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arXiv:1308.4225

Macroscopic Quantum Phenomena from the Coupling Pattern and Entanglement Structure Perspective

Chung-Hsien Chou, Yiğit Subaşı, B. L. Hu

Published Aug 20, 2013• 1 citation
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Abstract

We explore in this paper ways to qualify and quantify the quantum entanglement $E(M)$ between two macroscopic objects by way of model studies. Knowing that a macroscopic object is a composite, how does one determine $E(M)$ in terms of the entanglements between its micro-constituents $E(μ)$? We assert that the notion of `levels of structure', the coupling strength between constituents in different levels, and the use of collective variables in each level are all pertinent factors. We consider two types of coupling, each constituent particle is coupled to only one other particle (1-to-1) versus it coupled to all particles (1-to-all). In the 1-1 case with pairwise interactions of equal strength, the entanglement is independent of the number of constituent particles $N$ in the macroscopic object. In the 1-to-all case the relative coordinates are decoupled and the center of mass (CoM) coupling scales with $N$. We provide a proof of the conditions whereby the CoM variable decouples, a cause for the special role the CoM variable plays in the entanglement between the two such macroscopic objects. This qualitative behavior is largely not affected by fluctuations in the interaction strength. We also analyzed the entanglement pattern of 4 coupled oscillators in two pairs, representing the two objects A and B (or two adjacent levels of structure), each with two constituents. By assigning different coupling strengths we can investigate the interplay of inter-level entanglement with intra- level interactions. From the entanglement dynamics of the 4-oscillator system with varying coupling strength we see the entanglement between constituents meeting sudden death while the CoM variables may sustain over longer times. This offers another way to determine under what conditions quantum entanglement between macroscopic objects can persist.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1308.4225

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We explore in this paper ways to qualify and quantify the quantum entanglement E(M)E(M)E(M) between two macroscopic objects by way of model studies. Knowing that a macroscopic object is a composite, how does one determine E(M)E(M)E(M) in terms of the entanglements between its micro-constituents E(μ)E(μ)E(μ)? We assert that the notion of `levels of structure', the coupling strength between constituents in different levels, and the use of collective variables in each level are all pertinent factors. We consider two types of coupling, each constituent particle is coupled to only one other particle (1-to-1) versus it coupled to all particles (1-to-all). In the 1-1 case with pairwise interactions of equal strength, the entanglement is independent of the number of constituent particles NNN in the macroscopic object. In the 1-to-all case the relative coordinates are decoupled and the center of mass (CoM) coupling scales with NNN. We provide a proof of the conditions whereby the CoM variable decouples, a cause for the special role the CoM variable plays in the entanglement between the two such macroscopic objects. This qualitative behavior is largely not affected by fluctuations in the interaction strength. We also analyzed the entanglement pattern of 4 coupled oscillators in two pairs, representing the two objects A and B (or two adjacent levels of structure), each with two constituents. By assigning different coupling strengths we can investigate the interplay of inter-level entanglement with intra- level interactions. From the entanglement dynamics of the 4-oscillator system with varying coupling strength we see the entanglement between constituents meeting sudden death while the CoM variables may sustain over longer times. This offers another way to determine under what conditions quantum entanglement between macroscopic objects can persist.
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We investigate the entanglement dynamics of several models of coupled harmonic oscillators, whereby a number of properties concerning entanglement have been scrutinized, such as how the environment affects entanglement of a system, and death and revival of entanglement. Among them, there are two models for which we are able to vary their particle numbers easily by assuming identicalness, thereby examining how the particle number affects entanglement. We have found that the upper bound of entanglement between identical oscillators is approximately inversely proportional to the particle number.
In this sequel paper we explore how macroscopic quantum phenomena can be measured or understood from the behavior of quantum correlations which exist in a quantum system of many particles or components and how the interaction strengths change with energy or scale, under ordinary situations and when the system is near its critical point. We use the nPI (master) effective action related to the Boltzmann-BBGKY / Schwinger-Dyson hierarchy of equations as a tool for systemizing the contributions of higher order correlation functions to the dynamics of lower order correlation functions. Together with the large N expansion discussed in our first paper(MQP1) we explore 1) the conditions whereby an H-theorem is obtained, which can be viewed as a signifier of the emergence of macroscopic behavior in the system. We give two more examples from past work: 2) the nonequilibrium dynamics of N atoms in an optical lattice under the large N\cal NN (field components), 2PI and second order perturbative expansions, illustrating how N and N\cal NN enter in these three aspects of quantum correlations, coherence and coupling strength. 3) the behavior of an interacting quantum system near its critical point, the effects of quantum and thermal fluctuations and the conditions under which the system manifests infrared dimensional reduction. We also discuss how the effective field theory concept bears on macroscopic quantum phenomena: the running of the coupling parameters with energy or scale imparts a dynamical-dependent and an interaction-sensitive definition of `macroscopia'.
In this paper, we study the entanglement structure of a system of N quantum oscillators with distinctive coupling strengths, all linearly coupled to a common massless scalar quantum field. This study is helpful in characterizing the notion of an entanglement domain and its symmetry features, which is useful for understanding the interplay between different levels of structure in many-body quantum systems. The effect of the quantum field on the system is derived via the influence functional and the correlation functions are obtained from the solutions of the evolutionary operator of the reduced density matrix. They are then used to construct the covariance matrix, which forms the basis for our analysis of the structure of quantum entanglement in this open system. To make the physical features explicit, we consider a system of three quantum coupled oscillators placed at the vertices of an equilateral triangle with disparate pairwise couplings. We analyze the entanglement between one oscillator and the other two with equal (symmetric) and unequal (asymmetric) coupling strengths. As a physical illustration, we apply the results for these two different configurations to address some basic issues in macroscopic quantum phenomena from the quantum entanglement perspective.
The notion of a macroscopic quantum state must be pinned down in order to assess how well experiments probe the large-scale limits of quantum mechanics. However, the issue of quantifying so-called quantum macroscopicity is fraught with multiple approaches having varying interpretations and levels of computability and measurability. Here, we introduce two measures that capture independent macroscopic properties: i) extensive size, measuring the degree of coherence in position or momentum observables relative to atomic-scale units, and ii) entangled size, quantifying the number of entangled subsystems. These measures unify many desirable features of past proposals while having rigorously justified interpretations from quantum information theory in terms of coherence and multipartite entanglement. We demonstrate how to estimate them and obtain lower-bounds using experimental data from micro-mechanical oscillators and diffracting molecules. Notably, we find evidence for genuine multipartite entanglement of 10 5 to 10 7 atoms in recent mechanical superposition states.