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arXiv:2208.01217 · The Journal of Chemical Physics

Open quantum dynamics of strongly coupled oscillators with multi-configuration time-dependent Hartree propagation and Markovian quantum jumps

Johan F. Triana, Felipe Herrera

Published Nov 1, 2022• 7 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Modeling the non-equilibrium dissipative dynamics of strongly interacting quantized degrees of freedom is a fundamental problem in several branches of physics and chemistry. We implement a quantum state trajectory scheme for solving Lindblad quantum master equations that describe coherent and dissipative processes for a set of strongly coupled quantized oscillators. The scheme involves a sequence of stochastic quantum jumps with transition probabilities determined by the system state and the system-reservoir dynamics. Between consecutive jumps, the wave function is propagated in a coordinate space using the multi-configuration time-dependent Hartree method. We compare this hybrid propagation methodology with exact Liouville space solutions for physical systems of interest in cavity quantum electrodynamics, demonstrating accurate results for experimentally relevant observables using a tractable number of quantum trajectories. We show the potential for solving the dissipative dynamics of finite size arrays of strongly interacting quantized oscillators with high excitation densities, a scenario that is challenging for conventional density matrix propagators due to the large dimensionality of the underlying Hilbert space.

DOI
10.1063/5.0119293

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Modeling the non-equilibrium dissipative dynamics of strongly interacting quantized degrees of freedom is a fundamental problem in several branches of physics and chemistry. We implement a quantum state trajectory scheme for solving Lindblad quantum master equations that describe coherent and dissipative processes for a set of strongly coupled quantized oscillators. The scheme involves a sequence of stochastic quantum jumps with transition probabilities determined by the system state and the system-reservoir dynamics. Between consecutive jumps, the wave function is propagated in a coordinate space using the multi-configuration time-dependent Hartree method. We compare this hybrid propagation methodology with exact Liouville space solutions for physical systems of interest in cavity quantum electrodynamics, demonstrating accurate results for experimentally relevant observables using a tractable number of quantum trajectories. We show the potential for solving the dissipative dynamics of finite size arrays of strongly interacting quantized oscillators with high excitation densities, a scenario that is challenging for conventional density matrix propagators due to the large dimensionality of the underlying Hilbert space.
Physical quantum systems are generically coupled to an environment, resulting in open system dynamics. A typical approach to simulating this dynamics is to propagate the density matrix of the system via the Lindblad master equation. This approach is numerically challenging due to the size of the density matrix, which has led to the development of quantum jump methods, which unravel the density matrix into an ensemble of state vectors. These methods utilize a stochastic sampling of the quantum jump times, which becomes inefficent for weakly dissipative dynamics, in which jumps are rare events. Here, we propose the deterministic quantum jump (DQJ) method, which we show to outperform standard quantum jump methods in the weakly dissipative regime, by removing the error of stochastic sampling. We describe the methodology at the single-jump and two-jump level, reconstructing the density matrix at the corresponding level. We demonstrate the performance of the method for two examples, the dissipative transverse-field Ising model, and the dissipative Kerr oscillator. Given that quantum technologies such as quantum computing have weakly dissipative quantum dynamics as their central focus, we propose this method to be utilized in that context, for exploring and understanding quantum technology platforms.
This thesis explores the dynamics of linearly coupled quantum and classical oscillators interacting with environments. In the quantum regime, such dynamics is described in terms of the Liouvillian superoperator, which leads to non-unitary time evolution of the system, specifically of the density matrix. In particular, when the correlation time of the environment is significantly shorter than the characteristic timescale of the system, the dynamics are classified as Markovian. Therefore, the equation of motion for the density matrix that fulfils this property is known as the Lindblad master equation. Systems of coupled cavities and waveguides in the presence of gain and loss can be described by this equation and, more importantly, by non-Hermitian Hamiltonians. In particular, when two coupled cavities exhibit balance between gain and loss, the system is PT -symmetric. However, for certain values in the parameter space, this symmetry is broken and the non-Hermitian Hamiltonian is no longer diagonalizable. Such values are denoted as exceptional points. In the case of large arrays of coupled quantum oscillators, the dynamics description becomes more challenging since the dimensions of the density matrix grow exponentially. To address this, we study the dynamics of these arrays via the quantum state diffusion approach. In such approach, the Lindblad master equation is unraveled by a stochastic Schrödinger equation. Then, we decouple this equation by diagonalizing the non-Hermitian Hamiltonian that describes the system. Such diagonalization leads to a transformation of a system of coupled oscillators into a decoupled one, offering a great reduction in the basis size. For systems of classical oscillators with dissipative nearest-neighbor coupling, the dynamics leads to synchronized motion. We study how an array of such oscillators reaches the synchronized state. This behavior is found when the system is dissipation free, which implies that all the eigenvectors of the dynamical matrix are damped, except one. To measure the degree of synchronization, we introduce the inverse of participation ratio, whose maximum value is associated with a delocalized state and, therefore, fully synchronized motion. For larger arrays of oscillators, we examine the case where the frequency fluctuations of each oscillator are obtained from a Gaussian distribution with zero mean and a given standard deviation. Then, we derive a scaling law for the largest value of the mentioned standard deviation that still allows the oscillators fully synchronize their motion.:1 Introduction 2 Open quantum systems 3 Dynamics of two coupled cavities in the presence of losses 4 Unraveling of Lindblad equation for system of oscillators 5 Synchronization of dissipatively coupled harmonic oscillators 6 Conclusions and outlook A Derivation of equations of motion for the amplitudes B Quantum state diffusion unraveling for N decoupled oscillators C Model for disspative coupling D Perturbation theory for disorder in the frequencies References
In this article, we explore the dissipation dynamics of a strongly coupled multidimensional system in contact with a Markovian bath, following a system-bath approach. We use in this endeavor the recently developed stochastic multi-configuration time-dependent Hartree approach within the Monte Carlo wave packet formalism [S. Mandal et al., J. Chem. Phys. 156, 094109 (2022)]. The method proved to yield thermalized ensembles of wave packets when intramolecular coupling is weak. To treat strongly coupled systems, new Lindblad dissipative operators are constructed as linear combinations of the system coordinates and associated momenta. These are obtained by a unitary transformation to a normal mode representation, which reduces intermode coupling up to second order. Additionally, we use combinations of generalized raising/lowering operators to enforce the Boltzmann distribution in the dissipation operators, which yield perfect thermalization in the harmonic limit. The two ansatz are tested using a model two-dimensional Hamiltonian, parameterized to disentangle the effects of intramolecular potential coupling, of strong mode mixing observed in Fermi resonances, and of anharmonicity.
In this paper, multidimensional dissipative quantum dynamics is studied within a system–bath approach in the Markovian regime using a model Lindblad operator. We report on the implementation of a Monte Carlo wave packet algorithm in the Heidelberg version of the Multi-Configuration Time-Dependent Hartree (MCTDH) program package, which is henceforth extended to treat stochastic dissipative dynamics. The Lindblad operator is represented as a sum of products of one-dimensional operators. The new form of the operator is not restricted to the MCTDH formalism and could be used with other multidimensional quantum dynamical methods. As a benchmark system, a two-dimensional coupled oscillators model representing the internal stretch and the surface–molecule distance in the O2/Pt(111) system coupled to a Markovian bath of electron–hole-pairs is used. The simulations reveal the interplay between coherent intramolecular coupling due to anharmonic terms in the potential and incoherent relaxation due to coupling to an environment. It is found that thermalization of the system can be approximately achieved when the intramolecular coupling is weak.
We introduce a mapping between the ground state of interacting fermionic Hamiltonians and the non-equilibrium steady state of a purely dissipative open quantum system. Within the framework of third quantization, we map the Fermi-Hubbard Hamiltonian onto Lindblad jump operators acting on Majorana fermions. Remarkably, both hopping and interaction terms map onto jump operators that preserve the Gaussianity of Majorana fermions along individual quantum trajectories. As a result, the dynamics can be unravelled and each trajectory can be simulated efficiently using only two-point correlation functions, with a computational cost that scales polynomially with system size. We further show that finite particle number requires negative dissipative rates, leading to an intrinsically non-Markovian dynamics. The corresponding trajectory unravelling involves both positive and negative stochastic weights and exhibits a sign problem and large fluctuations, so that convergence requires an exponentially large number of trajectories. The overall computational cost remains exponential in system size despite the efficient Gaussian representation of individual trajectories, but is crucially dependent on the computational complexity of the non-Markovian unravelling, motivating further studies on the efficiency of such unravellings.
We propose a method which combines the quantum-classical mapping approach to surface hopping (MASH) with the dissipative quantum dynamics of the Lindblad master equation. Like conventional surface-hopping methods, our approach is based on classical trajectories coupled to the dynamics of a quantum subsystem. However, instead of evolving the subsystem wavefunction according to the time-dependent Schrödinger equation, we use stochastic quantum trajectories derived from secular Redfield theory. This enables the simulation of open quantum systems coupled simultaneously to Markovian quantum baths and anharmonic non-Markovian classical degrees of freedom. Applications to the spin--boson model and to the cavity-enhanced fluorescence of an electronically nonadiabatic molecule show excellent agreement with fully quantum-mechanical benchmarks.