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Physical Review A

Magnetic-field effects on the motion of a charged particle in a heat bath

X. L. Li, G. W. Ford, Robert F. O’Connell

Published May 1, 1990• 48 citations
Publisher

Abstract

In a recent paper, Ford, Lewis, and O'Connell [Phys. Rev. A 37, 4419 (1988)] considered a charged quantum particle moving in an arbitrary potential and linearly coupled to a heat bath, and they showed that the macroscopic equation describing the time development of the particle motion is in the form of a quantum generalized Langevin equation. We generalize these results to include the presence of an external magnetic field. We find that the magnetic field manifests itself in the presence of an additional term in the Langevin equation, which is the quantum generalization of the Lorentz force, but the magnetic field does not affect the memory function nor the random force appearing in the quantum Langevin equation. It follows that the noise-noise autocorrelation function, as well as the nonequal time commutator of the noise, is the same as that in the absence of a magnetic field. The case of a blackbody radiation heat bath is shown to be easily analyzed as a special case of our general formalism.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.41.5287

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In a recent paper, Ford, Lewis, and O'Connell [Phys. Rev. A 37, 4419 (1988)] considered a charged quantum particle moving in an arbitrary potential and linearly coupled to a heat bath, and they showed that the macroscopic equation describing the time development of the particle motion is in the form of a quantum generalized Langevin equation. We generalize these results to include the presence of an external magnetic field. We find that the magnetic field manifests itself in the presence of an additional term in the Langevin equation, which is the quantum generalization of the Lorentz force, but the magnetic field does not affect the memory function nor the random force appearing in the quantum Langevin equation. It follows that the noise-noise autocorrelation function, as well as the nonequal time commutator of the noise, is the same as that in the absence of a magnetic field. The case of a blackbody radiation heat bath is shown to be easily analyzed as a special case of our general formalism.
We obtain the quantum Langevin equation (QLE) of a charged quantum particle moving in a harmonic potential in the presence of a uniform external magnetic field and linearly coupled to a quantum heat bath through momentum variables. The bath is modeled as a collection of independent quantum harmonic oscillators. The QLE involves a random force which does not depend on the magnetic field, and a quantum-generalized classical Lorentz force. These features are also present in the QLE for the case of particle-bath coupling through coordinate variables. However, significant differences are also observed. For example, the mean force in the QLE is characterized by a memory function that depends explicitly on the magnetic field. The random force has a modified form with correlation and commutator different from those in the case of coordinate-coordinate coupling. Moreover, the coupling constants, in addition to appearing in the random force and in the mean force, also renormalize the inertial term and the harmonic potential term in the QLE.
We obtain the generalized susceptibility for the motion of a charged oscillator in a harmonic potential well in the presence of a uniform external magnetic field, and linearly coupled to a heat bath, by using the generalized quantum Langevin equation we obtained in an earlier paper. The result is then used to calculate the autocorrelation function of the position operator of the oscillator by the fluctuation-dissipation theorem. The free energy of the oscillator is then obtained in terms of the determinant of the susceptibility matrix. Applications are made to two types of heat baths: the Ohmic case and the case of blackbody radiation. As a special case (no heat bath) of our general formalism, a well-known eigenspectrum result is obtained but in a simple and rather novel fashion.
The macroscopic description of a quantum particle with passive dissipation and moving in an arbitrary external potential is formulated in terms of the generalized Langevin equation. The coupling with the heat bath corresponds to two terms: a mean force characterized by a memory function \ensuremath{\mu}(t) and an operator-valued random force. Explicit expressions are given for the correlation and commutator of the random force. The random force is never Markovian. It is shown that \ensuremath{\mu}\ifmmode \tilde{}\else \~{}\fi{}(z), the Fourier transform of the memory function, must be a positive real function, analytic in the upper half-plane and with Re[\ensuremath{\mu}\ifmmode \tilde{}\else \~{}\fi{}(\ensuremath{\omega}+i0+{0}^{+}0+)] a positive distribution on the real axis. This form is then derived for the independent-oscillator model of a heat bath. It is shown that the most general quantum Langevin equation can be realized by this simple model. A critical comparison is made with a number of other models that have appeared in the literature.
We investigate the quantum dissipative dynamics of a charged magneto-oscillator(CMO) coupled to a heat bath of harmonic oscillators in the presence of an additional field-bath interaction. The problem is formulated within the framework of the generalized quantum Langevin equation, where the external confining potential modifies the random force correlations and the memory kernel of the environment, and the effective spring constant. Using the corresponding non-Markovian master equation, we examine the influence of the field-bath coupling on the temporal decay of the reduced density matrix of the system. We show that the additional interaction leads to an enhancement of the decoherence rate by altering the dissipative response of the bath. Thus our results shed light on the role of field-bath coupling in the quantum to classical transition of a CMO. The resulting fluctuation-dissipation relation is analyzed, and the position autocorrelation, position-velocity correlation and velocity autocorrelation are obtained explicitly. The dependence of these experimentally accessible quantities on the field-bath coupling parameter is discussed. We outline an experimental proposal for testing our theoretical predictions. The study sheds light on reservoir engineering which is central to quantum technologies.
In this paper, the moderately long-time behaviours of the correlation functions for two charged coupled harmonic oscillators connected to a common heat bath are analyzed in the presence of a magnetic field via the Quantum Langevin dynamics. Interestingly it is seen that at long times the correlation functions at T→0T \rightarrow 0T→0 exhibit a power law decay with the coefficients of the power laws being completely different for the two masses, affecting the overall dynamics of the coupled system. The effect of the bath-induced force on mass m1 mediated by the interaction of m2 with the common heat bath is studied and the results are highlighted in the presence of an external magnetic field. It is shown that the effect of cyclotron frequency increases the correlation functions at an instant of time, lowering the rate of temporal decay of the correlation functions. The results in the absence of a magnetic field are also presented, which are extremely important for investigating the movements of the atoms in protein molecules at low temperatures.
In Chapter I of this dissertation, we present a pedagogical introduction to the basic concepts of stochastic theory and review the progress made as well as the outstanding unsolved problems in the field. For the rest of this dissertation, we use a generalized quantum Langevin equation (GLE) approach to investigate various properties of quantum dissipative systems. In Chapter II, calculations for the displacement and random force correlation functions for Brownian motion are generalized to the case of an arbitrary heat bath for a damped harmonic quantum oscillator. The mean square displacement of such an oscillator is then evaluated for both Ohmic and blackbody radiation heat baths, to determine the effects of many parameters on the localization of the oscillator. In Chapter III, the formalism is extended to the Brownian motion of a charged particle in an external magnetic field as well as in a potential. The influence of the magnetic field on the memory function and random force is determined, with the blackbody radiation heat bath analyzed as a special case. For a charged harmonic oscillator, the generalized susceptibility is obtained, which enables us to derive the symmetrized position correlation functions using the fluctuation-dissipation theorem. In addition, we obtain the free energy of the system by generalizing the "remarkable formula" of Ford, Lewis, and O'Connell. Explicit calculations are performed for Ohmic and blackbody radiation heat baths. Furthermore, the effect of dissipation on the localization of the oscillator in an Ohmic heat bath at zero temperature is shown to differ qualitatively from that without the magnetic field. Finally, we formulate retarded Green's functions and symmetrized position correlation functions for the oscillator, reach some general conclusions, and make explicit calculations for the Ohmic heat bath. For the special case of Brownian motion at both zero and nonzero temperatures, we prove two general asymptotic relations between the retarded Green's functions and the displacement correlation functions, which we use to evaluate the long-time behaviors of the latter from those of the former, for both the Ohmic heat bath and a rather general class of heat baths discussed extensively in the literature.