Pulses to steer the time evolution of quantum systems can be designed with optimal control theory. In most cases it is the coherent processes that can be controlled and one optimizes the time evolution toward a target unitary process, sometimes also in the presence of noncontrollable incoherent processes. Here we show how to extend the gradient ascent pulse engineering (GRAPE) algorithm in the case where the incoherent processes are controllable and the target time evolution is a nonunitary quantum channel. We perform a gradient search on a fidelity measure based on Choi matrices. We illustrate our algorithm by optimizing a phase qubit measurement pulse. We show how this technique can lead to a large measurement contrast close to 99. We also show, within the validity of our model, that this algorithm can produce short 1.4-ns pulses with 98.2 contrast.
The control of quantum dynamics via specially tailored laser pulses is a long-standing goal in physics and chemistry. Partly, this dream has come true, as sophisticated pulse-shaping experiments allow us to coherently control product ratios of chemical reactions. The theoretical design of the laser pulse to transfer an initial state to a given final state can be achieved with the help of quantum optimal control theory (QOCT). This tutorial provides an introduction to QOCT. It shows how the control equations defining such an optimal pulse follow from the variation of a properly defined functional. We explain the most successful schemes to solve these control equations and show how to incorporate additional constraints in the pulse design. The algorithms are then applied to simple quantum systems and the obtained pulses are analysed. Besides the traditional final-time control methods, the tutorial also presents an algorithm and an example to handle time-dependent control targets.
In quantum dynamics of many-body systems, to identify the Hamiltonian becomes more difficult very rapidly as the number of degrees of freedom increases. In order to simplify the dynamics and to deduce dynamically relevant Hamiltonian information, it is desirable to control the dynamics to lie within a reduced space. With a judicious choice for the cost functional, the closed loop optimal control experiments can be manipulated efficiently to steer the dynamics to lie within a subspace of the system eigenstates without requiring any prior detailed knowledge about the system Hamiltonian. The procedure is simulated for optimally controlled population transfer experiments in the system of two degrees of freedom. To show the feasibility of steering the dynamics to lie in a specified subspace, the learning algorithms guiding the dynamics are presented along with frequency filtering. The results demonstrate that the optimal control fields derive the system to the desired target state through the desired subspace.