ID: 2007.10187

Transition probabilities and transition rates in discrete phase space

July 20, 2020

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William F. Jr. Braasch, William K. Wootters
Quantum Physics

The evolution of the discrete Wigner function is formally similar to a probabilistic process, but the transition probabilities, like the discrete Wigner function itself, can be negative. We investigate these transition probabilities, as well as the transition rates for a continuous process, aiming particularly to give simple criteria for deciding when a set of such quantities corresponds to a legitimate quantum process. We also show how the transition rates for any Hamiltonian evolution can be worked out by expanding the Hamiltonian as a linear combination of displacement operators in the discrete phase space.

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