Dissipative Jaynes-Cummings Dynamics: A Systematic Study of Excitation Decay and Coherence Loss in the Strong-Coupling Regime
Miguel Percudani
This work presents a systematic numerical study of the dissipative Jaynes-Cummings model, consisting of a two-level system (qubit) coupled to a truncated harmonic oscillator, both subject to Markovian dissipation. The model is standard in quantum optics and open quantum systems. The master equation is solved using the Lindblad formalism with BDF integration. The study focuses on two standard observables: the qubit excited-state population P_exc(t) and the qubit Bloch vector length |r(t)|. A three-dimensional parameter scan is performed over the coupling g, the qubit dephasing rate gamma_phi, and the oscillator relaxation rate gamma_a, giving 216 cells in total. The parameters used are omega_0 = 6 Hz, omega_1 = 40 Hz, giving a detuning delta = 34 Hz, and thermal occupation n_th = 0.05. MAIN FINDINGS: The single-exponential description of the excited-state population is valid only at intermediate coupling (g approximately 4 to 8 Hz). Outside this region, the dynamics exhibits a multi-timescale structure. The decay time T is non-monotonic in g, with a minimum at g approximately 7 Hz. The location of the minimum depends only weakly on gamma_a, following a power law with exponent 0.127. At strong coupling (g greater than 15 Hz), a two-exponential model is strongly preferred by the Akaike Information Criterion in 43 out of 45 cells. The two timescales are separated by a factor of approximately 150. The fast timescale T_1 is best approximated by the Purcell formula (median ratio of numerical to theoretical value 0.68). The Fermi golden rule overestimates the decay rate by a factor of approximately 4.5. Neither the dressed-state correction nor the Bloch-Redfield calculation improves on the Purcell formula. The Bloch vector length does not follow any simple functional form (single exponential, stretched exponential, power law, or double exponential). All models have mean R-squared in the range 0.31 to 0.36. Its time derivative is, however, almost perfectly correlated with that of the population (mean correlation 0.91). The results are converged with respect to the Fock-space truncation at N_0 = 12, with identical observables for N_0 between 12 and 20. SCOPE: This is a purely numerical study of a well-defined quantum-optical model. It contains no empirical data, no claims about biological or cognitive systems, and no speculative ontology. The model, the numerical method, and the observables are standard. The results include several negative findings (the failure of perturbative formulas, the lack of a simple functional form for the Bloch vector) which are reported honestly and which identify the regime where non-perturbative methods are required. The purpose of this release is to provide reproducible numerical data and a benchmark for future analytical work on the dissipative Jaynes-Cummings model in the strong-coupling regime. CONTENTS: The LaTeX technical note (approximately 20 pages), the Python scripts for the numerical simulations, and the CSV files with the fit results, regime classification, and theoretical comparison. REFERENCES: E. T. Jaynes and F. W. Cummings, Proc. IEEE 51, 89 (1963).G. Lindblad, Commun. Math. Phys. 48, 119 (1976).H.-P. Breuer and F. Petruccione, The Theory of Open Quantum Systems, Oxford University Press (2002).C. W. Gardiner and P. Zoller, Quantum Noise, 3rd ed., Springer (2004).E. M. Purcell, Phys. Rev. 69, 681 (1946).C. Cohen-Tannoudji, J. Dupont-Roc, and G. Grynberg, Atom-Photon Interactions, Wiley (1992).W. P. Schleich, Quantum Optics in Phase Space, Wiley-VCH (2001).
•Oct 4, 2026•0 citations