Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

Physicae Proceedings

Finite Temperature Master Equation

Renan Cunha de Oliveira

Published Mar 29, 2012• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We study the behavior of two weakly coupled quantum systems, described by a separable density operator. One of them is a single oscillator, representing a microscopic system, while the other is a set of oscillators, which perform the role of a reservoir in thermal equilibrium. From the Liouville-Von Neumann equation for the reduced density operator, we devise the master equation that governs the evolution of the microscopic system, incorporating the effects of temperature via Thermofield Dynamics formalism and suitably redefining the vacuum of the macroscopic system. As applications, we study an oscillator interacting with a set of boson oscillators at finite temperature, usually employed in quantum mechanics to describe a Brownian particle; and investigate the behavior of an oscillator in the presence of a heat bath consisting of a set of fermion oscillators.

DOI
10.5196/physicae.proceedings.xiyrm.38

Related papers

Quantum Brownian motion of a macroscopic object in a general environment

Chung-Hsien Chou

For the purpose of understanding the quantum behavior such as quantum decoherence, fluctuations, dissipation, entanglement and teleportation of a mesoscopic or macroscopic object interacting with a general environment, we derive here a set of exact master equations for the reduced density matrix of N interacting harmonic oscillators in a heat bath with arbitrary spectral density and temperature. For the case N = 2, we also give an influence functional treatment of this model and provide explicit expressions for the evolution operator of the reduced density matrix which are useful for the study of decoherence and disentanglement issues. We show a simple application of this master equation by examining the decoherence and disentanglement of two harmonic oscillators due to their interaction with a common environment under Markovian approximation. Two classes of problems of interest to us which these equations can be usefully applied to are that of the quantum dynamics of nanoelectromechanical oscillators and the entanglement evolution of multi-partite macroscopic states such as quantum superposition of mirrors in a high Q cavity. To address a key conceptual issue for macroscopic quantum phenomena we examine the conditions for an assumption often implicitly made in these studies to be valid, namely, that the quantum behavior of a macroscopic object in an environment can be accurately represented by only treating the dynamics of its center-of-mass variable. We also mention how these results can be used to calculate the uncertainty principle governing a macroscopic object at finite temperature.

OSA Workshop on Entanglement and Quantum Decoherence•Jan 1, 2008•0 citations

From nonequilibrium Green's functions to quantum master equations for the density matrix and out-of-time-order correlators: Steady-state and adiabatic dynamics

Bibek Bhandari, Rosario Fazio, Fabio Taddei +1 more

We consider a finite quantum system under slow driving and weakly coupled to thermal reservoirs at different temperatures. We present a systematic derivation of the quantum master equation for the density matrix and the out-of-time-order correlators. We start from the microscopic Hamiltonian and we formulate the equations ruling the dynamics of these quantities by recourse to the Schwinger-Keldysh nonequilibrium Green's function formalism, performing a perturbative expansion in the coupling between the system and the reservoirs. We focus on the adiabatic dynamics, which corresponds to considering the linear response in the ratio between the relaxation time due to the system-reservoir coupling and the time scale associated to the driving. We calculate the particle and energy fluxes. We illustrate the formalism in the case of a qutrit coupled to bosonic reservoirs and of a pair of interacting quantum dots attached to fermionic reservoirs, also discussing the relevance of coherent effects.

arXiv:2103.04373•Physical review. B./Physical review. B•Jul 20, 2021•20 citations

Solutions to Master Equations of Quantum Brownian Motion in a General Environment with External Force

Albert Roura, Christen H. Fleming, B. L. Hu

We revisit the model of a system made up of a Brownian quantum oscillator linearly coupled to an environment made up of many quantum oscillators at finite temperature. We show that the HPZ master equation for the reduced density matrix derived earlier [B.L. Hu, J.P. Paz, Y. Zhang, Phys. Rev. D 45, 2843 (1992)] has incorrectly specified coefficients for the case of nonlocal dissipation. We rederive the QBM master equation, correctly specifying all coefficients, and determine the position uncertainty to be free of excessive cutoff sensitivity. Our coefficients and solutions are reduced entirely to contour integration for analytic spectra at arbitrary temperature, coupling strength, and cut-off. As an illustration we calculate the master equation coefficients and solve the master equation for ohmic coupling (with finite cutoff) and example supra-ohmic and sub-ohmic spectral densities. We determine the effect of an external force on the quantum oscillator and also show that our representation of the master equation and solutions naturally extends to a system of multiple oscillators bilinearly coupled to themselves and the bath in arbitrary fashion. This produces a formula for investigating the standard quantum limit which is central to addressing many theoretical issues in macroscopic quantum phenomena and experimental concerns related to low temperature precision measurements. We find that in a dissipative environment, all initial states settle down to a Gaussian density matrix whose covariance is determined by the thermal reservoir and whose mean is determined by the external force. We specify the thermal covariance for the spectral densities we explore.

•May 18, 2007•0 citations

Microscopic foundation of a finite-temperature stochastic Schrödinger equation

Peter Goetsch, Robert Graham, Fritz Haake

We present a microscopic derivation of a stochastic Schrödinger equation for an oscillator valid at finite temperatures. Damping and noise arise from interaction with a heat bath. Vacuum and thermal noise drive the wavevector in rather different ways which we illuminate by treating the fate of an initial Schrödinger cat state. While the decoherence of the two macroscopically distinct components of such a state is thermally enhanced, the rise of a classically interpretable signal indicating `life' or `death' is not. Suitable averages over the noises could be obtained from a well known master equation and demand interpretation in terms of ensembles, but results contingent on single realizations of the noises may be related to single runs of experiments.

Quantum and Semiclassical Optics Journal of the European Optical Society Part B•Feb 1, 1996•13 citations

Dynamics of a system of two coupled quibts in interaction with a thermal bath: A comparative study using different models for the system-bath interaction

G. L. Deçordi, A. Vidiella-Barranco

We investigate a system of two interacting qubits having one of them isolated and the other coupled to a thermal reservoir. We consider two different models of system-reservoir interaction: i) a model, in which the master equation is derived taking into account the interaction between the two subsystems (qubits), ii) a naive model, in which the master equation consists of a dissipative term added to the unitary evolution term. We study the dynamics of quantities such as bipartite entanglement, quantum discord and the linear entropy of the isolated qubit for both strong and weak coupling regimes (qubit-qubit interaction) as well as for different temperatures of the reservoir. We find significant disagreements between the results obtained from the two models even in the weak coupling regime. For instance, we show that according to the phenomenological model, the isolated qubit would approach a maximally mixed state more slowly for higher temperatures (unphysical result), while the microscopic model predicts the opposite behaviour (correct result).

•Jun 2, 2014•0 citations

Thermal symmetry of the Markovian master equation

Buang Ann Tay, Tomio Yamakoshi Petrosky

The quantum Markovian master equation of the reduced dynamics of a harmonic oscillator coupled to a thermal reservoir is shown to possess thermal symmetry. This symmetry is revealed by a Bogoliubov transformation that can be represented by a hyperbolic rotation acting on the Liouville space of the reduced dynamics. The Liouville space is obtained as an extension of the Hilbert space through the introduction of tilde variables used in the thermofield dynamics formalism. The angle of rotation depends on the temperature of the reservoir, as well as the value of Planck's constant. This symmetry relates the thermal states of the system at any two temperatures. This includes absolute zero, at which purely quantum effects are revealed. The Caldeira-Leggett equation and the classical Fokker-Planck equation also possess thermal symmetry. We compare the thermal symmetry obtained from the Bogoliubov transformation in related fields and discuss the effects of the symmetry on the shape of a Gaussian wave packet.

arXiv:0705.3278•Physical Review A•Oct 2, 2007•15 citations
We study the behavior of two weakly coupled quantum systems, described by a separable density operator. One of them is a single oscillator, representing a microscopic system, while the other is a set of oscillators, which perform the role of a reservoir in thermal equilibrium. From the Liouville-Von Neumann equation for the reduced density operator, we devise the master equation that governs the evolution of the microscopic system, incorporating the effects of temperature via Thermofield Dynamics formalism and suitably redefining the vacuum of the macroscopic system. As applications, we study an oscillator interacting with a set of boson oscillators at finite temperature, usually employed in quantum mechanics to describe a Brownian particle; and investigate the behavior of an oscillator in the presence of a heat bath consisting of a set of fermion oscillators.
For the purpose of understanding the quantum behavior such as quantum decoherence, fluctuations, dissipation, entanglement and teleportation of a mesoscopic or macroscopic object interacting with a general environment, we derive here a set of exact master equations for the reduced density matrix of N interacting harmonic oscillators in a heat bath with arbitrary spectral density and temperature. For the case N = 2, we also give an influence functional treatment of this model and provide explicit expressions for the evolution operator of the reduced density matrix which are useful for the study of decoherence and disentanglement issues. We show a simple application of this master equation by examining the decoherence and disentanglement of two harmonic oscillators due to their interaction with a common environment under Markovian approximation. Two classes of problems of interest to us which these equations can be usefully applied to are that of the quantum dynamics of nanoelectromechanical oscillators and the entanglement evolution of multi-partite macroscopic states such as quantum superposition of mirrors in a high Q cavity. To address a key conceptual issue for macroscopic quantum phenomena we examine the conditions for an assumption often implicitly made in these studies to be valid, namely, that the quantum behavior of a macroscopic object in an environment can be accurately represented by only treating the dynamics of its center-of-mass variable. We also mention how these results can be used to calculate the uncertainty principle governing a macroscopic object at finite temperature.
We consider a finite quantum system under slow driving and weakly coupled to thermal reservoirs at different temperatures. We present a systematic derivation of the quantum master equation for the density matrix and the out-of-time-order correlators. We start from the microscopic Hamiltonian and we formulate the equations ruling the dynamics of these quantities by recourse to the Schwinger-Keldysh nonequilibrium Green's function formalism, performing a perturbative expansion in the coupling between the system and the reservoirs. We focus on the adiabatic dynamics, which corresponds to considering the linear response in the ratio between the relaxation time due to the system-reservoir coupling and the time scale associated to the driving. We calculate the particle and energy fluxes. We illustrate the formalism in the case of a qutrit coupled to bosonic reservoirs and of a pair of interacting quantum dots attached to fermionic reservoirs, also discussing the relevance of coherent effects.
We revisit the model of a system made up of a Brownian quantum oscillator linearly coupled to an environment made up of many quantum oscillators at finite temperature. We show that the HPZ master equation for the reduced density matrix derived earlier [B.L. Hu, J.P. Paz, Y. Zhang, Phys. Rev. D 45, 2843 (1992)] has incorrectly specified coefficients for the case of nonlocal dissipation. We rederive the QBM master equation, correctly specifying all coefficients, and determine the position uncertainty to be free of excessive cutoff sensitivity. Our coefficients and solutions are reduced entirely to contour integration for analytic spectra at arbitrary temperature, coupling strength, and cut-off. As an illustration we calculate the master equation coefficients and solve the master equation for ohmic coupling (with finite cutoff) and example supra-ohmic and sub-ohmic spectral densities. We determine the effect of an external force on the quantum oscillator and also show that our representation of the master equation and solutions naturally extends to a system of multiple oscillators bilinearly coupled to themselves and the bath in arbitrary fashion. This produces a formula for investigating the standard quantum limit which is central to addressing many theoretical issues in macroscopic quantum phenomena and experimental concerns related to low temperature precision measurements. We find that in a dissipative environment, all initial states settle down to a Gaussian density matrix whose covariance is determined by the thermal reservoir and whose mean is determined by the external force. We specify the thermal covariance for the spectral densities we explore.
We present a microscopic derivation of a stochastic Schrödinger equation for an oscillator valid at finite temperatures. Damping and noise arise from interaction with a heat bath. Vacuum and thermal noise drive the wavevector in rather different ways which we illuminate by treating the fate of an initial Schrödinger cat state. While the decoherence of the two macroscopically distinct components of such a state is thermally enhanced, the rise of a classically interpretable signal indicating `life' or `death' is not. Suitable averages over the noises could be obtained from a well known master equation and demand interpretation in terms of ensembles, but results contingent on single realizations of the noises may be related to single runs of experiments.
We investigate a system of two interacting qubits having one of them isolated and the other coupled to a thermal reservoir. We consider two different models of system-reservoir interaction: i) a model, in which the master equation is derived taking into account the interaction between the two subsystems (qubits), ii) a naive model, in which the master equation consists of a dissipative term added to the unitary evolution term. We study the dynamics of quantities such as bipartite entanglement, quantum discord and the linear entropy of the isolated qubit for both strong and weak coupling regimes (qubit-qubit interaction) as well as for different temperatures of the reservoir. We find significant disagreements between the results obtained from the two models even in the weak coupling regime. For instance, we show that according to the phenomenological model, the isolated qubit would approach a maximally mixed state more slowly for higher temperatures (unphysical result), while the microscopic model predicts the opposite behaviour (correct result).
The quantum Markovian master equation of the reduced dynamics of a harmonic oscillator coupled to a thermal reservoir is shown to possess thermal symmetry. This symmetry is revealed by a Bogoliubov transformation that can be represented by a hyperbolic rotation acting on the Liouville space of the reduced dynamics. The Liouville space is obtained as an extension of the Hilbert space through the introduction of tilde variables used in the thermofield dynamics formalism. The angle of rotation depends on the temperature of the reservoir, as well as the value of Planck's constant. This symmetry relates the thermal states of the system at any two temperatures. This includes absolute zero, at which purely quantum effects are revealed. The Caldeira-Leggett equation and the classical Fokker-Planck equation also possess thermal symmetry. We compare the thermal symmetry obtained from the Bogoliubov transformation in related fields and discuss the effects of the symmetry on the shape of a Gaussian wave packet.