The analysis of the model quantum clocks proposed by Aharonov et al. [Phys. Rev. A 57 (1998) 4130 - quant-ph/9709031] requires considering evanescent components, previously ignored. We also clarify the meaning of the operational time of arrival distribution which had been investigated.
Repeated measurements of a quantum particle to check its presence in a region of space was proposed long ago [G. R. Allcock, Ann. Phys. {bf 53}, 286 (1969)] as a natural way to determine the distribution of times of arrival at the orthogonal subspace
, but the method was discarded because of the quantum Zeno effect: in the limit of very frequent measurements the wave function is reflected and remains in the original subspace. We show that by normalizing the small bits of arriving (removed) norm, an ideal time distribution emerges in correspondence with a classical local-kinetic-energy distribution.
In a recent paper (arXiv:1701.04298 [quant-ph]) Torov{s}, Gro{ss}ardt and Bassi claim that the potential necessary to support a composite particle in a gravitational field must necessarily cancel the relativistic coupling between internal and externa
l degrees of freedom. As such a coupling is responsible for the gravitational redshift measured in numerous experiments, the above statement is clearly incorrect. We identify the simple mistake in the paper responsible for the incorrect claim.
Via the proper-time eigenstates (event states) instead of the proper-mass eigenstates (particle states), free-motion time-of-arrival theory for massive spin-1/2 particles is developed at the level of quantum field theory. The approach is based on a p
osition-momentum dual formalism. Within the framework of field quantization, the total time-of-arrival is the sum of the single event-of-arrival contributions, and contains zero-point quantum fluctuations because the clocks under consideration follow the laws of quantum mechanics.
We apply the recently developed general theory of quantum time distributions arXiv:2010.07575 to find the distribution of arrival times at the detector. Even though the Hamiltonian in the absence of detector is hermitian, the time evolution of the sy
stem before detection involves dealing with a non-hermitian operator obtained from the projection of the hermitian Hamiltonian onto the region in front of the detector. Such a formalism eventually gives rise to a simple and physically sensible analytical expression for the arrival time distribution, for arbitrary wave packet moving in one spatial dimension with negligible distortion.
The experimental realization of successive non-demolition measurements on single microscopic systems brings up the question of ergodicity in Quantum Mechanics (QM). We investigate whether time averages over one realization of a single system are rela
ted to QM averages over an ensemble of similarly prepared systems. We adopt a generalization of von Neumann model of measurement, coupling the system to $N$ probes --with a strength that is at our disposal-- and detecting the latter. The model parallels the procedure followed in experiments on Quantum Electrodynamic cavities. The modification of the probability of the observable eigenvalues due to the coupling to the probes can be computed analytically and the results compare qualitatively well with those obtained numerically by the experimental groups. We find that the problem is not ergodic, except in the case of an eigenstate of the observable being studied.