Physical systems close to a quantum phase transition exhibit a divergent susceptibility, suggesting that an arbitrarily-high precision may be achieved by exploiting quantum critical systems as probes to estimate a physical parameter. However, such an improvement in sensitivity is counterbalanced by the closing of the energy gap, which implies a critical slowing down and an inevitable growth of the protocol duration. Here, we design different metrological protocols that make use of the superradiant phase transition of the quantum Rabi model, a finite-component system composed of a single two-level atom interacting with a single bosonic mode. We show that, in spite of the critical slowing down, critical quantum optical systems can lead to a quantum-enhanced time-scaling of the quantum Fisher information, and so of the measurement sensitivity.In a system close to a critical point, small variations of physical parameters may lead to dramatic changes in the equilibrium state properties. The possibility of exploiting this sensitivity for metrological purposes is well known, and it has already been applied in classical devices, e.g. in superconducting transition-edge sensor [1]. Besides, the development of quantum metrology has extensively shown that quantum states can outperform their classical counterparts for sensing tasks [2]. Therefore, a question naturally arises: what sensitivity can be achieved using interacting systems close to a quantum-critical point? In the last few years, this question has attracted growing interest and it has been addressed by different methods [3][4][5][6][7][8][9]. These studies may be roughly divided in two classes.The first approach, which we will call the "dynamical" paradigm [5,7], focus on the time evolution induced by a Hamiltonian close to a critical point. In this approach, one prepares a probe system in a suitably chosen state, lets it evolve according to the critical Hamiltonian, and finally measures it. This bear close similarity to the standard interferometric paradigm of quantum metrology [2]. On the other hand, the "static" approach [3, 6] is based on the equilibrium properties of the system. It consists in preparing and measuring the system ground state in the unitary case, or the system steady-state when open quantum systems are considered. In proximity of the phase transition the susceptibility of the equilibrium state diverges, and so it does the achievable measurement precision. Unfortunately, the time required to prepare the equilibrium state diverges as well, both in the unitary [10] and in the driven-dissipative case [11,12], a behavior called critical slowing down. Only very re-cently, it has been demonstrated that for a large class of spin models these two approaches are formally equivalent [9], and that they both make it possible to achieve the optimal scaling limit of precision with respect to system size and to measurement time. These results were obtained considering spin systems that undergo quantum phase transitions in the thermodynamic limit, where the numb...

In this Letter we present experimental results concerning the retrieval of images of absorbing objects immersed in turbid media via differential ghost imaging (DGI) in a backscattering configuration. The method has been applied, for the first time to our knowledge, to the imaging of thin black objects located inside a turbid solution in proximity of its surface. We show that it recovers images with a contrast better than standard noncorrelated direct imaging, but equivalent to noncorrelated diffusive imaging. A simple theoretical model capable of describing the basic optics of DGI in turbid media is proposed.

We address characterization of many-body superradiant systems and establish a fundamental connection between quantum criticality and the possibility of locally estimating the coupling constant, i.e., extracting its value by probing only a portion of the whole system. In particular, we consider Dicke-like superradiant systems made of an ensemble of two-level atoms interacting with a single-mode radiation field at zero effective temperature, and address estimation of the coupling by measurements performed only on radiation. At first, we obtain analytically the quantum Fisher information (QFI) and show that optimal estimation of the coupling may be achieved by tuning the frequency of the radiation field to drive the system toward criticality. The scaling behavior of the QFI at the critical point is obtained explicitly upon exploiting the symplectic formalism for Gaussian states. We then analyze the performances of feasible detection schemes performed only on the radiation subsystem, namely homodyne detection and photon counting, and show that the corresponding Fisher informations (FIs) approach the global QFI in the critical region. We thus conclude that criticality is a twofold resource. On the one hand, global QFI diverges at the critical point, i.e., the coupling may be estimated with the arbitrary precision. On the other hand, the FIs of feasible local measurements (which are generally smaller than the QFI out of the critical region), show the same scaling of the global QFI; i.e., optimal estimation of coupling may be achieved by locally probing the system, despite its strongly interacting nature.

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We address parameter estimation for complex/structured systems and suggest an effective estimation scheme based on continuous-variables quantum probes. In particular, we investigate the use of a single bosonic mode as a probe for Ohmic reservoirs, and obtain the ultimate quantum limits to the precise estimation of their cutoff frequency. We assume the probe prepared in a Gaussian state and determine the optimal working regime, i.e. the conditions for the maximization of the quantum Fisher information in terms of the initial preparation, the reservoir temperature and the interaction time. Upon investigating the Fisher information of feasible measurements we arrive at a remarkable simple result: homodyne detection of canonical variables allows one to achieve the ultimate quantum limit to precision under suitable, mild, conditions. Finally, upon exploiting a perturbative approach, we find the invariant sweet spots of the (tunable) characteristic frequency of the probe, able to drive the probe towards the optimal working regime.