© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

Terms Privacy Legal Notice

arXiv:2507.03471 · Physical Review A

Nonequilibrium thermometry via an ensemble of initially correlated qubits

Enrico Trombetti, Marco Malitesta, Marco Pezzutto, Stefano Gherardini

Published May 18, 2026• 0 citations

Abstract

We investigate a nonequilibrium quantum thermometry protocol in which an ensemble of qubits, acting as temperature probes, is weakly coupled to a macroscopic thermal bath. The temperature of the bath, the parameter of interest, is encoded in the dissipator of a Markovian thermalization process. For some relevant initial states, we observe a peak in the Quantum Fisher Information (QFI) during the transient of the thermalization, indicating enhanced sensitivity in early-time dynamics. This effect becomes more pronounced at higher bath temperatures and is further enhanced when the initial reduced state of the qubits has a large ground-state population and/or it is highly coherent. We also focus on the role of initial quantum correlations in the thermometric performance, which emerge as a central feature of this work. We find strong numerical evidence that, given same single-qubit reduced states, the inclusion of quantum correlations among the qubits of the ensemble always yields an enhanced QFI. Moreover, even if none of the considered states outperform the (pure, separable) ground state, maximally entangled states display QFIs values remarkably close to the standard quantum limit when probing extremely hot thermal baths. Finally, although the Markovian dynamics does not permit superlinear scaling of the QFI with the number of probes, we identify the most effective initial states for designing high-precision quantum thermometers within this setting. We also provide concrete guidelines for experimental implementations.

DOI: 10.1103/bb24-kfrz

Related papers

Nonequilibrium quantum thermometry with noncommutative system-bath couplings

Youssef Aiache, Abderrahim El Allati, İlkay Demir +1 more

Accurate temperature estimation in the quantum and cryogenic regimes remains a fundamental challenge. Here, we investigate nonequilibrium quantum thermometry using a single-qubit probe coupled to a bosonic bath through noncommuting interaction operators, which unify pure dephasing and dissipative dynamics within a spin-boson model. We show that the interference between these two coupling channels induces strong non-Markovian feedback between populations and coherences, leading to coherence trapping and enhanced thermal sensitivity. Remarkably, by tuning the coupling structure, the probe's temperature sensitivity exhibits a quadratic low-temperature scaling, even under weak coupling. Moreover, while coherence-based measurements are formally suboptimal, they become the most informative in the early nonequilibrium regime, where memory effects dominate. Our findings identify noncommutative system-bath couplings as a practical and tunable resource for achieving high-precision quantum thermometry in realistic open-system architectures.

quant-pharXiv:2512.19607•Physical Review A•Dec 23, 2025•2 citations

Coherence-Enhanced Single-Qubit Thermometry out of Equilibrium

Gonçalo Frazão, Marco Pezzutto, Yasser Omar +2 more

The metrological limits of thermometry operated in nonequilibrium dynamical regimes are analyzed. We consider a finite-dimensional quantum system, employed as a quantum thermometer, in contact with a thermal bath inducing Markovian thermalization dynamics. The quantum thermometer is initialized in a generic quantum state, possibly including quantum coherence with respect to the Hamiltonian basis. We prove that the precision of the thermometer, quantified by the Quantum Fisher Information, is enhanced by the quantum coherence in its initial state. We analytically show this in the specific case of qubit thermometers for which the maximization of the Quantum Fisher Information occurs at a finite time during the transient thermalization dynamics. Such a finite-time precision enhancement can be better than the precision that is achieved asymptotically.

arXiv:2405.14439•Entropy•Jun 30, 2024•4 citations

Non-equilibrium quantum thermometry with bosonic samples

Marek Winczewski, Michał Horodecki, Ricard Ravell Rodríguez

We study low-temperature non-equilibrium quantum thermometry with a bosonic probe: a quantum harmonic oscillator strongly coupled to a bosonic bath at temperature $T$ through a Drude--Ohmic spectral density. We treat the probe--bath dynamics both exactly, using the quadratic solution of Boyanovsky and Jasnow, and within a renormalized Gorini--Kossakowski--Lindblad--Sudarshan (GKLS) master equation. From the time-dependent covariance matrix we extract the quantum Fisher information (QFI) for general single-mode Gaussian probe states, including squeezed ones. In the strong-coupling, non-Markovian regime the QFI is non-monotonic in time, displaying bath-memory revivals that make a finite interrogation time $t^*>0$ strictly optimal. By contrast, we prove that the Markovian QFI rises monotonically to its stationary value and develops no interior optimum, so that its optimum is always pinned to the boundary $t^*\to\infty$; this complements existing Markovian precision-rate bounds, which concern $(\mathcal F(t)/t)$ rather than the single-shot QFI $(\mathcal F(t))$. Squeezed initial states yield a large transient advantage that thermalisation eventually erases, establishing squeezing and interrogation time as complementary thermometric resources. At equilibrium, strong coupling replaces the exponential Boltzmann suppression of the low-temperature relative error by a far milder polynomial divergence. As the model maps directly onto circuit quantum electrodynamics, these protocols appear within current experimental reach.

quant-pharXiv:2606.27894•Jun 29, 2026•0 citations

Precision Enhancement in Transient Quantum Thermometry:Cold-Probe Bias and Its Removal

Debarupa Saha, Ujjwal Sen

We unveil a fundamental temperature bias in transient quantum thermometry under Markovian dynamics. For qubit probes evolving in a thermal Markovian environment, we prove that transient precision beyond the steady-state benchmark can be achieved if and only if the probe is initially colder than the bath temperature to be estimated. Cold probes are therefore both necessary and sufficient for enhanced transient precision in the Markovian regime. We then investigate the fate of this bias in the presence of environmental memory. In particular, in a non-Markovian scenario generated by an auxiliary-mediated system-bath coupling, we find that the cold-probe requirement for enhanced transient precision persists, indicating that the temperature bias survives certain forms of memory effects. In contrast, for a non-Markovian collisional model with perfect swap interactions between bath ancillas, transient enhancement is entirely absent regardless of the probe's initial temperature. This indicates that strong non-Markovianity can lead to the complete disappearance of the enhancement effect, placing hot and cold probes on equal footing, with neither capable of achieving enhanced precision in this regime.

quant-pharXiv:2601.15237•Jan 22, 2026•0 citations

Strongly coupled fermionic probe for nonequilibrium thermometry

Ricard Ravell Rodríguez, Mohammad Mehboudi, Michał Horodecki +1 more

Abstract We characterise the measurement sensitivity, quantified by the quantum Fisher information (QFI), of a single-fermionic thermometric probe strongly coupled to the sample of interest, a fermionic bath, at temperature T. For nonequilibrium protocols, in which the probe is measured before reaching equilibrium with the sample, we find new behaviour of the measurement sensitivity arising due to non-Markovian dynamics. First, we show that the QFI displays a highly non-monotonic behaviour in time, in contrast to the Markovian case where it grows monotonically until equilibrium, so that non-Markovian revivals can be exploited to reach a higher QFI. Second, the QFI rate is maximised at a finite interrogation time t ∗ , which we characterize, in contrast to the solution t ∗ → 0 known in the Markovian limit (Pavel Sekatski and Martí Perarnau-Llobet 2022 Quantum 6 869). Finally, we consider probes make up of few fermions and discuss different collective enhancements in the measurement precision.

arXiv:2310.14655•New Journal of Physics•Jan 1, 2024•14 citations

Quantum Thermometry of External Phonon Reservoirs in Driven Open Quantum Systems

Yildiz Berk Ates

We investigate the non-monotonic temperature sensitivity of a coherently driven two-level quantum system coupled to an Ohmic phonon environment. By employing a unitary polaron transformation, we account for phonon-induced renormalization effects that go beyond the standard weak-coupling approximations. Our analysis reveals that the Quantum Fisher Information (QFI) exhibits a prominent peak at an intermediate system-environment coupling strength, identifying an optimal regime for thermal sensing. This behavior emerges from a fundamental competition between environment-induced dissipation enhancement and the exponential suppression of system parameters due to phonon dressing. We demonstrate that while thermometric precision vanishes in both the ultra-weak and strong coupling limits, a properly tuned nonequilibrium steady state can significantly enhance sensitivity. These results suggest that environmental interactions, often viewed as detrimental decoherence sources, can be engineered as a resource to optimize the performance of solid-state quantum thermometers.

quant-pharXiv:2604.14855•Apr 17, 2026•0 citations

We investigate a nonequilibrium quantum thermometry protocol in which an ensemble of qubits, acting as temperature probes, is weakly coupled to a macroscopic thermal bath. The temperature of the bath, the parameter of interest, is encoded in the dissipator of a Markovian thermalization process. For some relevant initial states, we observe a peak in the Quantum Fisher Information (QFI) during the transient of the thermalization, indicating enhanced sensitivity in early-time dynamics. This effect becomes more pronounced at higher bath temperatures and is further enhanced when the initial reduced state of the qubits has a large ground-state population and/or it is highly coherent. We also focus on the role of initial quantum correlations in the thermometric performance, which emerge as a central feature of this work. We find strong numerical evidence that, given same single-qubit reduced states, the inclusion of quantum correlations among the qubits of the ensemble always yields an enhanced QFI. Moreover, even if none of the considered states outperform the (pure, separable) ground state, maximally entangled states display QFIs values remarkably close to the standard quantum limit when probing extremely hot thermal baths. Finally, although the Markovian dynamics does not permit superlinear scaling of the QFI with the number of probes, we identify the most effective initial states for designing high-precision quantum thermometers within this setting. We also provide concrete guidelines for experimental implementations.

Accurate temperature estimation in the quantum and cryogenic regimes remains a fundamental challenge. Here, we investigate nonequilibrium quantum thermometry using a single-qubit probe coupled to a bosonic bath through noncommuting interaction operators, which unify pure dephasing and dissipative dynamics within a spin-boson model. We show that the interference between these two coupling channels induces strong non-Markovian feedback between populations and coherences, leading to coherence trapping and enhanced thermal sensitivity. Remarkably, by tuning the coupling structure, the probe's temperature sensitivity exhibits a quadratic low-temperature scaling, even under weak coupling. Moreover, while coherence-based measurements are formally suboptimal, they become the most informative in the early nonequilibrium regime, where memory effects dominate. Our findings identify noncommutative system-bath couplings as a practical and tunable resource for achieving high-precision quantum thermometry in realistic open-system architectures.

The metrological limits of thermometry operated in nonequilibrium dynamical regimes are analyzed. We consider a finite-dimensional quantum system, employed as a quantum thermometer, in contact with a thermal bath inducing Markovian thermalization dynamics. The quantum thermometer is initialized in a generic quantum state, possibly including quantum coherence with respect to the Hamiltonian basis. We prove that the precision of the thermometer, quantified by the Quantum Fisher Information, is enhanced by the quantum coherence in its initial state. We analytically show this in the specific case of qubit thermometers for which the maximization of the Quantum Fisher Information occurs at a finite time during the transient thermalization dynamics. Such a finite-time precision enhancement can be better than the precision that is achieved asymptotically.

We study low-temperature non-equilibrium quantum thermometry with a bosonic probe: a quantum harmonic oscillator strongly coupled to a bosonic bath at temperature

T

through a Drude--Ohmic spectral density. We treat the probe--bath dynamics both exactly, using the quadratic solution of Boyanovsky and Jasnow, and within a renormalized Gorini--Kossakowski--Lindblad--Sudarshan (GKLS) master equation. From the time-dependent covariance matrix we extract the quantum Fisher information (QFI) for general single-mode Gaussian probe states, including squeezed ones. In the strong-coupling, non-Markovian regime the QFI is non-monotonic in time, displaying bath-memory revivals that make a finite interrogation time

t^*>0

strictly optimal. By contrast, we prove that the Markovian QFI rises monotonically to its stationary value and develops no interior optimum, so that its optimum is always pinned to the boundary

t^*\to\infty

; this complements existing Markovian precision-rate bounds, which concern

(\mathcal F(t)/t)

rather than the single-shot QFI

(\mathcal F(t))

. Squeezed initial states yield a large transient advantage that thermalisation eventually erases, establishing squeezing and interrogation time as complementary thermometric resources. At equilibrium, strong coupling replaces the exponential Boltzmann suppression of the low-temperature relative error by a far milder polynomial divergence. As the model maps directly onto circuit quantum electrodynamics, these protocols appear within current experimental reach.

We unveil a fundamental temperature bias in transient quantum thermometry under Markovian dynamics. For qubit probes evolving in a thermal Markovian environment, we prove that transient precision beyond the steady-state benchmark can be achieved if and only if the probe is initially colder than the bath temperature to be estimated. Cold probes are therefore both necessary and sufficient for enhanced transient precision in the Markovian regime. We then investigate the fate of this bias in the presence of environmental memory. In particular, in a non-Markovian scenario generated by an auxiliary-mediated system-bath coupling, we find that the cold-probe requirement for enhanced transient precision persists, indicating that the temperature bias survives certain forms of memory effects. In contrast, for a non-Markovian collisional model with perfect swap interactions between bath ancillas, transient enhancement is entirely absent regardless of the probe's initial temperature. This indicates that strong non-Markovianity can lead to the complete disappearance of the enhancement effect, placing hot and cold probes on equal footing, with neither capable of achieving enhanced precision in this regime.

Abstract We characterise the measurement sensitivity, quantified by the quantum Fisher information (QFI), of a single-fermionic thermometric probe strongly coupled to the sample of interest, a fermionic bath, at temperature T. For nonequilibrium protocols, in which the probe is measured before reaching equilibrium with the sample, we find new behaviour of the measurement sensitivity arising due to non-Markovian dynamics. First, we show that the QFI displays a highly non-monotonic behaviour in time, in contrast to the Markovian case where it grows monotonically until equilibrium, so that non-Markovian revivals can be exploited to reach a higher QFI. Second, the QFI rate is maximised at a finite interrogation time t ∗ , which we characterize, in contrast to the solution t ∗ → 0 known in the Markovian limit (Pavel Sekatski and Martí Perarnau-Llobet 2022 Quantum 6 869). Finally, we consider probes make up of few fermions and discuss different collective enhancements in the measurement precision.

We investigate the non-monotonic temperature sensitivity of a coherently driven two-level quantum system coupled to an Ohmic phonon environment. By employing a unitary polaron transformation, we account for phonon-induced renormalization effects that go beyond the standard weak-coupling approximations. Our analysis reveals that the Quantum Fisher Information (QFI) exhibits a prominent peak at an intermediate system-environment coupling strength, identifying an optimal regime for thermal sensing. This behavior emerges from a fundamental competition between environment-induced dissipation enhancement and the exponential suppression of system parameters due to phonon dressing. We demonstrate that while thermometric precision vanishes in both the ultra-weak and strong coupling limits, a properly tuned nonequilibrium steady state can significantly enhance sensitivity. These results suggest that environmental interactions, often viewed as detrimental decoherence sources, can be engineered as a resource to optimize the performance of solid-state quantum thermometers.