The Emergence of Classicality via Decoherence Described by Lindblad Operators

We propose a theory of adiabaticity in quantum Markovian dynamics based on a decomposition of the Hilbert space induced by the asymptotic behavior of the Lindblad semigroup. A central idea of our approach is that the natural generalization of the concept of eigenspace of the Hamiltonian in the case of Markovian dynamics is a noiseless subsystem with a minimal noisy cofactor. Unlike previous attempts to define adiabaticity for open systems, our approach deals exclusively with ...

Efficient methods for the description of the non-Markovian dynamics of open systems play an important role in many proposed applications of quantum mechanics. Here we review some of the most important tools that are based on the projection operator techniques of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics. The standard product-state projection is generalized to a new class of correlated projection superoperators that allow the treatment of strong memory effects, and lead to a non-Ma...

With a choice of boundary conditions for solutions of the Schr\"odinger equation, state vectors and density operators even for closed systems evolve asymmetrically in time. For open systems, standard quantum mechanics consequently predicts irreversibility and signatures of the extrinsic arrow of time. The result is a new framework for the treatment of decoherence, not based on a reduced dynamics or a master equation. As an application, using a general model we quantitatively ...

One of the greatest challenges in quantum information processing is the coherent control over quantum systems with an ever increasing number of particles. Within this endeavor, the harnessing of many-body entanglement against the effects of the environment is a pressing issue. Besides being an important concept from a fundamental standpoint, entanglement is recognized as a crucial resource for performance enhancements over classical methods. Understanding and controlling many...

A systematic approach to the non-Markovian quantum dynamics of open systems is given by the projection operator techniques of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics. Combining these methods with concepts from quantum information theory and from the theory of positive maps, we derive a class of correlated projection superoperators that take into account in an efficient way statistical correlations between the open system and its environment. The result is used to develop a gener...

Despite being one of the hallmarks of quantum physics, there is a lack of operational interpretations of quantum coherence. Here we provide an operational interpretation of coherence of a quantum system, in terms of the amount of noise that is to be injected in order to fully decohere it. In particular, we show that in the asymptotic limit, the minimum amount of noise that is required to fully decohere a quantum system, is equal to the relative entropy of coherence. This quan...

Providing entanglement for the design of quantum technologies in the presence of noise constitutes today's main challenge in quantum information science. A framework is required that assesses the build-up of entanglement in realistic settings. In this work, we put forth a new class of nonlinear quantum master equations in Lindblad form that unambiguously identify dynamical entanglement in open quantum systems via deviations from a separable evolution. This separability Lindbl...

We study various measures of classicality of the states of open quantum systems subject to decoherence. Classical states are expected to be stable in spite of decoherence, and are thought to leave conspicuous imprints on the environment. Here these expected features of environment-induced superselection (einselection) are quantified using four different criteria: predictability sieve (which selects states that produce least entropy), purification time (which looks for states ...

A longstanding challenge in the foundations of quantum mechanics is the verification of alternative collapse theories despite their mathematical similarity to decoherence. To this end, we suggest a novel method based on dynamical decoupling. Experimental observation of nonzero saturation of the decoupling error in the limit of fast decoupling operations can provide evidence for alternative quantum theories. As part of the analysis we prove that unbounded Hamiltonians can alwa...

Control of open quantum dynamics is of great interest for realizing quantum technologies. Therefore, it is an important task to quantify and characterize the entropy for open quantum systems under decoherence. In this paper, we study the time evolution of the von Neumann entropy for open quantum systems described by the Lindblad master equation. Note that, in particular, when the decoherence corresponds to the measurement for the observable in the system, the von Neumann entr...