior displayed by other variables.
Quantum coherence and quantum correlations are studied in the strongly interacting system composed of two qubits and an oscillator with the presence of a parametric medium. To analytically solve the system, we employ the adiabatic approximation approach. It assumes each qubit's characteristic frequency is substantially lower than the oscillator frequency. To validate our approximation, a good agreement between the calculated energy spectrum of the Hamiltonian with its numerical result is presented. The time evolution of the reduced density matrices of the two-qubit and the oscillator subsystem…
We develop a method for the determination of thecdynamics of dissipative quantum systems in the limit of large number of quanta N, based on the 1/N-expansion of Heidmann et al. [ Opt. Commun. 54, 189 (1985) ] and the quantum-classical correspondence. Using this method, we find analytically the dynamics of nonclassical states generation in the higher-order anharmonic dissipative oscillators for an arbitrary temperature of a reservoir. We show that the quantum correction to the classical motion increases with time quadratically up to some maximal value, which is dependent on the degree of nonlin…
We study the system involving mutual interaction between three qubits and an oscillator within the ultrastrong coupling regime. We apply adiabatic approximation approach to explore two extreme regimes: (i) the oscillator's frequency is far larger than each qubit's frequency and (ii) the qubit's frequency is far larger than the oscillator's frequency, and analyze the energy-level spectrum and the ground-state property of the qubit-oscillator system under the conditions of various system parameters. For the energy-level spectrum, we concentrate on studying the degeneracy in low energy levels. Fo…
A deterministic scheme for generating a macroscopic superposition state of a nanomechanical resonator is proposed. The nonclassical state is generated through a suitably engineered dissipative dynamics exploiting the optomechanical quadratic interaction with a bichromatically driven optical cavity mode. The resulting driven dissipative dynamics can be employed for monitoring and testing the decoherence processes affecting the nanomechanical resonator under controlled conditions.
We address the dynamics of nonclassicality for a quantum system interacting with a noisy fluctuating environment described by a classical stochastic field. As a paradigmatic example, we consider a harmonic oscillator initially prepared in a maximally nonclassical state, e.g. a Fock number state or a Schroedinger cat-like state, and then coupled to either resonant or non-resonant external field. Stochastic modeling allows us to describe the decoherence dynamics without resorting to approximated quantum master equations, and to introduce non- Markovian effects in a controlled way. A detailed com…
Reservoir engineering enables the robust preparation of pure quantum states in noisy environments. We show how a new family of quantum states of a mechanical oscillator can be stabilized in a cavity that is parametrically coupled to both the mechanical displacement and the displacement squared. The cavity is driven with three tones, on the red sideband, on the cavity resonance and on the second blue sideband. The states so stabilized are (squeezed and displaced) superpositions of a finite number of phonons. They show the unique feature of encompassing two prototypes of nonclassicality for boso…
Nonclassicality conditions for an oscillator-like system interacting with a hot thermal bath are considered. Nonclassical properties of quantum states can be conserved up to a certain temperature threshold only. In this case, affection of the thermal noise can be compensated via transformation of an observable, which tests the nonclassicality (witness function). Possibilities for experimental implementations based on unbalanced homodyning are discussed. At the same time, we demonstrate that the scheme based on balanced homodyning cannot be improved for noisy states with proposed technique and …
We investigate the states generated in continuous variable (CV) optical fields on operating them with a number-conserving operator of the type $s\hat{a}\hat{a}^†+ t\hat{a}^†\hat{a}$, formed by the generalised superposition of products of field annihilation ($\hat{a}$) and creation ($\hat{a}^†$) operators, with $s^2+t^2=1$. Such an operator is experimentally realizable and can be suitably manipulated to generate nonclassical optical states when applied on single- and two-mode coherent, thermal, and squeezed input states. At low intensities, these nonclassical states can interact with a secondar…
Conventional Glauber coherent states (CS) can be defined in several equivalent ways, e.g., by displacing the vacuum or, explicitly, by their infinite Poissonian expansion in Fock states. It is well known that these definitions become inequivalent if applied to finite $d$-level systems (qudits). We present a comparative Wigner-function description of the qudit CS defined (i) by the action of the truncated displacement operator on the vacuum and (ii) by the Poissonian expansion in Fock states of the Glauber CS truncated at $(d-1)$-photon Fock state. These states can be generated from a classical…
We propose a protocol for quantum state tomography of nonclassical states in optomechanical systems. Using a parametric drive, the procedure overcomes the challenges of weak optomechanical coupling, poor detection efficiency, and thermal noise to enable high efficiency homodyne measurement. Our analysis is based on the analytic description of the generalized measurement that is performed when optomechanical position measurement competes with thermal noise and a parametric drive. The proposed experimental procedure is numerically simulated in realistic parameter regimes, which allows us to show…
The Leggett-Garg inequality (LGI), based on the notions of realism and noninvasive measurability, is applied in the context of a linear harmonic oscillator. It is found that merely through observing at various instants which region of the potential well, the oscillating quantum object is in, the LGI can be violated without taking recourse to any ancillary quantum system. Strikingly, this violation reveals an unexplored nonclassicality of the state which is considered the most "classical-like" of all quantum states, namely the Schrödinger coherent state. In the macrolimit, the extent to which s…
The time evolution of thermal states of a mirror released from a tight harmonic trap is studied. After the release no dissipation is assumed to be present and the mirror is, after a time delay, kicked into a momentum superposition state. The thermal character of the initial state washes out the telltale interference patterns of the superposition but no loss of coherence is found. This investigation resolves a controversy about decoherence--without--dissipation and shows that entrained measurements can be surprisingly insensitive to temperature effects.
