Stochastic Feshbach Projection for the Dynamics of Open Quantum Systems

Valentin Link and Walter T. Strunz
Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 180401 – Published 30 October 2017

Abstract

We present a stochastic projection formalism for the description of quantum dynamics in bosonic or spin environments. The Schrödinger equation in the coherent state representation with respect to the environmental degrees of freedom can be reformulated by employing the Feshbach partitioning technique for open quantum systems based on the introduction of suitable non-Hermitian projection operators. In this picture the reduced state of the system can be obtained as a stochastic average over pure state trajectories, for any temperature of the bath. The corresponding non-Markovian stochastic Schrödinger equations include a memory integral over the past states. In the case of harmonic environments and linear coupling the approach gives a new form of the established non-Markovian quantum state diffusion stochastic Schrödinger equation without functional derivatives. Utilizing spin coherent states, the evolution equation for spin environments resembles the bosonic case with, however, a non-Gaussian average for the reduced density operator.

  • Received 13 July 2017

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.119.180401

© 2017 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

General Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Valentin Link* and Walter T. Strunz

  • Institut für Theoretische Physik, Technische Universität Dresden, D-01062 Dresden, Germany

  • *valentin.link@tu-dresden.de

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Issue

Vol. 119, Iss. 18 — 3 November 2017

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