Quantum rectifier in a one-dimensional photonic channel

Mascarenhas, Eduardo; Santos, Marcelo F.; Auffèves, Alexia; Gerace, Dario

doi:10.1103/physreva.93.043821

Cited by 33 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Novel correlations among injected near-resonant photons result from the nonlinearity of the qubits, and intriguing interference effects occur because of the 1D confinement of the light. The field has focused on qubits in a local region for which these correlation and interference effects can be used for local quantum information purposes such as single-photon routing [6], rectification of photonic signals [7][8][9][10], and quantum gates [11][12][13]. This regime of waveguide QED involves neglecting delay times: the time taken by photons to travel between qubits is far shorter than all other characteristic times.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Non-Markovian dynamics of a qubit due to single-photon scattering in a waveguide

2018

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We investigate the open dynamics of a qubit due to scattering of a single photon in an infinite or semi-infinite waveguide. Through an exact solution of the time-dependent multi-photon scattering problem, we find the qubitʼs dynamical map. Tools of open quantum systems theory allow us then to show the general features of this map, find the corresponding non-Linbladian master equation, and assess in a rigorous way its non-Markovian nature. The qubit dynamics has distinctive features that, in particular, do not occur in emission processes. Two fundamental sources of non-Markovianity are present: the finite width of the photon wavepacket and the time delay for propagation between the qubit and the end of the semi-infinite waveguide.Clarifying the importance of NM effects and the mechanisms behind their onset is thus pivotal in waveguide QED. At the same time, the theory of OQS [34,35] is currently making major advances, yielding a more accurate understanding of NM effects [36][37][38][39]. Through an approach often inspired by quantum information concepts [40], a number of physical properties such as information back-flow [41] and divisibility [42] have been spotlighted as distinctive manifestations of quantum NM behavior and then used to formulate corresponding quantum non-Markovianity measures. These tools have been effectively applied to dynamics in various scenarios [37,38], including in waveguide QED with regard to emission processes [26, 32] 5 such as a single atom emitting into a semi-infinite waveguide [26].Motivated by the need to quantify NM effects in photon scattering from qubits, we present a case study of a qubit undergoing single-photon scattering in an infinite or semi-infinite waveguide (see figure 1), the latter of which is the basis of the proposed controlled-Z [12] and controlled-NOT [13] gates. We aim at answering two main questions: What are the essential features of the qubit open dynamics during scattering? Is such dynamics NM?The key task is to find the dynamical map (DM) of the qubit in the scattering process, which fully describes the open dynamics and is needed in order to apply OQS tools [38]. A distinctive feature of our open dynamics is that the bath (the waveguide field) is initially in a well-defined single-photon state [43,44]. Toward this task, we tackle in full the time evolution of multiple excitations (in contrast to those limited to the one-excitation sector [43,[45][46][47][48]), a problem that has become important recently [30,31,33,[49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57].Intuitively, one may expect that the dynamics is fully Markovian in the infinite-waveguide case and NM in the semi-infinite case due to the atom-mirror delay time. We show that this expectation is inaccurate in general, mostly because it does not account for a fundamental source of NM behavior namely the wavepacket bandwidth. This NM mechanism is present in an infinite waveguide, while in a semi-infinite waveguide it augments the natural NM behavior coming from the photon delay time.Recently, NM effects in infi...

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Non-Markovian dynamics of a qubit due to single-photon scattering in a waveguide

2018

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“…The last two decades have also seen the emergence of individual quantum systems, such as classical atoms [30,31] or artificial ones, as is the case of quantum dots [32,33], which have been proposed to develop photon rectifiers [34][35][36], transistors [37,38] or even electrically controlled phonon transistors [39]. Moreover, given that quantum systems are always coupled to their environment, in particular to a thermal bath, the question of how heat is transferred through a set of quantum systems in interaction naturally arises [40][41][42] and has led to several studies reporting thermal rectification [43][44][45][46].…”

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confidence: 99%

Quantum Thermal Transistor

et al. 2016

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We demonstrate that a thermal transistor can be made up with a quantum system of three interacting subsystems, coupled to a thermal reservoir each. This thermal transistor is analogous to an electronic bipolar one with the ability to control the thermal currents at the collector and at the emitter with the imposed thermal current at the base. This is achieved by determining the heat fluxes by means of the strong-coupling formalism. For the case of three interacting spins, in which one of them is coupled to the other two, that are not directly coupled, it is shown that high amplification can be obtained in a wide range of energy parameters and temperatures. The proposed quantum transistor could, in principle, be used to develop devices such as a thermal modulator and a thermal amplifier in nanosystems.Managing and harvesting wasted heat in energy processes is becoming a big issue due to the limited energy resources and to the constraints of global warming. Heat can be transported by fluids and radiation, as well as guided in good conductors or devices, such as heat pipes. However, there exists no device that can manage the switching or heat amplification, as is the case in electricity.In the last century, electricity management and its use for logical operations have been realized through the development of two components: the diode [1] and the transistor [2]. By analogy, one can, of course, envisage developing similar thermal devices that could make the thermal control easier. Thus, one of the goals of recent researches in thermal science has been focused on thermal rectifiers, i.e. components which exhibit an asymmetric flux when the temperatures at their ends are inverted. Thermal rectifiers have been designed for phononic [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] and electronic [12,14] thermal transport, which has led to the conception and modeling of thermal transistors [15,16]. In the framework of thermal radiation, rectifiers have been the subject of numerous theoretical works, both in near field [17][18][19] and far field [20][21][22][23][24]. The most efficient of these devices have involved phase change materials, such as thermochrome [25] materials like VO 2 [26,27]. This has led to the design of radiative thermal transistors based on phase change materials too [28,29].The last two decades have also seen the emergence of individual quantum systems, such as classical atoms [30,31] or artificial ones, as is the case of quantum dots [32,33], which have been proposed to develop photon rectifiers [34][35][36], transistors [37,38] or even electrically controlled phonon transistors [39]. Moreover, given that quantum systems are always coupled to their environment, in particular to a thermal bath, the question of how heat is transferred through a set of quantum systems in interaction naturally arises [40][41][42] and has led to several studies reporting thermal rectification [43][44][45][46].The goal of this Letter is to demonstrate that a thermal transistor can be achieved with a quantum system, made of 3 two lev...

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“…They are typically used to route or isolate signals propagating in different directions. Recently, a unidirectional, two-atom device has been identified as potentially useful in quantum electronics [1][2][3][4][5][6][7], building on earlier analyses of distributed atomic systems [8][9][10][11][12]. Transmission through this device depends asymmetrically on the direction of the input field, hence it has been dubbed a quantum diode.…”

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confidence: 99%

Nonreciprocal atomic scattering: A saturable, quantum Yagi-Uda antenna

et al. 2017

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Recent theoretical studies of a pair of atoms in a 1D waveguide find that the system responds asymmetrically to incident fields from opposing directions at low powers. Since there is no explicit time-reversal symmetry breaking elements in the device, this has caused some debate. Here we show that the asymmetry arises from the formation of a quasi-dark-state of the two atoms, which saturates at extremely low power. In this case the nonlinear saturability explicitly breaks the assumptions of the Lorentz reciprocity theorem. Moreover, we show that the statistics of the output field from the driven system can be explained by a very simple stochastic mirror model and that at steady state, the two atoms and the local field are driven to an entangled, tripartite |W state. Because of this, we argue that the device is better understood as a saturable Yagi-Uda antenna, a distributed system of differentially-tuned dipoles that couples asymmetrically to external fields.Nonreciprocal devices, such as isolators, circulators, and gyrators, are important components for optical and microwave technologies. They are typically used to route or isolate signals propagating in different directions. Recently, a unidirectional, two-atom device has been identified as potentially useful in quantum electronics [1][2][3][4][5][6][7], building on earlier analyses of distributed atomic systems [8][9][10][11][12]. Transmission through this device depends asymmetrically on the direction of the input field, hence it has been dubbed a quantum diode.The quantum diode consists of a pair of spatiallyseparated, nondegenerate atoms in a 1D waveguide, shown in Fig. 1a, tuned to discriminate between a coherent field α incident from the left, and a coherent field β incident from the right. Prima facie, this appears to violate reciprocity: the transmission coefficients of a passive, linear, time-reversal-symmetric scatterer should satisfy T ← = T → , so there is an interesting question as to the origin of the transmission asymmetry.Here, we derive a master equation for the driven twoatom system shown in Fig. 1a. We show that the twoatom dark state [7] responsible for the asymmetry arises from entanglement between the matter and the field [10]. This leads to non-reciprocal [13] and incoherent [7] scattering matrices, and we establish the maximum possible 'diode efficiency' [2] of 2/3, for which the steady state is inverted. Finally, we show that a toy-model of a randomly fluctuating mirror replicates the statistics of the scattered field and corresponds exactly to the rate equation model when adiabatically eliminating all coherences.The picture that emerges is that in the steady-state, under cw-driving from one direction, the two atoms become entangled with the local electromagnetic field in a tripartite |W state. In the atomic Hilbert space, this corresponds to a long-lived, probabilistic mixture of the ground and dark states. Since scattering arises from coherence between the ground and bright states, the dark * c.muller2@uq.edu.au † stace@physics.uq.edu...

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Quantum rectifier in a one-dimensional photonic channel

Cited by 33 publications

References 32 publications

Non-Markovian dynamics of a qubit due to single-photon scattering in a waveguide

Non-Markovian dynamics of a qubit due to single-photon scattering in a waveguide

Quantum Thermal Transistor

Nonreciprocal atomic scattering: A saturable, quantum Yagi-Uda antenna

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