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arXiv:1702.04284 · Journal of Mathematical Physics

Large-time limit of the quantum Zeno effect

Paolo Facchi A, Marilena Ligabò

Published Mar 1, 2017• 6 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

If very frequent periodic measurements ascertain whether a quantum system is still in its initial state, its evolution is hindered. This peculiar phenomenon is called quantum Zeno effect. We investigate the large-time limit of the survival probability as the total observation time scales as a power of the measurement frequency, t∝Nα. The limit survival probability exhibits a sudden jump from 1 to 0 at α=1/2, the threshold between the quantum Zeno effect and a diffusive behavior. Moreover, we show that for α≥1, the limit probability becomes sensitive to the spectral properties of the initial state and to the arithmetic properties of the measurement periods.

DOI
10.1063/1.4978851

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If very frequent periodic measurements ascertain whether a quantum system is still in its initial state, its evolution is hindered. This peculiar phenomenon is called quantum Zeno effect. We investigate the large-time limit of the survival probability as the total observation time scales as a power of the measurement frequency, t∝Nα. The limit survival probability exhibits a sudden jump from 1 to 0 at α=1/2, the threshold between the quantum Zeno effect and a diffusive behavior. Moreover, we show that for α≥1, the limit probability becomes sensitive to the spectral properties of the initial state and to the arithmetic properties of the measurement periods.
If frequent measurements ascertain whether a quantum system is still in a given subspace, it remains in that subspace and a quantum Zeno effect takes place. The limiting time evolution within the projected subspace is called quantum Zeno dynamics. This phenomenon is related to the limit of a product formula obtained by intertwining the time evolution group with an orthogonal projection. By introducing a novel product formula, we will give a characterization of the quantum Zeno effect for finite-rank projections in terms of a spectral decay property of the Hamiltonian in the range of the projections. Moreover, we will also characterize its limiting quantum Zeno dynamics and exhibit its (not necessarily bounded from below) generator as a generalized mean value Hamiltonian.
Abstract. If frequent measurements ascertain whether a quantum system is still in its initial state, transitions to other states are hindered and the quantum Zeno effect takes place. However, in its broader formulation, the quantum Zeno effect does not necessarily freeze everything. On the contrary, for frequent projections onto a multidimensional subspace, the system can evolve away from its initial state, although it remains in the subspace defined by the measurement. The continuing time evolution within the projected “quantum Zeno subspace ” is called “quantum Zeno dynamics: ” for instance, if the measurements ascertain whether a quantum particle is in a given spatial region, the evolution is unitary and the generator of the Zeno dynamics is the Hamiltonian with hard-wall (Dirichlet) boundary conditions. We discuss the physical and mathematical aspects of this evolution, highlighting the open mathematical problems. We then analyze some alternative strategies to obtain a Zeno dynamics and show that they are physically equivalent.
If frequent measurements ascertain whether a quantum system is still in its initial state, transitions to other states are hindered and the quantum Zeno effect takes place. However, in its broader formulation, the quantum Zeno effect does not necessarily freeze everything. On the contrary, for frequent projections onto a multidimensional subspace, the system can evolve away from its initial state, although it remains in the subspace defined by the measurement. The continuing time evolution within the projected "quantum Zeno subspace" is called "quantum Zeno dynamics:" for instance, if the measurements ascertain whether a quantum particle is in a given spatial region, the evolution is unitary and the generator of the Zeno dynamics is the Hamiltonian with hard-wall (Dirichlet) boundary conditions. We discuss the physical and mathematical aspects of this evolution, highlighting the open mathematical problems. We then analyze some alternative strategies to obtain a Zeno dynamics and show that they are physically equivalent.
Quantum measurements are crucial for observing the properties of a quantum system, which, however, unavoidably perturb its state and dynamics in an irreversible way. Here we study the dynamics of a quantum system being subjected to a sequence of projective measurements applied at random times. In the case of independent and identically distributed intervals of time between consecutive measurements, we analytically demonstrate that the survival probability of the system to remain in the projected state assumes a large deviation (exponentially decaying) form in the limit of an infinite number of measurements. This allows us to estimate the typical value of the survival probability, which can therefore be tuned by controlling the probability distribution of the random time intervals. Our analytical results are numerically tested for Zeno-protected entangled states, which also demonstrate that the presence of disorder in the measurement sequence further enhances the survival probability when the Zeno limit is not reached (as it happens in experiments). Our studies provide a new tool for protecting and controlling the amount of quantum coherence in open complex quantum systems by means of tunable stochastic measurements.
We investigate the discrete-time quantum walk evolution under the influence of the periodic measurements in position subspace. The undisturbed survival probability of the particle at the position subspace, P(0,t)P(0, t)P(0,t) is compared with the survival probability after frequent (nnn) measurements at interval τ=t/n\tau = t/nτ=t/n, P(0,τ)nP(0, \tau)^nP(0,τ)n. We show that P(0,τ)n>P(0,t)P(0, \tau)^n > P(0, t)P(0,τ)n>P(0,t) leading to the quantum Zeno effect in the position subspace when a parameter θ\thetaθ in the quantum coin operations and frequency of measurements is greater than the critical value, θ>θc\theta > \theta_{c}θ>θc​ and n>ncn>n_{c}n>nc​. This Zeno effect in the subspace preserves the dynamics in coin Hilbert space of the walk dynamics and has a potential to play a significant role in quantum tasks such as, preserving the quantum state of the particle at any particular position and to understand the Zeno dynamics in a multidimensional system which is highly transient in nature.
The quantum Zeno effect is a distinctive phenomenon in quantum mechanics, describing the nontrivial effect of frequent projective measurements on hindering the evolution of a quantum system. However, when subjected to environmental noise, the quantum system may dissipate, and the quantum Zeno effect no longer works. This research starts from the physical mechanism for the decay of the quantum Zeno effect in the presence of noise and investigates the effect of coherent quantum controls on mitigating the decrease of the survival probability that the system stays in the initial state induced by the noise. We derive the decay rate of the survival probability with and without coherent quantum controls in general, and show that when the frequency of the projective measurements is large but finite, proper coherent controls by sufficiently strong Hamiltonians can be designed to decrease the decay rate of the survival probability. A two-level quantum system suffering from typical unitary and nonunitary noise is then considered to demonstrate the effect of the proposed coherent quantum control scheme in protecting the quantum Zeno effect against the noise. The decay rate of the survival probability is obtained in the presence of noise, and the control Hamiltonian is further optimized analytically to minimize the decay rate by a variational approach. The evolution paths of the quantum system with the optimal coherent controls are illustrated numerically for different scenarios to explicitly show how the coherent control scheme works in lowering the decay of survival probability.