Engineering statistical transmutation of identical quantum particles

Simone Barbarino, Rosario Fazio, Vlatko Vedral, and Yuval Gefen
Phys. Rev. B 99, 045430 – Published 22 January 2019

Abstract

A fundamental pillar of quantum mechanics concerns indistinguishable quantum particles. In three dimensions they may be classified into fermions or bosons, having, respectively, antisymmetric or symmetric wave functions under particle exchange. One of the numerous manifestations of this quantum statistics is the tendency of fermions (bosons) to antibunch (bunch). In a two-particle scattering experiment with two possible outgoing channels [C. K. Hong, Z. Y. Ou, and L. Mandel, Phys. Rev. Lett. 59, 2044 (1987)], the probability of the two particles to arrive each at a different terminal is enhanced (with respect to classical particles) for fermions, and reduced for bosons. Here we show that by entangling the particles with an external degree of freedom, we can engineer quantum statistical transmutation, which may cause fermions to bunch. Our analysis may have consequences on the observed fractional statistics of anyons, including non-Abelian statistics, with serious implications for quantum computing operations in the presence of external degrees of freedom.

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  • Received 28 June 2018

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.99.045430

©2019 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Simone Barbarino1,2, Rosario Fazio3,4, Vlatko Vedral5,6, and Yuval Gefen7

  • 1SISSA, Via Bonomea 265, 34136 Trieste, Italy
  • 2Institute of Theoretical Physics, Technische Universität Dresden, 01062 Dresden, Germany
  • 3ICTP, Strada Costiera 11, 34151 Trieste, Italy
  • 4NEST, Scuola Normale Superiore & Istituto Nanoscienze-CNR, 56126 Pisa, Italy
  • 5Centre for Quantum Technologies, National University of Singapore, 3 Science Drive 2, 117543 Singapore
  • 6Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Parks Road, OX13PU Oxford, United Kingdom
  • 7Department of Condensed Matter Physics, The Weizmann Institute of Science, 76100 Rehovot, Israel

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Issue

Vol. 99, Iss. 4 — 15 January 2019

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