No Arabic abstract
Disordered quantum networks, as those describing light-harvesting complexes, are often characterized by the presence of peripheral ring-like structures, where the excitation is initialized, and inner reaction centers (RC), where the excitation is trapped. The peripheral rings display coherent features: their eigenstates can be separated in the two classes of superradiant and subradiant states. Both are important to optimize transfer efficiency. In the absence of disorder, superradiant states have an enhanced coupling strength to the RC, while the subradiant ones are basically decoupled from it. Static on-site disorder induces a coupling between subradiant and superradiant states, creating an indirect coupling to the RC. The problem of finding the optimal transfer conditions, as a function of both the RC energy and the disorder strength, is very complex even in the simplest network, namely a three-level system. In this paper we analyze such trimeric structure choosing as initial condition a subradiant state, rather than the more common choice of an excitation localized on a site. We show that, while the optimal disorder is of the order of the superradiant coupling, the optimal detuning between the initial state and the RC energy strongly depends on system parameters: when the superradiant coupling is much larger than the energy gap between the superradiant and the subradiant levels, optimal transfer occurs if the RC energy is at resonance with the subradiant initial state, whereas we find an optimal RC energy at resonance with a virtual dressed state when the superradiant coupling is smaller than or comparable with the gap. The presence of dynamical noise, which induces dephasing and decoherence, affects the resonance structure of energy transfer producing an additional incoherent resonance peak, which corresponds to the RC energy being equal to the energy of the superradiant state.
Disordered quantum networks, as those describing light-harvesting complexes, are often characterized by the presence of antenna structures where the light is captured and inner structures (reaction centers) where the excitation is transferred. Antennae often display distinguished coherent features: their eigenstates can be separated, with respect to the transfer of excitation, in the two classes of superradiant and subradiant states. Both are important to optimize transfer efficiency. In absence of disorder superradiant states have an enhanced coupling strength to the RC, while subradiant ones are basically decoupled from it. Disorder induces a coupling between subradiant and superradiant states, thus creating an indirect coupling to the RC. We consider the problem of finding the maximal excitation transfer efficiency as a function of the RC energy and the disorder strength, first in a paradigmatic three-level system and then in a realistic model for the light-harvesting complex of purple bacteria. Specifically, we focus on the case in which the excitation is initially on a subradiant state, showing that the optimal disorder is of the order of the superradiant coupling. We also determine the optimal detuning between the initial state and the RC energy. We show that the efficiency remains high around the optimal detuning in a large energy window, proportional to the superradiant coupling. This allows for the simultaneous optimization of excitation transfer from several initial states with different optimal detuning.
We investigate the emergence of long-range electron hopping mediated by cavity vacuum fields in disordered quantum Hall systems. We show that the counter-rotating (anti-resonant) light-matter interaction produces an effective hopping between disordered eigenstates within the last occupied Landau band. The process involves a number of intermediate states equal to the Landau degeneracy: each of these states consists of a virtual cavity photon and an electron excited in the next Landau band with the same spin. We study such a cavity-mediated hopping mechanism in the dual presence of a random disordered potential and a wall potential near the edges, accounting for both paramagnetic coupling and diamagnetic renormalization. We determine the cavity-mediated scattering rates, showing the impact on both bulk and edge states. The effect for edge states is shown to increase when their energy approaches the disordered bulk band, while for higher energy the edge states become asymptotically free. We determine the scaling properties while increasing the Landau band degeneracy. Consequences on the quantum Hall physics and future perspectives are discussed.
Topological phases of matter have attracted much attention over the years. Motivated by analogy with photonic lattices, here we examine the edge states of a one-dimensional trimer lattice in the phases with and without inversion symmetry protection. In contrast to the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model, we show that the edge states in the inversion-symmetry broken phase of the trimer model turn out to be chiral, i.e., instead of appearing in pairs localized at opposite edges they can appear at a $textit{single}$ edge. Interestingly, these chiral edge states remain robust to large amounts of disorder. In addition, we use the Zak phase to characterize the emergence of degenerate edge states in the inversion-symmetric phase of the trimer model. Furthermore, we capture the essentials of the whole family of trimers through a mapping onto the commensurate off-diagonal Aubry-Andre-Harper model, which allow us to establish a direct connection between chiral edge modes in the two models, including the calculation of Chern numbers. We thus suggest that the chiral edge modes of the trimer lattice have a topological origin inherited from this effective mapping. Also, we find a nontrivial connection between the topological phase transition point in the trimer lattice and the one in its associated two-dimensional parent system, in agreement with results in the context of Thouless pumping in photonic lattices.
We examine energy transport in an ensemble of closed quantum systems driven by stochastic perturbations. One can show that the probability and energy fluxes can be described in terms of quantum advection modes (QAM) associated with the off-diagonal elements of the density matrix. These QAM play the role of Landauer channels in a system with discrete energy spectrum and the eigenfunctions that cannot be described as plane waves. In order to determine the type of correlations that exist between the direction and magnitudes of each QAM and the average direction of energy and probability fluxes we have numerically solved the time-dependent Schr{o}dinger equation describing a single particle trapped in a parabolic potential well which is perturbed by stochastic ripples. The ripples serve as a localized energy source and are offset to one side of the potential well. As the result a non-zero net energy flux flows from one part of the potential well to another across the symmetry center of the potential. We find that some modes exhibit positive correlation with the direction of the energy flow. Other modes, that carry a smaller energy per unit of the probability flux, anticorrelate with the energy flow and thus provide a backflow of the probability. The overall picture of energy transport that emerges from our results is very different from the conventional one based on a system with continuous energy spectrum.
We study the interplay between dephasing, disorder, and openness on transport efficiency in a one-dimensional chain of finite length $N$, and in particular the beneficial or detrimental effect of dephasing on transport. The excitation moves along the chain by coherent nearest-neighbor hopping $Omega$, under the action of static disorder $W$ and dephasing $gamma$. The system is open due to the coupling of the last site with an external acceptor system (sink), where the excitation can be trapped with a rate $Gamma_{rm trap}$, which determines the opening strength. While it is known that dephasing can help transport in the localized regime, here we show that dephasing can enhance energy transfer even in the ballistic regime. Specifically, in the localized regime we recover previous results, where the optimal dephasing is independent of the chain length and proportional to $W$ or $W^2/Omega$. In the ballistic regime, the optimal dephasing decreases as $1/N$ or $1/sqrt{N}$ respectively for weak and moderate static disorder. When focusing on the excitation starting at the beginning of the chain, dephasing can help excitation transfer only above a critical value of disorder $W^{rm cr}$, which strongly depends on the opening strength $Gamma_{rm trap}$. Analytic solutions are obtained for short chains.