arXiv subjects

A. S. Sanz

Publications and source records attributed to A. S. Sanz.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2010

Linear response theory of activated surface diffusion with interacting adsorbates

Activated surface diffusion with interacting adsorbates is analyzed within the Linear Response Theory framework. The so-called interacting single adsorbate model is justified by means of a two-bath model, where one harmonic bath takes into account the interaction with the surface phonons, while the other one describes the surface coverage, this leading to defining a collisional friction. Here, the corresponding theory is applied to simple systems, such as diffusion on flat surfaces and the frustrated translational motion in a harmonic potential. Classical and quantum closed formulas are obtained. Furthermore, a more realistic problem, such as atomic Na diffusion on the corrugated Cu(001) surface, is presented and discussed within the classical context as well as within the framework of Kramer's theory. Quantum corrections to the classical results are also analyzed and discussed.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2010

Generalized Arago-Fresnel laws: The EME-flow-line description

We study experimentally and theoretically the influence of light polarization on the interference patterns behind a diffracting grating. Different states of polarization and configurations are been considered. The experiments are analyzed in terms of electromagnetic energy (EME) flow lines, which can be eventually identified with the paths followed by photons. This gives rise to a novel trajectory interpretation of the Arago-Fresnel laws for polarized light, which we compare with interpretations based on the concept of "which-way" (or "which-slit") information.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2010

Understanding interference experiments with polarized light through photon trajectories

Bohmian mechanics allows to visualize and understand the quantum-mechanical behavior of massive particles in terms of trajectories. As shown by Bialynicki-Birula, Electromagnetism also admits a hydrodynamical formulation when the existence of a wave function for photons (properly defined) is assumed. This formulation thus provides an alternative interpretation of optical phenomena in terms of photon trajectories, whose flow yields a pictorial view of the evolution of the electromagnetic energy density in configuration space. This trajectory-based theoretical framework is considered here to study and analyze the outcome from Young-type diffraction experiments within the context of the Arago-Fresnel laws. More specifically, photon trajectories in the region behind the two slits are obtained in the case where the slits are illuminated by a polarized monochromatic plane wave. Expressions to determine electromagnetic energy flow lines and photon trajectories within this scenario are provided, as well as a procedure to compute them in the particular case of gratings totally transparent inside the slits and completely absorbing outside them. As is shown, the electromagnetic energy flow lines obtained allow to monitor at each point of space the behavior of the electromagnetic energy flow and, therefore, to evaluate the effects caused on it by the presence (right behind each slit) of polarizers with the same or different polarization axes. This leads to a trajectory-based picture of the Arago-Fresnel laws for the interference of polarized light.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2010

Two-bath model for activated surface diffusion of interacting adsorbates

The diffusion and low vibrational motions of adsorbates on surfaces can be well described by a purely stochastic model, the so-called interacting single adsorbate model, for low-moderate coverages (θ\lesssim 0.12). Within this model, the effects of thermal surface phonons and adsorbate-adsorbate collisions are accounted for by two uncorrelated noise functions which arise in a natural way from a two-bath model based on a generalization of the one-bath Caldeira-Leggett Hamiltonian. As an illustration, the model is applied to the diffusion of Na atoms on a Cu(001) surface with different coverages.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2009

Femtosecond response in rare gas matrices doped with NO impurities: A stochastic approach

The femtosecond response of NO-doped rare gas matrices is studied within a stochastic Langevin theoretical framework. As is shown, a simple damped harmonic oscillator model can describe properly the absorption and emission line shapes associated with the NO ($A^2Σ^+ \longleftrightarrow X^2Π$) electronic transitions inside these media as well as the matrix first-solvation shell response in a process with two timescales, finding a fairly good agreement with available experimental data. This approach thus constitutes an alternative and complementary way to analyze the structural relaxation dynamics of systems in liquids and solids, leading to a better understanding of the underlying physics.

physics.chem-ph↗

arXiv2009

Contextuality, decoherence and quantum trajectories

Here we analyze the relationship between quantum contextuality and decoherence in interference experiments with matter particles by means of a simple reduced quantum-trajectory model, which attempts to simulate the behavior of the projections of multi-dimensional, system-plus-environment Bohmian trajectories onto the subspace of the reduced system. This model allows us to understand the crossing of the subsystem trajectories as a combined effect of interference quenching and erasure of ``which-way'' information, which can be of utility to interpret decoherence effects in many-dimensional systems where full Bohmian treatments become prohibitive computationally.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2009

Understanding chemical reactions within a generalized Hamilton-Jacobi framework

Reaction paths and classical and quantum trajectories are studied within a generalized Hamilton-Jacobi framework, which allows to put on equal footing topology and dynamics in chemical reactivity problems. In doing so, we show how high-dimensional problems could be dealt with by means of Caratheodory plots or how trajectory-based quantum-classical analyses reveal unexpected discrepancies. As a working model, we consider the reaction dynamics associated with a Mueller-Brown potential energy surface, where we focus on the relationship between reaction paths and trajectories as well as on reaction probability calculations from classical and quantum trajectories.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2009

Hydrodynamic View of Wave-Packet Interference: Quantum Caves

Wave-packet interference is investigated within the complex quantum Hamilton-Jacobi formalism using a hydrodynamic description. Quantum interference leads to the formation of the topological structure of quantum caves in space-time Argand plots. These caves consist of the vortical and stagnation tubes originating from the isosurfaces of the amplitude of the wave function and its first derivative. Complex quantum trajectories display counterclockwise helical wrapping around the stagnation tubes and hyperbolic deflection near the vortical tubes. The string of alternating stagnation and vortical tubes is sufficient to generate divergent trajectories. Moreover, the average wrapping time for trajectories and the rotational rate of the nodal line in the complex plane can be used to define the lifetime for interference features.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2009

Time-Dependent Density Functional Theory from a Bohmian Perspective

This article has been published as a chapter in "Chemical Reactivity Theory: A Density Functional View", ed. P. K. Chattaraj (CRC Press, New York, 2009), ch. 8, p. 105. In it, an overview of the relationship between time-dependent DFT and quantum hydrodynamics is presented, showing the role that Bohmian mechanics can play within the ab-initio methodology as both a numerical and an interpretative tool.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2009

Evolution of the wave function of an atom hit by a photon in a three-grating interferometer

In 1995, Chapman et al. (1995 Phys. Rev. Lett. 75 2783) showed experimentally that the interference contrast in a three-grating atom interferometer does not vanish under the presence of scattering events with photons, as required by the complementarity principle. In this work we provide an analytical study of this experiment, determining the evolution of the atom wave function along the three-grating Mach-Zehnder interferometer under the assumption that the atom is hit by a photon after passing through the first grating. The consideration of a transverse wave function in momentum representation is essential in this study. As is shown, the number of atoms transmitted through the third grating is given by a simple periodic function of the lateral shift along this grating, both in the absence and in the presence of photon scattering. Moreover, the relative contrast (laser on/laser off) is shown to be a simple analytical function of the ratio d_p/λ_i, where d_p is the distance between atomic paths at the scattering locus and λ_i the scattered photon wavelength. We argue that this dependence, being in agreement with experimental results, can be regarded to show compatibility of the wave and corpuscle properties of atoms.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2009

Electromagnetic energy flow lines as possible paths of photons

Motivated by recent experiments where interference patterns behind a grating are obtained by accumulating single photon events, here we provide an electromagnetic energy flow-line description to explain the emergence of such patterns. We find and discuss an analogy between the equation describing these energy flow lines and the equation of Bohmian trajectories used to describe the motion of massive particles.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2008

Quantum Markovian activated surface diffusion of interacting adsorbates

A quantum Markovian activated atom-surface diffusion model with interacting adsorbates is proposed for the intermediate scattering function, which is shown to be complex-valued and factorizable into a classical-like and a quantum-mechanical factor. Applications to the diffusion of Na atoms on flat (weakly corrugated) and corrugated-Cu(001) surfaces at different coverages and surface temperatures are analyzed. Quantum effects are relevant to diffusion at low surface temperatures and coverages even for relatively heavy particles, such as Na atoms, where transport by tunneling is absent.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2008

A trajectory-based understanding of quantum interference

Interference is one of the most fundamental features which characterizes quantum systems. Here we provide an exhaustive analysis of the interfere dynamics associated with wave-packet superpositions from both the standard quantum-mechanical perspective and the Bohmian one. From this analysis, clear and insightful pictures of the physics involved in this kind of processes are obtained, which are of general validity (i.e., regardless of the type of wave packets considered) in the understanding of more complex cases where interference is crucial (e.g., scattering problems, slit diffraction, quantum control scenarios or, even, multipartite interactions). In particular, we show how problems involving wave-packet interference can be mapped onto problems of wave packets scattered off potential barriers.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2008

Interplay of causticity and vorticality within the complex quantum Hamilton-Jacobi formalism

Interference dynamics is analyzed in the light of the complex quantum Hamilton-Jacobi formalism, using as a working model the collision of two Gaussian wave packets. Though simple, this model nicely shows that interference in quantum scattering processes gives rise to rich dynamics and trajectory topologies in the complex plane, both ruled by two types of singularities: caustics and vortices, where the former are associated with the regime of free wave-packet propagation, and the latter with the collision (interference) process. Furthermore, an unambiguous picture connecting the complex and real frameworks is also provided and discussed.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2008

Should particle trajectories comply with the transverse momentum distribution?

The momentum distributions associated with both the wave function of a particle behind a grating and the corresponding Bohmian trajectories are investigated and compared. Near the grating, it is observed that the former does not depend on the distance from the grating, while the latter changes with this distance. However, as one moves further apart from the grating, in the far field, both distributions become identical.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2008

Stochastic theory of lineshape broadening in quasielastic He atom scattering with interacting adsorbates

The activated surface diffusion of interacting adsorbates is described in terms of the so-called interacting single adsorbate approximation, which is applied to the diffusion of Na atoms on Cu(001) for coverages up to 20% in quasielastic He atom scattering experiments. This approximation essentially consists of solving the standard Langevin equation with two noise sources and frictions: a Gaussian white noise accounting for the friction with the substrate, and a white shot noise characterized by a collisional friction simulating the adsorbate-adsorbate collisions. The broadenings undergone by the quasielastic peak are found to be in very good agreement with the experimental data reported at two surface temperatures 200 and 300 K.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2008

A quantum trajectory description of decoherence

A complete theoretical treatment in many problems relevant to physics, chemistry, and biology requires considering the action of the environment over the system of interest. Usually the environment involves a relatively large number of degrees of freedom, this making the problem numerically intractable from a purely quantum-mechanical point of view. To overcome this drawback, a new class of quantum trajectories is proposed. These trajectories, based on the same grounds as Bohmian ones, are solely associated to the system reduced density matrix, since the evolution of the environment degrees of freedom is not considered explicitly. Within this approach, environment effects come into play through a time-dependent damping factor that appears in the system equations of motion. Apart from their evident computational advantage, this type of trajectories also results very insightful to understand the system decoherence. In particular, here we show the usefulness of these trajectories analyzing decoherence effects in interference phenomena, taking as a working model the well-known double-slit experiment.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2007

Aspects of nonlocality from a quantum trajectory perspective: A WKB approach to Bohmian mechanics

Nonlocality is a property of paramount importance both conceptually and computationally exhibited by quantum systems, which has no classical counterpart. Conceptually, it is important because it implies that the evolving system has information on what happens at any space point and time. Computationally, because such a knowledge makes any calculation intractable as the number of degrees of freedom involved increases beyond a few of them. Bohmian mechanics, with its trajectory-based formalism in real configuration space, can help to better understand nonlocality. A detailed analysis of how nonlocal information is transmitted to quantum trajectories in simple systems (free particle and harmonic oscillator) turns out to be very interesting when compared to analogous systems in classical mechanics.

quant-ph↗