We study decoherence properties of arbitrarily long histories constructed from a fixed projective partition of a finite dimensional Hilbert space. We show that decoherence of such histories for all initial states that are naturally induced by the projective partition implies decoherence for arbitrary initial states. In addition we generalize the simple necessary decoherence condition [Scherer et al., Phys. Lett. A (2004)] for such histories to the case of arbitrary coarse-graining.
Within the decoherent histories formulation of quantum mechanics, we consider arbitrarily long histories constructed from a fixed projective partition of a finite-dimensional Hilbert space. We review some of the decoherence properties of such histories including simple necessary decoherence conditions and the dependence of decoherence on the initial state. Here we make a first step towards generalization of our earlier results [Scherer and Soklakov, e-print: quant-ph/0405080, (2004) and Scherer et al., Phys. Lett. A, vol. 326, 307, (2004)] to the case of approximate decoherence.
We investigate the decoherence of histories of local densities for linear oscillators models. It is shown that histories of local number, momentum and energy density are approximately decoherent, when coarse-grained over sufficiently large volumes. Decoherence arises directly from the proximity of these variables to exactly conserved quantities (which are exactly decoherent), and not from environmentally-induced decoherence. We discuss the approach to local equilibrium and the subsequent emergence of hydrodynamic equations for the local densities.
Within the decoherent histories formulation of quantum mechanics, we investigate necessary conditions for decoherence of arbitrarily long histories. We prove that fine-grained histories of arbitrary length decohere for all classical initial states if and only if the unitary evolution preserves classicality of states (using a natural formal definition of classicality). We give a counterexample showing that this equivalence does not hold for coarse-grained histories.
In the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory, attention focuses on the conditions under which probabilities may be assigned to sets of quantum histories. A variety of conditions have been proposed, but the most important one is decoherence, which means that the interference between every pair of histories in the set is zero. Weaker conditions have been considered, such as consistency, or linear positivity, but these are ruled out by the requirement of consistent composition of subsystems, proposed by Diosi. Here we propose a new condition which we call partial decoherence, and is the…
Using the Gell-Mann and Hartle formalism of generalized quantum mechanics of closed systems, we study the classical limit of coarse-grained spacetime histories and their decoherence. The system under consideration is one-dimensional and consists of a particle coupled to a von Neumann apparatus that performs a measurement of the position of the particle during the finite time interval during which the histories of this system take place. We consider two cases: a free particle and a harmonic oscillator. The real line is divided into intervals of the same length, and coarse-grained histories are …
We consider the decoherence of phase space histories in a class of quantum Brownian motion models, consisting of a particle moving in a potential $V(x)$ in interaction with a heat bath at temperature $T$ and dissipation gamma, in the Markovian regime. The evolution of the density operator for this open system is thus described by a non-unitary master equation. The phase space histories of the system are described by a class of quasiprojectors. Generalizing earlier results of Hagedorn and Omnès, we show that a phase space projector onto a phase space cell $Γ$ is approximately evolved under the …
An example shows that weak decoherence is more restrictive than the minimal logical decoherence structure that allows probabilities to be used consistently for quantum histories. The probabilities in the sum rules that define minimal decoherence are all calculated by using a projection operator to describe each possibility for the state at each time. Weak decoherence requires more sum rules. They bring in additional variables, that require different measurements and a different way to calculate probabilities, and raise questions of operational meaning. The example shows that extending the line…
The theory of decoherent histories is checked for the requirement of statistical independence of subsystems. Strikingly, this is satisfied only when the decoherence functional is diagonal in both its real a n d imaginary parts. In particular, the condition of consistency (or weak decoherence) required for the assignment of probabilities appears to be ruled out. The same conclusion is obtained independently, by claiming a plausible dynamical robustness of decoherent histories.
We introduce a new notion of consistency for 2-events quantum histories, based on the concept of mirror projection. Contrary to all notions of consistency so far introduced, our consistency, named self-decoherence, is an individual property, i.e., it can be attributed to every single sample of the physical system. Furthermore, self-decoherence forbids contrary inferences.
For a wide set of quantum systems it is demonstrated that the quantum regime can be considered as the transient phase while the final classical statistical regime is a permanent state. A basis where exact matrix decoherence appears for these final states is found. The relation with the decoherence of histories formalism is studied. A set of final intrinsically consistent histories is found.
The decoherence of a two-state tunneling molecule, such as a chiral molecule or ammonia, due to collisions with a buffer gas is analyzed in terms of a succession of quantum states of the molecule satisfying the conditions for a consistent family of histories. With $\hbar ω$ the separation in energy of the levels in the isolated molecule and $γ$ a decoherence rate proportional to the rate of collisions, we find for $γ\gg ω$ (strong decoherence) a consistent family in which the molecule flips randomly back and forth between the left- and right-handed chiral states in a stationary Markov process.…
This paper relates both to the metaphysics of probability and to the physics of time asymmetry. Using the formalism of decoherent histories, it investigates whether intuitions about intrinsic time directedness that are often associated with probability can be justified in the context of no-collapse approaches to quantum mechanics. The standard (two-vector) approach to time symmetry in the decoherent histories literature is criticised, and an alternative approach is proposed, based on two decoherence conditions ('forwards' and 'backwards') within the one-vector formalism. In turn, consideration…
Using a reformulation of conventional results in decoherence theory, a condition is proposed for singling out a distinguished class of histories which includes those which use the ``pointer basis'' of Zurek.
D. Wallace has tried to use decoherence to solve the preferred basis problem of Everettian Quantum Mechanics, and this solution lays the foundation for his proof of the Born rule. But this is a circular argument, as approximations used in decoherence usually rely on the probabilistic interpretation of the Hilbert space norm. He claims the norm can measure approximations even without probabilities, but this assumption has not been properly justified. Without it, the combination of the Everettian and decoherent histories formalisms leads to strange consequences, such as a proliferation of small …
The basic ingredients of the consistent histories approach to quantum mechanics are the space of histories and the space of decoherence functionals. In this work we extend the classification theorem for decoherence functionals proven by Isham, Linden and Schreckenberg to the case where the space of histories is the lattice of projection operators on an arbitrary separable or non-separable complex Hilbert space of dimension strictly greater than two.
The geometry of decoherence in generalized "consistent histories" quantum theory is explored, revealing properties of the theory that are independent of any particular application of it. It is shown how the decoherence functional of a closed quantum system may be regarded as an Hermitian form on the space of linear operators on the Hilbert space of the system. This identification makes manifest a number of structural properties of decoherence functionals. For example, a bound on the maximum number of histories in a consistent set is determined. When the decoherence functional is positive -- as…
Macroscopic systems are described most completely by local densities (particle number, momentum and energy) yet the superposition states of such physical variables, indicated by the Everett interpretation, are not observed. In order to explain this, it is argued that histories of local number, momentum and energy density are approximately decoherent when coarse-grained over sufficiently large volumes. Decoherence arises directly from the proximity of these variables to exactly conserved quantities (which are exactly decoherent), and not from environmentally-induced decoherence. We discuss the …
Using the Gell-Mann and Hartle formalism of generalized quantum mechanics of closed systems, we study coarse-grained decoherent histories. The system under consideration is one-dimensional and consists of a particle coupled to a von Neumann apparatus that measures its position. The particle moves in a quadratic potential; in particular we consider a driven harmonic oscillator. The real line is divided into intervals of the same length, and coarse-grained histories are defined by the arithmetic average of the initial and final position of the particle to be within one of these intervals. The po…
We study and compare the decoherent histories approach, the environment-induced decoherence and the localization properties of thesolutions to the stochastic Schrödinger equation in quantum jump simulationand quantum state diffusion approaches, for a quantum two-level system model. We show, in particular, that there is a close connection between the decoherent histories and the quantum jump simulation, complementing a connection with the quantum state diffusion approach noted earlier by Diósi, Gisin, Halliwell and Percival. In the case of the decoherent histories analysis, the degree of approx…
This paper explores the possibility that an exactly decoherent set of histories may be constructed from an approximately decoherent set by small distortions of the operators characterizing the histories. In particular, for the case of histories of positions and momenta, this is achieved by doubling the set of operators and then finding, amongst this enlarged set, new position and momentum operators which commute, so decohere exactly, and which are ``close'' to the original operators. The enlarged, exactly decoherent, theory has the same classical dynamics as the original one, and coincides wit…
This paper describes how the entire universe might be considered an eigenstate determined by classical limiting conditions within it. This description is in the context of an approach in which the path of each relativistic particle in spacetime represents a fine-grained history for that particle, and a path integral represents a coarse-grained history as a superposition of paths meeting some criteria. Since spacetime paths are parametrized by an invariant parameter, not time, histories based on such paths do not evolve in time but are rather histories of all spacetime. Measurements can then be…
We investigate the idea that decoherence is connected with the storage of information about the decohering system somewhere in the universe. The known connection between decoherence of histories and the existence of records is extended from the case of pure initial states to mixed states. Records may still exist but are necessarily imperfect. We formulate an information-theoretic conjecture about decoherence due to an environment: the number of bits required to describe a set of decoherent histories is approximately equal to the number of bits of information thrown away to the environment in t…
In the context of the decoherent histories approach to the quantum mechanics of closed systems, Gell-Mann and Hartle have argued that the variables typically characterizing the quasiclassical domain of a large complex system are the integrals over small volumes of locally conserved densities -- hydrodynamic variables. The aim of this paper is to exhibit some simple models in which approximate decoherence arises as a result of local conservation. We derive a formula which shows the explicit connection between local conservation and approximate decoherence. We then consider a class of models con…
For a system consisting of a large collection of particles, a set of variables that will generally become effectively classical are the local densities (number, momentum, energy). That is, in the context of the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory, it is expected that histories of these variables will be approximately decoherent, and that their probabilites will be strongly peaked about hydrodynamic equations. This possibility is explored for the case of the diffusion of the number density of a dilute concentration of foreign particles in a fluid. This system has the appealing featu…
General history quantum theories are quantum theories without a globally defined notion of time. Decoherence functionals represent the states in the history approach and are defined as certain bivariate complex-valued functionals on the space of all histories. However, in practical situations -- for instance in the history formulation of standard quantum mechanics -- there often is a global time direction and the homogeneous decoherence functionals are specified by their values on the subspace of homogeneous histories. In this work we study the analytic properties of (i) the standard decoheren…
Modal interpretations of quantum mechanics assign definite properties to physical systems and specify single-time joint probabilities of these properties. We show that a natural extension, applying to properties at several times, can be given if a decoherence condition is satisfied. This extension defines "consistent histories" of modal properties. We suggest a new form of the modal scheme, that offers prospects of a more general applicability of the histories concept. Finally, we discuss a possible way of applying these ideas to relativistic quantum field theory.
A general `quantum history theory' can be characterised by the space of histories and by the space of decoherence functionals. In this note we consider the situation where the space of histories is given by the lattice of projection operators on an infinite dimensional Hilbert space $H$. We study operator representations for decoherence functionals on this space of histories. We first give necessary and sufficient conditions for a decoherence functional being representable by a trace class operator on $H \otimes H$, an infinite dimensional analogue of the Isham-Linden-Schreckenberg representat…
The inherent difficulty in talking about quantum decoherence in the context of quantum cosmology is that decoherence requires subsystems, and cosmology is the study of the whole Universe. Consistent histories gave a possible answer to this conundrum, by phrasing decoherence as loss of interference between alternative histories of closed systems. When one can apply Boolean logic to a set of histories, it is deemed 'consistent'. However, the vast majority of the sets of histories that are merely consistent are blatantly nonclassical in other respects, and further constraints than just consistenc…
We introduce a condition for the strong decoherence of a set of alternative histories of a closed quantum-mechanical system such as the universe. The condition applies, for a pure initial state, to sets of homogeneous histories that are chains of projections, generally branch-dependent. Strong decoherence implies the consistency of probability sum rules but not every set of consistent or even medium decoherent histories is strongly decoherent. Two conditions characterize a strongly decoherent set of histories: (1) At any time the operators that effectively commute with generalized records of h…
We sketch a quantum mechanical framework for the universe as a whole. Within that framework we propose a program for describing the ultimate origin in quantum cosmology of the quasiclassical domain of familiar experience and for characterizing the process of measurement. Predictions in quantum mechanics are made from probabilities for sets of alternative histories. Probabilities can be assigned only to sets of histories that approximately decohere. Decoherence is defined and the mechanism of decoherence is reviewed. Decoherence requires a sufficiently coarse-grained description of alternative …
We study the decoherence of two coupled spins that interact with a spin-bath environment. It is shown that the connectivity and the coupling strength between the spins in the environment are of crucial importance for the decoherence of the central system. For the anisotropic spin-bath, changing the connectivity or coupling strenghts changes the decoherence of the central system from Gaussian to exponential decay law. The initial state of the environment is shown to affect the decoherence process in a qualitatively significant manner.
We study a model of dephasing (decoherence) in a two-state quantum system (qubit) coupled to a bath of harmonic oscillators. An exact analytic solution for the reduced dynamics of a two-state system in this model has been obtained previously for factorizing initial states of the combined system. We show that the model admits exact solutions for a large class of correlated initial states which are typical in the theory of quantum measurements. We derive exact expressions for the off-diagonal elements of the qubit density matrix, which hold for an arbitrary strength of coupling between the qubit…
In this paper we investigate a open two-qubit model whose dynamics is not exactly solvable. When the initial state is the maximum entangled state, as the exactly solvable open two-qubit model [D. Tolkunov and V. Privman, Phys. Rev. A 71, 060308(R) (2005)], the decay of entanglement of formation of the model, expressed by concurrence is also governed by the product of suppression factors describing decoherence of the subsystems (qubits). However, if the initial state is not the maximum entangled state, its concurrence will decrease faster than the product of the suppression factors describing d…
We analyze the evolution of a quantum Brownian particle starting from an initial state that contains correlations between this system and its environment. Using a path integral approach, we obtain a master equation for the reduced density matrix of the system finding relatively simple expressions for its time dependent coefficients. We examine the evolution of delocalized initial states (Schrödinger's cats) investigating the effectiveness of the decoherence process. Analytic results are obtained for an ohmic environment (Drude's model) at zero temperature.
We consider a free charged particle interacting with an electromagnetic bath at zero temperature. The dipole approximation is used to treat the bath wavelengths larger than the width of the particle wave packet. The effect of these wavelengths is described then by a linear Hamiltonian whose form is analogous to phenomenological Hamiltonians previously adopted to describe the free particle-bath interaction. We study how the time dependence of decoherence evolution is related with initial particle-bath correlations. We show that decoherence is related to the time dependent dressing of the partic…
We study the decoherence process induced by a spin chain environment on a central spin consisting of R spins and we apply it on the dynamics of quantum correlations (QCs) of three interacting qubits. In order to see the impact of the initial prepared state of the spin chain environment on the decoherence process, we assume the spin chain environment prepared in two main ways, namely, either the ground state or the vacuum state in the momentum space. We develop a general heuristic analysis when the spin chain environment in prepared in these states, in order to understand the decoherence proces…
We investigate system-environment correlations based on the exact dynamics of a qubit and its environment in the framework of pure decoherence (phase damping). We focus on the relation of decoherence and the build-up of system-reservoir entanglement for an arbitrary (possibly mixed) initial qubit state. In the commonly employed regime where the qubit dynamics can be described by a Markov master equation of Lindblad type, we find that for almost all qubit initial states inside the Bloch sphere, decoherence is complete while the total state is still separable - no entanglement is involved. In ge…
We introduce the quantitative measures characterizing the rates of decoherence and thermalization of quantum systems. We study the time evolution of these measures in the case of a quantum harmonic oscillator whose relaxation is described in the framework of the standard master equation, for various initial states (coherent, `cat', squeezed and number). We establish the conditions under which the true decoherence measure can be approximated by the linear entropy $1-{Tr}\hatρ^2$. We show that at low temperatures and for highly excited initial states the decoherence process consists of three dis…
To protect a quantum system from decoherence due to interaction with its environment, we investigate the existence of initial states of the environment allowing for decoherence-free evolution of the system. For models in which a two-state system interacts with a dynamical environment, we prove that such states exist if and only if the interaction and self-evolution Hamiltonians share an eigenstate. If decoherence by state preparation is not possible, we show that initial states minimizing decoherence result from a delicate compromise between the environment and interaction dynamics.
By considering an exactly solvable model of a two interacting spin-1/2 qubits described by the Heisenberg anisotropic interaction in the presence of intrinsic decoherence, we study the dynamics of entanglement quantified by the concurrence and measurement-induced nonlocality (MIN) based on Hilbert-Schmidt norm and trace distance with different initial conditions. We highlight the relationship between the entanglement and MIN for the pure initial state. For an initial separable state, it is found that the robustness and the generation of the quantum correlations depend on the physical parameter…
We study the decoherence of a coupled quantum system consisting of a central spin and its correlated environment described by a general $XY$ spin-chain model. We make it clear that the evolution of the coherence factor sensitively depends on the initial states of the environment spin-chain. Specially, the dynamical evolution of the coherence factor of the central spin is numerically and analytically investigated in both weak and strong coupling cases for different initial states including thermal equilibrium state. In both weak and strong coupling regimes, the decay of the coherence factor can…
Most discussions of decoherence in the literature consider the high-temperature regime but it is also known that, in the presence of dissipation, decoherence can occur even at zero temperature. Whereas most previous investigations all assumed initial decoupling of the quantum system and bath, we consider that the system and environment are entangled at all times. Here, we discuss decoherence for a free particle in an initial Schrödinger cat state. Memory effects are incorporated by use of the single relaxation time model (since the oft-used Ohmic model does not give physically correct results)…
The dynamics associated with a measurement-based master equation for quantum Brownian motion are investigated. A scheme for obtaining time evolution from general initial conditions is derived. This is applied to analyze dissipation and decoherence in the evolution of both a Gaussian and a Schrödinger cat initial state. Dependence on the diffusive terms present in the master equation is discussed with reference to both the coordinate and momentum representations.
In this work we find explicitly the decoherence free subspace (DFS) for a two two-level system in a common squeezed vacuum bath. We also find an orthogonal basis for the DFS composed of a symmetrical and an antisymmetrical (under particle permutation) entangled state. For any initial symmetrical state, the master equation has one stationary state which is the symmetrical entangled decoherence free state. In this way, one can generate entanglement via common squeezed bath of the two systems. If the initial state does not have a definite parity, the stationary state depends strongly on the initi…
We study the dynamics of quantum and classical correlations in the presence of nondissipative decoherence. We discover a class of initial states for which the quantum correlations, quantified by the quantum discord, are not destroyed by decoherence for times t < \bar{t}. In this initial time interval classical correlations decay. For t > \bar{t}, on the other hand, classical correlations do not change in time and only quantum correlations are lost due to the interaction with the environment. Therefore, at the transition time \bar{t} the open system dynamics exhibits a sudden transition from cl…
Distillability sudden death and sudden birth in a two-qutrit system under decoherence of finite temperature is studied in detail. By using of the negativity and realignment criterion, it is shown that certain initial prepared free entangled states may become bound entangled or separable states in a finite time. Moreover, initial prepared bound entangled or separable states also may become distillabile entangled states in a finite time.
We study the entanglement between the 2D vibrational motion and two ground state hyperfine levels of a trapped ion, Under particular conditions this entanglement depends on the parity of the total initial vibrational quanta. We study the robustness of this quantum coherence effect with respect to the presence of non-dissipative sources of decoherence, and of an imperfect initial state preparation.
The dynamics of the entanglement rate are investigated in this paper for pairwise interaction and two special sets of initial states. The results show that for the given interaction and the decoherence scheme, the competitions between decohering and entangling lead to two different results--some initial states may be used to prepare entanglement while the others do not. A criterion on decohering and entangling is also presented and discussed.
The dynamics of a quantum anharmonic oscillator whose position is monitored by a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) trapped in a symmetric double well potential is studied. The (non-exponential) decoherence induced on the oscillator by the measuring device is analysed. A detailed quasiclassical and quantum analysis is presented. In the first case, for an arbitrary initial coherent state, two different decoherence regimes are observed: An initial Gaussian decay followed by a power law decay for longer times. The characteristic time scales of both regimes are reported. Analytical approximated expres…
Exact solutions of the Caldeira-Leggett Master equation for the reduced density matrix for a free particle and for a harmonic oscillator system coupled to a heat bath of oscillators are obtained for arbitrary initial conditions. The solutions prove that the Fourier transform of the density matrix at time t with respect to (x + x')/2, where x and x' are the initial and final coordinates, factorizes exactly into a part depending linearly on the initial density matrix and a part independent of it. The theorem yields the exact initial state dependence of the density operator at time t and its even…
We investigate the characteristics of entanglement teleportation of a two-qubit Heisenberg XYZ model under different Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction with intrinsic decoherence taken into account. The comparison of the two different Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction, the effects of the initial state and the inputting state on the entanglement teleportation are presented. The results reveal that the dynamics of entanglement is a symmetry function about for the system, whereas it is not for the system. The ferromagnetic case is superior to the antiferromagnetic case for restrain decoherence whe…
The destruction of quantum interference, decoherence, and the destruction of entanglement both appear to occur under the same circumstances. To address the connection between these two phenomena, we consider the evolution of arbitrary initial states of a two-particle system under open system dynamics described by a class of master equations which produce decoherence of each particle. We show that all initial states become separable after a finite time, and we produce the explicit form of the separated state. The result extends and amplifies an earlier result of Diósi. We illustrate the general…
We analyze the dynamics of entanglement due to decoherence in a system of two identical fermions with spin $3/2$ interacting with a global bosonic environment. We resort to an appropriate measure of the so-called fermionic entanglement to quantify the fermionic correlations, and compare its dynamics with that of a pair of distinguishable qubits immersed in the same environment. According to the system's initial state, three types of qualitatively different dynamics are identified: i) \textit{invariant regime}, corresponding to initial states that belong to a decoherence free subspace (DFS), wh…
We address the degradation of continuous variable (CV) entanglement in a noisy channel focusing on the set of photon-number entangled states. We exploit several separability criteria and compare the resulting separation times with the value of non-Gaussianity at any time, thus showing that in the low-temperature regime: i) non-Gaussianity is a bound for the relative entropy of entanglement and ii) Simon' criterion provides a reliable estimate of the separation time also for nonGaussian states. We provide several evidences supporting the conjecture that Gaussian entanglement is the most robust …
We present a new short-time approximation scheme for evaluation of decoherence. At low temperatures, the approximation is argued to apply at intermediate times as well. It then provides a tractable approach complementary to Markovian-type approximations, and is appropriate for evaluation of deviations from pure states in quantum computing models.
We study time evolution of entanglement between two qubits, which are part of a larger system, after starting from a random initial product state. We show that, due to randomness in the initial product state, entanglement is present only between directly coupled qubits and only for short times. Time dependence of the entanglement appears essentially independent of the specific hamiltonian used for time evolution and is well reproduced by a parameter-free two-body random matrix model.
