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arXiv:0709.1703 · The Annals of Probability

Existence, uniqueness and approximation of a stochastic Schrödinger equation: The diffusive case

Clément Pellegrini

Published Nov 1, 2008• 74 citations
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Abstract

Recent developments in quantum physics make heavy use of so-called “quantum trajectories.” Mathematically, this theory gives rise to “stochastic Schrödinger equations,” that is, perturbation of Schrödinger-type equations under the form of stochastic differential equations. But such equations are in general not of the usual type as considered in the literature. They pose a serious problem in terms of justifying the existence and uniqueness of a solution, justifying the physical pertinence of the equations. In this article we concentrate on a particular case: the diffusive case, for a two-level system. We prove existence and uniqueness of the associated stochastic Schrödinger equation. We physically justify the equations by proving that they are a continuous-time limit of a concrete physical procedure for obtaining a quantum trajectory.

DOI
10.1214/08-aop391

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Recent developments in quantum physics make heavy use of so-called “quantum trajectories.” Mathematically, this theory gives rise to “stochastic Schrödinger equations,” that is, perturbation of Schrödinger-type equations under the form of stochastic differential equations. But such equations are in general not of the usual type as considered in the literature. They pose a serious problem in terms of justifying the existence and uniqueness of a solution, justifying the physical pertinence of the equations. In this article we concentrate on a particular case: the diffusive case, for a two-level system. We prove existence and uniqueness of the associated stochastic Schrödinger equation. We physically justify the equations by proving that they are a continuous-time limit of a concrete physical procedure for obtaining a quantum trajectory.
In quantum physics, recent investigations deal with the so-called "quantum trajectory" theory. Heuristic rules are usually used to give rise to "stochastic Schrodinger equations" which are stochastic differential equations of non-usual type describing the physical models. These equations pose tedious problems in terms of mathematical justification: notion of solution, existence, uniqueness, justification... In this article, we concentrate on a particular case: the Poisson case. Random measure theory is used in order to give rigorous sense to such equations. We prove existence and uniqueness of a solution for the associated stochastic equation. Furthermore, the stochastic model is physically justified by proving that the solution can be obtained as a limit of a concrete discrete time physical model.
The principle of "indirect continuous measurement" in "open quantum system theory" is usually described by non-usual types of stochastic differential equations. These equations are called "stochastic Schrödinger equations" and their solutions are called "quantum trajectories". Physically, they describe the random evolution of the state of a quantum system undergoing indirect quantum measurement (such models are widely used in quantum optics, quantum computing and quantum information theory). In this chapter, we consider a physically realistic discrete-time setup for two-level quantum systems and we present the theory of "discrete quantum trajectories". These discrete trajectories are Markov chains which can be expressed as solutions of "discrete-time" stochastic differential equations". In particular, these equations appear as time discretization of "stochastic Schrödinger equations". Going to the continuous-time limit, we justify the stochastic Schrödinger equations associated to the two-level systems. Within this approach, we obtain two different types of behaviors described either by jump-type or diffusive-type stochastic differential equations. Finally we investigate the large time behavior of the solutions and we prove return to equilibrium properties for the associated physical models.
"Quantum trajectories" are solutions of stochastic differential equations of non-usual type. Such equations are called ``Belavkin'' or ``Stochastic Schrödinger Equations'' and describe random phenomena in continuous measurement theory of Open Quantum System. Many recent investigations deal with the control theory in such model. In this article, stochastic models are mathematically and physically justified as limit of concrete discrete procedures called ``Quantum Repeated Measurements''. In particular, this gives a rigorous justification of the Poisson and diffusion approximation in quantum measurement theory with control. Furthermore we investigate some examples using control in quantum mechanics.
"Quantum trajectories" are solutions of stochastic differential equations also called Belavkin or Stochastic Schrödinger Equations. They describe random phenomena in quantum measurement theory. Two types of such equations are usually considered, one is driven by a one-dimensional Brownian motion and the other is driven by a counting process. In this article, we present a way to obtain more advanced models which use jump-diffusion stochastic differential equations. Such models come from solutions of martingale problems for infinitesimal generators. These generators are obtained from the limit of generators of classical Markov chains which describe discrete models of quantum trajectories. Furthermore, stochastic models of jump-diffusion equations are physically justified by proving that their solutions can be obtained as the limit of the discrete trajectories.
The ensemble-averaged dynamics of open quantum systems are typically irreversible. We show that this irreversibility need not hold at the level of individually monitored quantum trajectories. Our main results are analytical stochastic Schrödinger equations for quantum reverse diffusion, along with corresponding stochastic master equations. These equations describe the exact and approximate stochastic reverse processes for continuously monitored Pauli channels, including time-dependent depolarizing noise. We show that the reverse processes generalize the forward dynamics by combining the noise effects of the forward processes with an additional stochastic drift that dynamically steers a quantum state back to its initial configuration. Consequently, the exact reverse stochastic Schrödinger equations admit closed-form solutions that can be implemented in real-time without the need for variational techniques. Our findings establish an analytical framework for quantum state recovery, noise-resilient quantum gates, quantum generative modelling, quantum tomography via forward-reverse cycles, and potential paradigms for quantum error correction based on reverse diffusion.