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arXiv:0810.4386 · Physical Review A

Weak and strong measurement of a qubit using a switching-based detector

Sahel Ashhab, J. Q. You, Franco Nori

Published Mar 16, 2009• 34 citations
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Abstract

We analyze the operation of a switching-based detector that probes a qubit's observable that does not commute with the qubit's Hamiltonian, leading to a nontrivial interplay between the measurement and free-qubit dynamics. In order to obtain analytical results and develop intuitive understanding of the different possible regimes of operation, we use a theoretical model where the detector is a quantum two-level system that is constantly monitored by a macroscopic system. We analyze how to interpret the outcome of the measurement and how the state of the qubit evolves while it is measured. We find that the answers to the above questions depend on the relation between the different parameters in the problem. In addition to the traditional strong-measurement regime, we identify a number of regimes associated with weak qubit-detector coupling. An incoherent detector whose switching time is measurable with high accuracy can provide high-fidelity information, but the measurement basis is determined only upon switching of the detector. An incoherent detector whose switching time can be known only with low accuracy provides a measurement in the qubit's energy eigenbasis with reduced measurement fidelity. A coherent detector measures the qubit in its energy eigenbasis and, under certain conditions, can provide high-fidelity information.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.79.032317

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We analyze the operation of a switching-based detector that probes a qubit's observable that does not commute with the qubit's Hamiltonian, leading to a nontrivial interplay between the measurement and free-qubit dynamics. In order to obtain analytical results and develop intuitive understanding of the different possible regimes of operation, we use a theoretical model where the detector is a quantum two-level system that is constantly monitored by a macroscopic system. We analyze how to interpret the outcome of the measurement and how the state of the qubit evolves while it is measured. We find that the answers to the above questions depend on the relation between the different parameters in the problem. In addition to the traditional strong-measurement regime, we identify a number of regimes associated with weak qubit-detector coupling. An incoherent detector whose switching time is measurable with high accuracy can provide high-fidelity information, but the measurement basis is determined only upon switching of the detector. An incoherent detector whose switching time can be known only with low accuracy provides a measurement in the qubit's energy eigenbasis with reduced measurement fidelity. A coherent detector measures the qubit in its energy eigenbasis and, under certain conditions, can provide high-fidelity information.
We analyze the information that one can learn about the state of a quantum two-level system, i.e. a qubit, when probed weakly by a nearby detector. In particular, we focus on the case when the qubit Hamiltonian and the qubit's operator being probed by the detector do not commute. Because the qubit's state keeps evolving while being probed and because the measurement data is mixed with detector-related background noise, one might expect the detector to fail in this case. We show, however, that under suitable conditions and by proper analysis of the measurement data useful information about the state of the qubit can be extracted. It turns out that the measurement basis is stochastically determined every time the experiment is repeated. We analyze in detail the probability distributions that govern the choice of measurement bases. We also analyze the information acquisition rate and show that it is largely unaffected by the apparent conflict between the measurement and intrinsic qubit dynamics. We discuss the relation between our analysis and the stochastic master equation that describes the evolution of the qubit's state under the influence of measurement and decoherence. In particular, we write down a stochastic equation that encompasses the usual stochastic master equation for the evolution of the qubit's density matrix and additionally contains the measurement information that can be extracted from the observed signal.
We analyze the information that one can learn about the state of a quantum two-level system, i.e. a qubit, when probed weakly by a nearby detector. We consider the general case where the qubit Hamiltonian and the qubit's operator probed by the detector do not commute. Because the qubit's state keeps evolving while being probed and the measurement data is mixed with a detector-related background noise, one might expect the detector to fail in this case. We show, however, that under suitable conditions and by proper analysis of the measurement data, useful information about the initial state of the qubit can be extracted. Our approach complements the usual master-equation and quantum-trajectory approaches, which describe the evolution of the qubit's quantum state during the measurement process but do not keep track of the acquired measurement information.
We have studied quantum coherent oscillations of two qubits under continuous measurement by a symmetrically coupled mesoscopic detector. The analysis is based on a Bayesian formalism that is applicable to individual quantum systems. Measurement continuously collapses the two-qubit system to one of the subspaces of the Bell basis. For a detector with linear response this corresponds to measurement of the total spin of the qubits. In the other extreme of purely quadratic response the operator ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{y}^{1}{\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{y}^{2}+{\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{z}^{1}{\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{z}^{2}$ is measured. In both cases, collapse naturally leads to spontaneous entanglement which can be identified by measurement of the power spectrum and/or the average current of the detector. Asymmetry between the two qubits results in evolution between the different measurement subspaces. However, when the qubits are even weakly coupled to the detector, a kind of quantum Zeno effect cancels the gradual evolution and replaces it with rare, abrupt switching events. We obtain the asymptotic switching rates for these events and confirm them with numerical simulations. We show how such switching affects the observable power spectrum on different time scales.
We study the decoherence dynamics of a superconducting qubit coupled to a quantum two-level system (TLS) in addition to its weak coupling to a background environment [1]. We identify two weak-coupling regimes, which differ by the relation between qubit and TLS decoherence times, and a strong coupling regime. We find expressions for the qubit decoherence rates in the weak-coupling regimes. For a weakly coupled and strongly dissipative TLS we find that the qubit dynamics is markovian, whereas for a weakly dissipative TLS the qubit dynamics shows non-markovian behavior. In the strong-coupling regime we study the driven qubit dynamics and we analyze the differences from standard Rabi-oscillations due to the coupling to the quantum TLS [2]. In doing so we identify signatures in the qubit dynamics that can be used to characterize the TLS. We also investigate the possibility of using environmental TLSs with long coherence times for quantum information processing [3]. By using the Josephson junction as a bus and the TLSs in the environment as qubits, we demonstrate that initialization, a universal set of quantum gates, and read-out of the TLSs can be implemented, even though the TLSs themselves cannot be directly accessed.
We address continuous weak linear quantum measurement and argue that it is best understood in terms of statistics of the outcomes of the linear detectors measuring a quantum system, for example, a qubit. We mostly concentrate on a setup consisting of a qubit and three independent detectors that simultaneously monitor three noncommuting operator variables, those corresponding to three pseudospin components of the qubit. We address the joint probability distribution of the detector outcomes and the qubit variables. When analyzing the distribution in the limit of big values of the outcomes, we reveal a high degree of correspondence between the three outcomes and three components of the qubit pseudospin after the measurement. This enables a high-fidelity monitoring of all three components. We discuss the relation between the monitoring described and the algorithms of quantum information theory that use the results of the partial measurement. We develop a proper formalism to evaluate the statistics of continuous weak linear measurement. The formalism is based on Feynman-Vernon approach, roots in the theory of full counting statistics, and boils down to a Bloch-Redfield equation augmented with counting fields.