A Resonance Theory for Open Quantum Systems with Time-Dependent Dynamics

We develop a resonance theory to describe the evolution of open systems with time-dependent dynamics. Our approach is based on piecewise constant Hamiltonians: we represent the evolution on each constant bit using a recently developed dynamical resonance theory, and we piece them together to obtain the total evolution. The initial state corresponding to one time-interval with constant Hamiltonian is the final state of the system corresponding to the interval before. This results in a non-Markovian dynamics. We find a representation of the dynamics in terms of resonance energies and resonance states associated to the Hamiltonians, valid for all times t≥0 and for small (but fixed) interaction strengths. The representation has the form of a path integral over resonances. We present applications to a spin-fermion system, where the energy levels of the spin may undergo rather arbitrary crossings in the course of time. In particular, we find the probability for transition between ground- and excited state at all times.     

TIME-DEPENDENT LANDAU SYSTEM AND NON-ADIABATIC BERRY PHASE IN TWO DIMENSIONS

By applying the time-independent unitary transformation, the time-dependent Landau system is transformed into a product of a time-independent Landau system's Hamiltonian and a factor only depending on time, which can be solved exactly. Both the invariant operator and the eigenstate are obtained. In the periodical time-dependent case, the non-adiabatic Berry's phase is also presented.     

The Pauli Objection

Schrödinger’s equation says that the Hamiltonian is the generator of time translations. This seems to imply that any reasonable definition of time operator must be conjugate to the Hamiltonian. Then both time and energy must have the same spectrum since conjugate operators are unitarily equivalent. Clearly this is not always true: normal Hamiltonians have lower bounded spectrum and often only have discrete eigenvalues, whereas we typically desire that time can take any real value. Pauli concluded that constructing a general a time operator is impossible (although clearly it can be done in specific cases). Here we show how the Pauli argument fails when one uses an external system (a “clock”) to track time, so that time arises as correlations between the system and the clock (conditional probability amplitudes framework). In this case, the time operator is conjugate to the clock Hamiltonian and not to the system Hamiltonian, but its eigenvalues still satisfy the Schrödinger equation for arbitrary system Hamiltonians.     

Adiabatic switching approach to multidimensional supersymmetric quantum mechanics for several excited states

We present a time-dependent method for determining several approximate excited-state energies and wave functions using a vectorial approach to multidimensional supersymmetric quantum mechanics. First, a vectorial approach is used to generate the tensor sector two Hamiltonian, which is isospectral with the original scalar sector one Hamiltonian above the ground state of the sector one Hamiltonian. We construct a time-dependent Hamiltonian interpolating between the scalar sector one Hamiltonian and the tensor sector two Hamiltonian. Then, we can adiabatically switch from the ground state of the sector one Hamiltonian to the ground state of the sector two Hamiltonian by solving the time-dependent Schrödinger equation. In addition, by employing an initial wave packet orthogonal to that leading to the ground state of sector two, we also obtain the first-excited state of sector two. Construction of the orthogonal sector one states is trivial due to the tensor nature of sector two. The ground and first-excited states of the sector two Hamiltonian can be used with the charge operator to obtain the first two excited state wave functions of the sector one Hamiltonian. Excellent computational results are obtained for two-dimensional nonseparable degenerate and nondegenerate systems.     

Quantum Systems Connected by a Time-Dependent Canonical Transformation

We study both classical and quantum relation between two Hamiltoniansystems which are mutually connected by time-dependent canonical transformation. One is ordinary conservative system and the other istime-dependent Hamiltonian system. The quantum unitary operatorrelevant to classical canonical transformation between the two systems are obtained through rigorous evaluation. With the aid of the unitary operator, we have derived quantum states of the time-dependent Hamiltonian system through transforming the quantum states of the conservative system. The invariant operators of the two systems are presented and the relation between them are addressed. We showed that there exist numerous Hamiltonians, which gives the same classical equation of motion. Though it is impossible to distinguish the systems described by these Hamiltonians within the realm of classical mechanics, they can be distinguishable quantum mechanically.     

Shortcut-to-Adiabaticity-Like Techniques for Parameter Estimation in Quantum Metrology

Quantum metrology makes use of quantum mechanics to improve precision measurements and measurement sensitivities. It is usually formulated for time-independent Hamiltonians, but time-dependent Hamiltonians may offer advantages, such as a T4 time dependence of the Fisher information which cannot be reached with a time-independent Hamiltonian. In Optimal adaptive control for quantum metrology with time-dependent Hamiltonians (Nature Communications 8, 2017), Shengshi Pang and Andrew N. Jordan put forward a Shortcut-to-adiabaticity (STA)-like method, specifically an approach formally similar to the “counterdiabatic approach”, adding a control term to the original Hamiltonian to reach the upper bound of the Fisher information. We revisit this work from the point of view of STA to set the relations and differences between STA-like methods in metrology and ordinary STA. This analysis paves the way for the application of other STA-like techniques in parameter estimation. In particular we explore the use of physical unitary transformations to propose alternative time-dependent Hamiltonians which may be easier to implement in the laboratory.     

Analysis of Adiabatic Approximation Using Stable Hamiltonian Method

In this paper, we deal with the adiabatic approximation of general Hamiltonians by splitting it into two parts, with one part a Hamiltonian that has at least one time-independent eigenstate up to a phase factor. We first develop the method of finding this kind of Hamiltonians. Then the relationship between adiabatic approximation and these Hamiltonians is discussed. Applying this to a general case, we give both a necessary condition and a sufficient condition for adiabatic approximation, followed by a spin-half example to illustrate.     

Hamiltonian systems of relativistic particles

Hamiltonian relativistic dynamics is formulated. Models can be constructed by writing down Hamiltonians. These Hamiltonians are generating functions leading to the equations of motion. These equations admit a Poisson bracket form, analogous to Heisenberg evolution equations. The Hamiltonians are not the energy. They are rather related to the masses of the interacting particles. In contrast, the energy is the time component of a conserved vector.Among tractable examples we find a relativistic generalization of the harmonic oscillator. An attempt at quantization by means of coupled wave equations is made.     

Quantum mechanical hamiltonian models of turing machines

Quantum mechanical Hamiltonian models, which represent an aribtrary but finite number of steps of any Turing machine computation, are constructed here on a finite lattice of spin-1/2 systems. Different regions of the lattice correspond to different components of the Turing machine (plus recording system). Successive states of any machine computation are represented in the model by spin configuration states. Both time-independent and time-dependent Hamiltonian models are constructed here. The time-independent models do not dissipate energy or degrade the system state as they evolve. They operate close to the quantum limit in that the total system energy uncertainty/computation speed is close to the limit given by the time-energy uncertainty relation. However, the model evolution is time global and the Hamiltonian is more complex. The time-dependent models do not degrade the system state. Also they are time local and the Hamiltonian is less complex.     

Quantum Brachistochrone problem and the geometry of the state space in pseudo-Hermitian quantum mechanics

A non-Hermitian operator with a real spectrum and a complete set of eigenvectors may serve as the Hamiltonian operator for a unitary quantum system provided that one makes an appropriate choice for the defining the inner product of physical Hilbert state. We study the consequences of such a choice for the representation of states in terms of projection operators and the geometry of the state space. This allows for a careful treatment of the quantum Brachistochrone problem and shows that it is indeed impossible to achieve faster unitary evolutions using PT-symmetric or other non-Hermitian Hamiltonians than those given by Hermitian Hamiltonians.     

Quasi-exactly solvable quantum systems with explicitly time-dependent Hamiltonians

For a large class of time-dependent non-Hermitian Hamiltonians expressed in terms linear and bilinear combinations of the generators for an Euclidean Lie-algebra respecting different types of PT-symmetries, we find explicit solutions to the time-dependent Dyson equation. A specific Hermitian model with explicit time-dependence is analyzed further and shown to be quasi-exactly solvable. Technically we constructed the Lewis–Riesenfeld invariants making use of the metric picture, which is an equivalent alternative to the Schrödinger, Heisenberg and interaction picture containing the time-dependence in the metric operator that relates the time-dependent Hermitian Hamiltonian to a static non-Hermitian Hamiltonian.     

Nontrivial dynamics induced by a nonlinear Jaynes-Cummings Hamiltonian

The addition of a nonlinear term to the Jaynes-Cummings Hamiltonian induced a nontrivial discrete dynamics for the number of possible transitions of a given order, represented by a Fibonacci series. We describe the physics of the problem in terms of relevant operators which close a semi-Lie algebra under commutation with the Hamiltonian and therefore extending the generalized Bloch equations, already obtained for the linear case, to the nonlinear one. The initial conditions as well as a thermodynamical treatmetn of the problem is analyzed via the maximum entropy principle density operator. Finally, a generalized solution for the time-independent case is obtained and the solution for the field in a thermal state is recovered.     

Scalar-relativistic spline augmented plane-wave method using a Douglas Kroll transformation in coordinate representation

A scalar-relativistic Hamiltonian, which contains all relativistic corrections up to second order in the fine structure constant, is derived with coordinate representation of the first order Douglas Kroll transformation. In addition to the correction of second order in the fine structure constant, this Hamiltonian contains the exact relativistic kinetic energy as well as the exact relativistic potential correction up to terms linear in the external potential. Based on this Hamiltonian, we develop a scalar-relativistic extension of the Spline Augmented Plane-Wave method, and show that the matrix elements with the new operator can be evaluated elegantly when using an alternative basis of Spline functions. As a first test we investigate solid silver and gold. By comparing the energies of the core states with the solutions of the radial Dirac equation we find that the stabilization of the s levels are slightly overestimated. Even smaller deviations from the Dirac energies are found for higher angular momentum. By comparing the valence band structure with the results for other scalar-relativistic operators, which can be used in a variational context, we find the new operator superior in all aspects: s-type bands are reproduced quite well, and again bands which are dominated by higher angular momenta behave even better. On the contrary, the results obtained with simpler scalar-relativistic Hamiltonians are unsatisfactory. Received 21 November 1996     

Parametric interactions and scattering

We show how a variety of parametric Hamiltonians arise by a limiting procedure applied to a time-independent Hamiltonian. We then study one such Hamiltonian, that for a parametric frequency converter, in detail and find its associated Raman scattering matrix.     

Energy landscape of 3D spin Hamiltonians with topological order

We explore the feasibility of a quantum self-correcting memory based on 3D spin Hamiltonians with topological quantum order in which thermal diffusion of topological defects is suppressed by macroscopic energy barriers. To this end we characterize the energy landscape of stabilizer code Hamiltonians with local bounded-strength interactions which have a topologically ordered ground state but do not have stringlike logical operators. We prove that any sequence of local errors mapping a ground state of such a Hamiltonian to an orthogonal ground state must cross an energy barrier growing at least as a logarithm of the lattice size. Our bound on the energy barrier is tight up to a constant factor for one particular 3D spin Hamiltonian.     

Product-State Approximations to Quantum States

We show that for any many-body quantum state there exists an unentangled quantum state such that most of the two-body reduced density matrices are close to those of the original state. This is a statement about the monogamy of entanglement, which cannot be shared without limit in the same way as classical correlation. Our main application is to Hamiltonians that are sums of two-body terms. For such Hamiltonians we show that there exist product states with energy that is close to the ground-state energy whenever the interaction graph of the Hamiltonian has high degree. This proves the validity of mean-field theory and gives an explicitly bounded approximation error. If we allow states that are entangled within small clusters of systems but product across clusters then good approximations exist when the Hamiltonian satisfies one or more of the following properties: (1) high degree, (2) small expansion, or (3) a ground state where the blocks in the partition have sublinear entanglement. Previously this was known only in the case of small expansion or in the regime where the entanglement was close to zero. Our approximations allow an extensive error in energy, which is the scale considered by the quantum PCP (probabilistically checkable proof) and NLTS (no low-energy trivial-state) conjectures. Thus our results put restrictions on the possible Hamiltonians that could be used for a possible proof of the qPCP or NLTS conjectures. By contrast the classical PCP constructions are often based on constraint graphs with high degree. Likewise we show that the parallel repetition that is possible with classical constraint satisfaction problems cannot also be possible for quantum Hamiltonians, unless qPCP is false. The main technical tool behind our results is a collection of new classical and quantum de Finetti theorems which do not make any symmetry assumptions on the underlying states.     

Combining spin-adapted open-shell TD-DFT with spin–orbit coupling

The recently proposed spin-adapted time-dependent density functional theory (S-TD-DFT) is extended to the relativistic domain for fine-structure splittings of excited states of open-shell systems. Scalar-relativistic effects are treated to infinite order via the spin-free (sf) part of the exact two-component (X2C) Hamiltonian, whereas the spin–orbit couplings (SOC) between the scalar-excited states are treated perturbatively via an effective one-electron spin–orbit operator derived from the same X2C Hamiltonian. The calculated results for prototypical open-shell systems containing heavy elements reveal that the composite approach sf-X2C-S-TD-DFT-SOC is very promising. The fine-structure splitting of a spatially degenerate ground state can also be described properly by taking a non-degenerate excited state as the reference.     

Exact solutions for nonlinear Hamiltonians

We find the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of two nonlinear Hamiltonians describing the interaction between a two-level system and a quantized linear harmonic oscillator. In the first case we obtain exact isolated solutions for the Hamiltonian used as a model of an ion in a harmonic trap and interacting with a laser field, not restricted to the Lamb-Dicke limit. After projecting these eigenstates onto one of the levels of the two-level system the oscillator state is described by a finite superposition of Fock states. In the second case we consider a Hamiltonian, with a squeeze operator in the interaction part. We give perturbation results in the weak-coupling limit and results obtained by numerical diagonalization for the strong coupling limit. Non-classical results are pointed out also in this case.     

Spectrally equivalent time-dependent double wells and unstable anharmonic oscillators

We construct a time-dependent double well potential as an exact spectral equivalent to the explicitly time-dependent negative quartic oscillator with a time-dependent mass term. Defining the unstable anharmonic oscillator Hamiltonian on a contour in the lower-half complex plane, the resulting time-dependent non-Hermitian Hamiltonian is first mapped by an exact solution of the time-dependent Dyson equation to a time-dependent Hermitian Hamiltonian defined on the real axis. When unitary transformed, scaled and Fourier transformed we obtain a time-dependent double well potential bounded from below. All transformations are carried out non-perturbatively so that all Hamiltonians in this process are spectrally exactly equivalent in the sense that they have identical instantaneous energy eigenvalue spectra.     

Effects of Different Time-Dependent Couplings on Two-Atom Entanglement

The effects of different time-independent and time-dependent couplings on two-atom entanglement are studied. The results show that the effects depend on the initial state. For the initial state ｜eeO〉, it is found that different time-independent couplings make the case without entanglement exhibit entanglement, and time-dependent couplings turn the irregular entanglement regions into regular one. Under the case of decay, for the initial state ｜eg0〉, the different time-dependent couplings have disbenefit.