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arXiv:0811.1872 · Europhysics Letters (EPL)

On the long-time behavior of Hilbert space diffusion

Angelo Bassi, D. Dürr

Published Sep 16, 2008• 17 citations
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Abstract

Stochastic differential equations in Hilbert space as random nonlinear modified Schrödinger equations have achieved great attention in recent years; of particular interest is the long-time behavior of their solutions. In this note we discuss the long-time behavior of the solutions of the stochastic differential equation describing the time evolution of a free quantum particle subject to spontaneous collapses in space. We explain why the problem is subtle and report on a recent rigorous result, which asserts that any initial state converges almost surely to a Gaussian state having a fixed spread both in position and momentum.

DOI
10.1209/0295-5075/84/10005

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Stochastic differential equations in Hilbert space as random nonlinear modified Schrödinger equations have achieved great attention in recent years; of particular interest is the long-time behavior of their solutions. In this note we discuss the long-time behavior of the solutions of the stochastic differential equation describing the time evolution of a free quantum particle subject to spontaneous collapses in space. We explain why the problem is subtle and report on a recent rigorous result, which asserts that any initial state converges almost surely to a Gaussian state having a fixed spread both in position and momentum.
We discuss the time evolution of the wave function which is the solution of a stochastic Schrödinger equation describing the dynamics of a free quantum particle subject to spontaneous localizations in space. We prove global existence and uniqueness of solutions. We observe that there exist three time regimes: the collapse regime, the classical regime and the diffusive regime. Concerning the latter, we assert that the general solution converges almost surely to a diffusing Gaussian wave function having a finite spread both in position as well as in momentum. This paper corrects and completes earlier works on this issue.
We discuss the time evolution of the wave function which is solution of a stochastic Schroedinger equation describing the dynamics of a free quantum particle subject to spontaneous localizations in space. We prove global existence and uniqueness of solutions. Observing that there exist three time regimes, namely the collapse regime, after which the wave function is localized in space; the classical regime, during which the collapsed wave function moves along a classical path and the diffusive regime, in which diffusion overlaps significantly the deterministic motion, we study the long time behavior of the wave function. We assert that the general solution converges a.s. to a diffusing Gaussian wave function having a finite spread both in position as well as in momentum. This paper corrects and completes earlier works on this.
We analyze the non-Markovian stochastic Schrödinger equation describing a particle subject to spontaneous collapses in space (in the language of collapse models), or subject to a continuous measurement of its position (in the language of continuous quantum measurement). For the first time, we give the explicit general solution for the free particle case (H=p(2)/2m) and discuss the main properties. We analyze the case of an exponential correlation function for the noise, giving a quantitative description of the dynamics and of its dependence on the correlation time.
The quantum wave-function of a massive particle with small initial uncertainties (consistent with the uncertainty relation) is believed to spread very slowly, so that the dynamics is deterministic. This assumes that the classical motions for given initial data are unique. In fluid turbulence non-uniqueness due to "roughness" of the advecting velocity field is known to lead to stochastic motion of classical particles. Vanishingly small random perturbations are magnified by Richardson diffusion in a "nearly rough" velocity field so that motion remains stochastic as the noise disappears, or classical spontaneous stochasticity, . Analogies between stochastic particle motion in turbulence and quantum evolution suggest that there should be quantum spontaneous stochasticity (QSS). We show this for 1D models of a particle in a repulsive potential that is "nearly rough" with V(x)∼C∣x∣1+αV(x) \sim C|x|^{1+α}V(x)∼C∣x∣1+α at distances ∣x∣≫ℓ|x|\gg \ell∣x∣≫ℓ , for some UV cut-off ℓ\ellℓ, and for initial Gaussian wave-packet centered at 0. We consider the WKB limit with ℏ/m→0\hbar/m \to 0ℏ/m→0, then position-spread σ→0σ\to 0σ→0. The limit of the position density is non-deterministic, with equal probabilities of the particle following either of two, non-unique classical solutions and with "Richardson-like" spreading of the wave-packet. The splitting of the wave-packet occurs in a very short time t∼(ℓ1+α/C)1/2t\sim(\ell^{1+α}/C)^{1/2}t∼(ℓ1+α/C)1/2 for small ℓ\ellℓ. QSS also occurs in the scattering of a wave-packet off the rough potential, for careful fine-tuning. We also consider other semi-classical limits by a numerical solution of the Schrödinger equation, observing QSS both in position- and momentum-space. Although the wave-function remains split into two widely separated branches in the classical limit, rapid phase oscillations within each branch prevent any coherent superposition. These effects should be observable in laboratory experiments.
In this article we study the long time behaviour of a class of stochastic differential equations introduced in the theory of measurements continuous in time for quantum open systems. Such equations give the time evolution of the a posteriori states for a system underlying a continual measurement. First of all we give conditions for the equation to preserve pure states and then, in the case of a finite-dimensional Hilbert space, we obtain sufficient conditions from which the stochastic equation for a posteriori states is ensured to map, for t → +∞, mixed states into pure ones. Finally we study existence and uniqueness of an invariant measure for the equations which preserve pure states. We give a general theorem for the purely diffusive case, again in the finite-dimensional case; we then apply it to some physical examples. For the purely jump case, an example is discussed in which the invariant measure exists and is unique.
Recently, the stochastic nonlinear wave equation describing the dynamics of an observed quantum system has been solved for a free particle [Phys. Rev. A 45, 1347 (1992)]. In this paper, transient effects that occur during a continuous observation of the particle position are discussed. It is shown that the dispersion of the Gaussian wave packet of the particle always decreases in the beginning of the observation, then takes the form of oscillations which, after a short time, decay rapidly to the asymptotic value.