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International Journal of Quantum Chemistry

On master equations, spectral resolutions, and self‐energy fields in propagator theories for quantum open systems

Roberto C. Bochicchio, Horacio Grinberg

Published Apr 5, 1995• 6 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Abstract Master equations for propagators in quantum open systems and their spectral resolutions are derived. The Zwanzig partitioning scheme along the superoperator algebra are used to derive equations of motion for partitioned operators in a Liouville space. The reservoir influence on the dynamical evolution of operators is shown to lead explicitly to dissipative effects arising from memory terms in the evolution equations of such operators. It is also shown that spectral representations may be written in a self‐consistent analytic way by means of the self‐energy fields for transition energies of the system by taking into account the lack of the complete knowledge about the reservoir. A kinematic fluid interpretation of the resultant equations is given and an explicit form of the “collision” superoperator is obtained. Finally, a simple example to illustrate the determination of self‐energy fields for the system–reservoir interaction corrections is given. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

DOI
10.1002/qua.560540106

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Abstract Master equations for propagators in quantum open systems and their spectral resolutions are derived. The Zwanzig partitioning scheme along the superoperator algebra are used to derive equations of motion for partitioned operators in a Liouville space. The reservoir influence on the dynamical evolution of operators is shown to lead explicitly to dissipative effects arising from memory terms in the evolution equations of such operators. It is also shown that spectral representations may be written in a self‐consistent analytic way by means of the self‐energy fields for transition energies of the system by taking into account the lack of the complete knowledge about the reservoir. A kinematic fluid interpretation of the resultant equations is given and an explicit form of the “collision” superoperator is obtained. Finally, a simple example to illustrate the determination of self‐energy fields for the system–reservoir interaction corrections is given. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Abstract An explicit definition for the self‐energy field operator and the self‐energy fields obtained from an average of the associated operator within the algebraic formalism of superoperators is presented. It stems from the formal expansion of the many‐body propagator equations of motion hierachy in quantum many‐body systems within the scenario of the Liouvillian decoupling scheme developed in previous works. An essential theoretical property of such fields for the complete expansion of the propagator to any order in the interaction potential is shown. This states that the interaction potential to a given order only depends on one q‐reduced density matrix. The contraction order q of the density matrix depends on both the nature of the operators defining the propagator and the actual order of the expansion. This result is rigorous regarding infinite summation of the irreducible terms of the self‐energy fields and provides a direct way to estimate the extent to which many‐body effects are involved in successive approximations, i.e., truncation of the excitation level given by the reference state throughout the reduced density matrix and the expansion of the propagator. © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Int J Quantum Chem, 2002
A direct approach for the generalized reduced Liouville equation of motion decoupling problem associated with open quantum systems within the superoperator formalism is presented. The procedure is based on inversion of the perturbation series for the energy representation of the density operator so as to obtain one for the proper self-energy fields that emerge as a consequence of the analytic character of the associated spectral representation. Thus, the perturbation series that arises from the iteration of the energy-dependent matrix elements hierarchy involved in the statistical operator allows, upon further expansion of the inverse of such series, to get formally exact expressions for the corrections to all orders of the self-energy fields. The lower order corrections of these fields are discussed in terms of resonant and nonresonant contributions. The present approach provides matrix equations that show the close relation between the environment effects represented by the self-energy fields and the relaxation kernel that drives the system–reservoir interaction. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Int J Quant Chem 79: 280–290, 2000
We show that the projection operators P usually employed to derive the Nakajima–Zwanzig master equation are non-Hermitian. As a consequence the operator QLQ which governs the dynamics of subsystem-reservoir interactions (here Q=1−P and L is the Liouville operator) is also non-Hermitian and possesses a complex temperature-dependent spectrum of resonances. We use the self-consistent Born approximation to derive a formula for the spectral density of QLQ. From this spectral density we calculate the memory function and mean relaxation time of subsystem-reservoir correlations. These formulas are compared with numerical results obtained from the spin–spin-bath model to test their accuracy. The memory function and mean relaxation time are essential ingredients for the SRA (statistical resonance approximation) theory of microscopic dissipation and decoherence. We show that the SRA master equation preserves positivity when the memory function derived in this paper is employed.
One of the main methods for describing the dynamics of open quantum systems is the method of quantum master equations. These equations describe the dynamics of the reduced density operator of a system interacting with a reservoir. In this case, averaging is performed over the degrees of freedom of the reservoir, which does not allow one to describe the dynamics of reservoir observables. In this paper we show that applying the Zwanzig projection operator method, which is used in deriving quantum master equations, one can also derive dynamic equations for reservoir observables. As an example, we derive dynamic equations for the average number of quanta (photons, phonons) of a bosonic reservoir in the approximation of its weak coupling to the system in the case of the dipole interaction Hamiltonian.
Using the recently discussed quantum dynamics in phase space, we derive a master equation, starting from the phase-space equivalent to the Schr\"odinger equation of motion for the density operator. Use is made of Zwanzig's projection-operator techniques and some explicit realizations of the projection operators are given. The master equation is then applied to show that the time-correlation functions, as defined in the text, satisfy an integral equation of the Volterra type. Next, a master equation for a system interacting with a large system is derived. As an illustration, we determine the lowest-order Born approximation and carry out a short-memory-approximation calculation for an oscillator coupled to a reservoir and for a two-level system interacting with an oscillator heat bath; we obtain equations of the Fokker-Planck type. Some physical implications of these equations are also discussed.
A method based on spectral Green's functions is presented for the simulation of driven open quantum dynamics that can be described by the Lindblad master equation in Liouville density operator space. The method extends the Hilbert space formalism and provides simple algebraic connections between the driven and nondriven dynamics in the spectral frequency domain. The formalism shows remarkable analogies to the use of Green's functions in quantum field theory, such as the elementary excitation energies and the Dyson self-energy equation. To demonstrate its potential, we apply the method to a coherently driven dissipative ensemble of two-level systems comprising a single ``active'' subsystem interacting with NNN ``passive'' subsystems---a generic model with important applications in quantum optics and dynamic nuclear polarization. The method dramatically reduces the computational cost compared with simulations based on solving the full master equation, thus making it possible to study and optimize many-body correlated states up to the physically realistic limit of an arbitrarily large NNN.