This thesis covers various aspects of open systems in classical and quantum mechanics. In the first part, we deal with classical systems. The bath-of-oscillators formalism is used to describe an open system, and the phenomenological Langevin equation is recovered. The Fokker-Planck equation is derived from its corresponding Langevin equation. The Fokker-Planck equation for a particle in a periodic potential in the high-friction limit is solved using the continued-fraction method. The equilibrium and time-dependent solutions are obtained. Under strong periodic driving, we observe significant non-linear effects in the dynamical hysteresis loops. Shapiro steps appear in the time-average of the drift velocity curves. Similar study is carried out for a dipole in an electric field. In the second part of the thesis, we begin the study of open quantum systems by re-deriving the quantum master equation using perturbation theory. The master equation is then applied to the bath-of-oscillators model. The subtleties and approximations of the master equation are discussed. We then use the master equation to solve the damped harmonic oscillator. The equilibrium solution coincides with the canonical distribution. The steady state response to DC and AC forces is also studied. Driven systems are more challenging in quantum open systems, and we manage to solve the quantum master equation with the continued-fraction method. We obtain the frequency-dependent susceptibility curves, which exhibit typical absorption and dispersion profiles.
This thesis covers various aspects of open systems in classical and quantum mechanics. In the first part, we deal with classical systems. The bath-of-oscillators formalism is used to describe an open system, and the phenomenological Langevin equation is recovered. The Fokker-Planck equation is derived from its corresponding Langevin equation. The Fokker-Planck equation for a particle in a periodic potential in the high-friction limit is solved using the continued-fraction method. The equilibrium and time-dependent solutions are obtained. Under strong periodic driving, we observe significant non-linear effects in the dynamical hysteresis loops. Shapiro steps appear in the time-average of the drift velocity curves. Similar study is carried out for a dipole in an electric field. In the second part of the thesis, we begin the study of open quantum systems by re-deriving the quantum master equation using perturbation theory. The master equation is then applied to the bath-of-oscillators model. The subtleties and approximations of the master equation are discussed. We then use the master equation to solve the damped harmonic oscillator. The equilibrium solution coincides with the canonical distribution. The steady state response to DC and AC forces is also studied. Driven systems are more challenging in quantum open systems, and we manage to solve the quantum master equation with the continued-fraction method. We obtain the frequency-dependent susceptibility curves, which exhibit typical absorption and dispersion profiles.
Open quantum systems have drawn attention over decades due to its applicability in the foundation of theoretical physics, e.g. statistical mechanics, quantum mechanics and condensed matter physics. The dynamics of open quantum systems has been described as separate entities from their surrounding environment that consists of a very large number of modes, somehow coupled to the mode of the system. Even though the exact solution of the dynamical behavior of the system is impossible to calculate, we obtain a tentative solution using the crucial Markov approximation. The input-output formalism of the quantum Langevin equation (QLE) has been considered as a useful tool which provides a semi-classical description of the dynamics of the system, whereas the master equation provides a complete picture of the dynamics of the system expressed in terms of density matrix. While studying the dynamics of nonlinear system/environment coupling using QLE, we see, for a small value of external field, that the steady state system field does not change much from the steady state field obtained in the absence of nonlinear dissipation. However, in a case where a stronger external field is applied, we see that the deviation becomes substantial from the solution of linear system. We also see that the nonlinear coupling introduces significant difference in the cavity fluctuation spectrum. The description, therefore, provides a potential explanation of parametric effects in terms of nonlinear dissipation phenomena associated with the nonlinear coupling. Even though the theories developed in the context of open quantum systems have proven to be powerful tools, they do not provide a satisfactory platform to be implemented on non-linear Hamiltonians. We often approximate it by linearizing over nonlinear steady state field amplitude, and therefore, the interesting effects are often overlooked. The limitation of the analytics provokes us to simulate open quantum dynamics numerically. The numerical method consists of transformation of the environmental degrees of freedom to a one-dimensional many-body chain, and the computational technique includes numerical diagonalization and renormalization process. The time-adaptive density matrix renormalisation group (t-DMRG) is known as one of the most powerful techniques for the simulation of strongly-correlated many-body quantum systems. In this thesis, along with the theoretical modeling, we implement DMRG numerical scheme for the simulation of canonical S/B model by mapping it to one-dimensional harmonic chain with nearest neighbor interactions, and use the method to investigate the dynamics of the free dissipative system. The thermalization of open quantum systems is also studied by generating minimally entangled typical thermal states (METTS) through imaginary time evolution, and real-time evolving an empty system in the presence of the thermal bath. Further, we simulate coherently driven free dissipative Kerr nonlinear system numerically using Euler's method by solving Heisenberg equation of motion and t-DMRG algorithm, and demonstrate how the numerical results are analogous to classical bistability. By comparing with analytics, we see that the DMRG numerics is analogous to the quantum-mechanical exact solution obtained by mapping the equation of motion of the density matrix of the system to a Fokker-Plank equation. The comparison between two different numerical techniques shows that the semi-classical Euler's method determines the dynamics of the system field of one among two coherent branches, whereas DMRG numerics gives the superposition of both of them. Hence, DMRG-determined time dynamics undergoes generating non-classical states. Our approach of dealing with nonlinearity represents an important contribution in the developments of technique to study the dynamical and steady-state behavior of open quantum systems, which is a fundamental aspect of quantum physics.
The subject of this thesis is the modelling of non-Markovian open quantum systems, in particular those that display memory effects due to time-delayed interactions. I study these systems in the context of a model of an open quantum system that interacts with a bosonic environment by way of particle exchanges. While the model is flexible enough to describe quite general memory effects, this work focuses to a large extent on a single prototypical system. This system emits into a coherent feedback loop with a time delay, and it captures the essential phenomena we aim to model. Within the context of this general model, I develop a general approach to spontaneous emission from singly-excited systems and show how to calculate the corresponding emission spectra. I also evaluate two commonly-used perturbative techniques in the context of spontaneous emission from singly-excited systems, coming to the conclusion that perturbation theory is of limited use in modelling open quantum systems with delayed feedback. I then turn attention to exact equations of motion for more general non-Markovian open quantum systems. I derive Heisenberg–Langevin equations that describe a large class of such systems, and solve these equations analytically for a series of simple bosonic systems. I also use the theory of cascaded open quantum systems to simulate systems with delayed coherent feedback in the limit of long time delay, and compare the results of these simulations with the analytic solutions obtained in the Heisenberg picture. Finally, I show that once we have a solution to a given Heisenberg–Langevin equation we can derive an alternative, time-local equation of motion that describes equivalent dynamics, and that these time-local Heisenberg–Langevin equations can in turn be used to derive corresponding time-local master equations. These master equations provide an exact description of the non-Markovian dynamics, but this treatment is limited to linear, bosonic systems—those systems for which the Heisenberg–Langevin equations can be solved in closed form. I discuss the prospect of generalising these master equations to take into account nonlinear and fermionic systems.
Inspired by the continued-fraction technique to solve the classical Fokker-Planck equation, we develop continued-fraction methods to solve quantum master equations in phase space (Wigner representation of the density matrix). The approach allows to study several classes of nonlinear quantum systems subjected to environmental effects (fluctuations and dissipation), with the only limitations that the starting master equations may have. We illustrate the method with the canonical problem of quantum Brownian motion in periodic potentials.
This thesis investigates two thematic lines of research, both underpinned by non-Markovian system-reservoir interactions in quantum optics. The overarching focus is on modelling the open system dynamics in a non-perturbative fashion, broadly on - though not restricted to - instances when the environment is structured. A theory is developed by means of enlarging the open system over environmental degrees of freedom to include memory effects in its dynamics. This is achieved using an established technique that involves mapping a bosonic environment onto a 1D chain of harmonic oscillators. Within this setting, we apply a Heisenberg equation-of-motion approach to derive an exact set coupled differential equations for the open system and a single auxiliary oscillator of the chain. The combined equations are shown to have their interpretation rooted in a quantum Markov stochastic process. Including the auxiliary chain oscillator as part of the original system then enables us to obtain an exact master equation for the enlarged system, avoiding any need for the Born-Markov approximations. Our method is valid for a dissipative two-state system, with cases of multiple excitations and added driving discussed. Separately, we apply the framework of quantum Darwinism to an atom-cavity system, and, subsequently, to a more general multiple-environment model. In both cases, the time-dependent spread of correlations between the open system and fractions of the environment is analysed during the course of the decoherence process. The degree to which information is redundant across different fractions is checked to infer the emergence of classicality. In the second case, we go further and present a decomposition of information in terms of its quantum and classical correlations. A quantitative measure of redundancy is also studied with regard to its ability to witness non-Markovian behaviour. Besides fundamental interest, our results have application to quantum information processing and quantum technologies, keeping in mind the potential beneficial use of non-Markovian effects in reservoir engineering.
Previous years researchers began to simulate open quantum system, taking into account the interaction between system and the environment. One approach to deal with this problem is to use the density matrix within the Liouville-von-Neumann formalism or the Markovian variant the Lindblad equations. Another way is to use a stochastic approach where a random force is added to the system. The benefit of the stochastic approach is to solve the dynamics of the system with less time and memory than the density matrix approaches. In this project we want to develop a stochastic approach that can deal with the stochastic wave functions approach. We did this on a 2-level system and found that it works well when comparing to a density matrix approach. Next, we tested a quantum particle connect to a bath of harmonic oscillators using the stochastic approach. We found that a friction term is necessary and applied it. Like in the classical Langevin equations the friction constant and the random force fluctuations are related by the fluctuation-dissipation constant. We showed that with friction the dynamics decays to an ensemble with energy of Egs+kBT. However, we also found here are problems. The system seems to absorb energy indefinitely if the temperature is higher than the zero point energy or if the system is a Morse oscillator. Thus more research is required to make this method work.