arXiv subjects

Miles P. Blencowe

Publications and source records attributed to Miles P. Blencowe.

10 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2024

Relational superposition measurements with a material quantum ruler

In physics, it is crucial to identify operational measurement procedures to give physical meaning to abstract quantities. There has been significant effort to define time operationally using quantum systems, but the same has not been achieved for space. Developing an operational procedure to obtain information about the location of a quantum system is particularly important for a theory combining general relativity and quantum theory, which cannot rest on the classical notion of spacetime. Here, we take a first step towards this goal, and introduce a model to describe an extended material quantum system working as a position measurement device. Such a "quantum ruler" is composed of $N$ harmonically interacting dipoles and serves as a (quantum) reference system for the position of another quantum system. We show that we can define a quantum measurement procedure corresponding to the "superposition of positions", and that by performing this measurement we can distinguish when the quantum system is in a coherent or incoherent superposition in the position basis. The model is fully relational, because the only meaningful variables are the relative positions between the ruler and the system, and the measurement is expressed in terms of an interaction between the measurement device and the measured system.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2023

Analogue black-white hole solitons in travelling wave parametric amplifiers with superconducting nonlinear asymmetric inductive elements

We show that existing travelling wave parametric amplifier (TWPA) setups, using superconducting nonlinear asymmetric inductive elements (SNAILs), admit soliton solutions that act as analogue event horizons. The SNAIL-TWPA circuit dynamics are described by the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) or modified Korteweg-de Vries (mKdV) equations in the continuum field approximation, depending on the external magnetic flux bias, and validated numerically. The soliton spatially modulates the velocity for weak probes, resulting in the effective realization of analogue black hole and white hole event horizon pairs. The SNAIL external magnetic flux bias tunability facilitates a three-wave mixing process, which enhances the prospects for observing Hawking photon radiation.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Fast high-fidelity charge readout by operating the cavity-embedded Cooper pair transistor in the Kerr bistable regime

Operating the cavity-embedded Cooper pair transistor (cCPT) in the Kerr bistable regime, we demonstrate single-shot resolution between two charge states that are $0.09e$ apart. The measurement is performed with 94$\%$ fidelity in a duration of 3 $μ$s. The drive power at which the measurement is performed corresponds to only 20 intracavity photons on average in the high oscillation amplitude state of the cCPT, which is orders-of-magnitude smaller than that in rf-SETs. We find that the limiting factor for this mode of operation of the cCPT is the spontaneous fluctuation-induced switching between the two metastable oscillation amplitude states. We present empirical data on the variation of the switching dynamics with drive parameters and cCPT DC bias.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2021

The Wigner Current for Open Quantum Systems

We extend the Wigner current vector field (Wigner current) construct to single bosonic mode quantum systems interacting with an environment. In terms of the Wigner function quasiprobability density and associated Wigner current, the open system quantum dynamics can be concisely expressed as a continuity equation. Through the consideration of the harmonic oscillator and additively driven Duffing oscillator in the bistable regime as illustrative system examples, we show how the evolving Wigner current vector field on the system phase space yields useful geometric insights concerning how quantum states decohere away due to interactions with the environment, as well as how they may be stabilized through the counteracting effects of the system anharmonicity (i.e., nonlinearity).

quant-ph↗

arXiv2020

Analogue Gravity on a Superconducting Chip

We describe how analogues of a Hawking evaporating black hole as well as the Unruh effect for an oscillatory, accelerating photodetector in vacuum may be realized using superconducting, microwave circuits that are fashioned out of Josephson tunnel junction and film bulk acoustic resonator elements.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2012

Damping and decoherence of Fock states in a nanomechanical resonator due to two level systems

We numerically investigate the decay of initial quantum Fock states and their superpositions for a mechanical resonator mode coupled to an environment comprising interacting, damped tunneling two level system (TLS) defects. The cases of one, three, and six near resonant, interacting TLS's are considered in turn and it is found that the resonator displays Ohmic bath like decay behavior with as few as three TLS's.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2004

Thermodynamic Equivalence of Certain Ideal Bose and Fermi Gases

We show that the recently discovered thermodynamic equivalence between noninteracting Bose and Fermi gases in two dimensions, and between one-dimensional Bose and Fermi systems with linear dispersion, both in the grand-canonical ensemble, are special cases of a larger class of equivalences of noninteracting systems having an energy-independent single-particle density of states. We also conjecture that the same equivalence will hold in the grand-canonical ensemble for any noninteracting quantum gas with a discrete ladder-type spectrum whenever $σΔ/ N k_{\rm B} T$ is small, where $N$ is the average particle number and $σ$ its standard deviation, $Δ$ is the level spacing, $k_{\rm B}$ is Boltzmann's constant, and $T$ is the temperature.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2001

Partition asymptotics from one-dimensional quantum entropy and energy currents

We give an alternative method to that of Hardy-Ramanujan-Rademacher to derive the leading exponential term in the asymptotic approximation to the partition function p(n,a), defined as the number of decompositions of a positive integer 'n' into integer summands, with each summand appearing at most 'a' times in a given decomposition. The derivation involves mapping to an equivalent physical problem concerning the quantum entropy and energy currents of particles flowing in a one-dimensional channel connecting thermal reservoirs, and which obey Gentile's intermediate statistics with statistical parameter 'a'. The method is also applied to partitions associated with Haldane's fractional exclusion statistics.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2000

Sensitivity of a micromechanical displacement detector based on the radio-frequency single-electron transistor

We investigate the tunneling shot noise limits on the sensitivity of a micromechanical displacement detector based on a metal junction, radio-frequency single-electron transistor (rf-SET). In contrast with the charge sensitivity of the rf-SET electrometer, the displacement sensitivity improves with increasing gate voltage bias and, with a suitably optimized rf-SET, displacement sensitivities of $10^{-6} {\rmÅ}/\sqrt{\rm Hz}$ may be possible.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2000

Universal quantum limits on single channel information, entropy and heat flow

We show that the recently discovered universal upper bound on the thermal conductance of a single channel comprising particles obeying arbitrary fractional statistics is in fact a consequence of a more general universal upper bound, involving the averaged entropy and energy currents of a single channel connecting heat reservoirs with arbitrary temperatures and chemical potentials. The latter upper bound in turn leads, via Holevo's theorem, to a universal (i.e., statistics independent) upper bound on the optimum capacity for classical information transmission down a single, wideband quantum channel.

quant-ph↗