We solve the optimal quantum limit of probing a classical force exactly by a damped oscillator initially prepared in the factorized squeezed state. The memory effects of the thermal bath on the oscillator evolution are investigated. We show that the optimal force sensitivity obtained by the quantum estimation theory approaches to zero for the non-Markovian bath, whereas approaches to a finite non-zero value for the Markovian bath as the energy of the damped oscillator goes to infinity.
The force estimation problem in quantum metrology with an arbitrary non-Markovian Gaussian bath is considered. No assumptions are made on the bath spectrum and coupling strength with the probe. Considering the natural global unitary evolution of both bath and probe and assuming initial global Gaussian states we are able to solve the main issues of any quantum metrological problem: the best achievable precision determined by the quantum Fisher information, the best initial state and the best measurement. Studying the short time behavior and comparing to regular Markovian dynamics we observe an increase of quantum Fisher information. We emphasize that this phenomenon is due to the ability to perform measurements below the correlation time of the bath, activating non-Markovian effects. This brings huge consequences for the sequential preparation-and- measurement scenario as the quantum Fisher information becomes unbounded when the initial probe mean energy goes to infinity, whereas its Markovian counterpart remains bounded by a constant. The long time behavior shows the complexity and potential variety of non-Markovian effects, somewhere between the exponential decay characteristic of Markovian dynamics and the sinusoidal oscillations characteristic of resonant narrow bands.
We study a driven two-state system interacting with a structured environment. We introduce the non-Markovian master equation ruling the system dynamics, and we derive its analytic solution for general reservoir spectra. We compare the non-Markovian dynamics of the Bloch vector for two classes of reservoir spectra: the Ohmic and the Lorentzian reservoir. Finally, we derive the analytic conditions for complete positivity with and without the secular approximation. Interestingly, the complete positivity conditions have a transparent physical interpretation in terms of the characteristic timescales of phase diffusion and relaxation processes.
Time evolution of a harmonic oscillator linearly coupled to a heat bath is compared for three classes of initial states for the bath modes - grand canonical ensemble, number states and coherent states. It is shown that for a wide class of number states the behavior of the oscillator is similar to the case of the equilibrium bath. If the bath modes are initially in coherent states, then the variances of the oscillator coordinate and momentum, as well as its entanglement to the bath, asymptotically approach the same values as for the oscillator at zero temperature and the average coordinate and momentum show a Brownian-like behavior. We derive an exact master equation for the characteristic function of the oscillator valid for arbitrary factorized initial conditions. In the case of the equilibrium bath this equation reduces to an equation of the Hu-Paz-Zhang type, while for the coherent states bath it leads to an exact stochastic master equation with a multiplicative noise.
We analyze the new equation of motion for the damped oscillator. It differs from the standard one by a damping term which is nonlocal in time and hence it gives rise to a system with memory. Both classical and quantum analysis is performed. The characteristic feature of this nonlocal system is that it breaks local composition low for the classical Hamiltonian dynamics and the corresponding quantum propagator.
We study the analytically solvable Ising model of a single qubit system coupled to a spin bath. The purpose of this study is to analyze and elucidate the performance of Markovian and non-Markovian master equations describing the dynamics of the system qubit, in comparison to the exact solution. We find that the time-convolutionless master equation performs particularly well up to fourth order in the system-bath coupling constant, in comparison to the Nakajima-Zwanzig master equation. Markovian approaches fare poorly due to the infinite bath correlation time in this model. A recently proposed post-Markovian master equation performs comparably to the time-convolutionless master equation for a properly chosen memory kernel, and outperforms all the approximation methods considered here at long times. Our findings shed light on the applicability of master equations to the description of reduced system dynamics in the presence of spin-baths.