• DOI:10.1103/PhysRevA.87.052123
• Corpus ID: 119255520

Partial Decoherence and Thermalization through Time-Domain Ergodicity

@article{Englman2013PartialDA,
  title={Partial Decoherence and Thermalization through Time-Domain Ergodicity},
  author={Robert Englman and Asher Yahalom},
  journal={Physical Review A},
  year={2013},
  volume={87},
  pages={052123}
}

• R. Englman, A. Yahalom
• Published 17 May 2013
• Physics
• Physical Review A

An approach, differing from two commonly used methods (the stochastic Schrodinger equation and the master equation (1, 2)) but entrenched in the traditional density matrix formalism, is developed in a semi-classical setting, so as to go from the solutions of the time depen- dent Schrodinger equation to decohering and thermalized states. This is achieved by utilizing the time-ergodicity, rather than the sampling- (or ensemble-) ergodicity, of physical systems. We introduce the formalism through a study of the Rabi model (a two level system coupled to an oscillator) and show that our semi- classical version exhibits, both qualitatively and quantitatively, many features of state truncation and equilibration (3). We then study the time evolution of two qubits in interaction with a bosonic environ- ment, such that the energy scale of one qubit is much larger, and that of the other much smaller than the environment's energy scale. The small energy qubit decoheres to a mixture, while the high energy qubit is protected through the adiabatic theorem. However, an inter-qubit coupling generates an overall decoherence and leads for some values of the coupling to long term revivals in the state occupations.