arXiv subjects

Ramon van Handel

Publications and source records attributed to Ramon van Handel.

65 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2006

A discrete invitation to quantum filtering and feedback control

The engineering and control of devices at the quantum-mechanical level--such as those consisting of small numbers of atoms and photons--is a delicate business. The fundamental uncertainty that is inherently present at this scale manifests itself in the unavoidable presence of noise, making this a novel field of application for stochastic estimation and control theory. In this expository paper we demonstrate estimation and feedback control of quantum mechanical systems in what is essentially a noncommutative version of the binomial model that is popular in mathematical finance. The model is extremely rich and allows a full development of the theory, while remaining completely within the setting of finite-dimensional Hilbert spaces (thus avoiding the technical complications of the continuous theory). We introduce discretized models of an atom in interaction with the electromagnetic field, obtain filtering equations for photon counting and homodyne detection, and solve a stochastic control problem using dynamic programming and Lyapunov function methods.

math.PR↗

arXiv2006

Singular perturbation of quantum stochastic differential equations with coupling through an oscillator mode

We consider a physical system which is coupled indirectly to a Markovian resevoir through an oscillator mode. This is the case, for example, in the usual model of an atomic sample in a leaky optical cavity which is ubiquitous in quantum optics. In the strong coupling limit the oscillator can be eliminated entirely from the model, leaving an effective direct coupling between the system and the resevoir. Here we provide a mathematically rigorous treatment of this limit as a weak limit of the time evolution and observables on a suitably chosen exponential domain in Fock space. The resulting effective model may contain emission and absorption as well as scattering interactions.

math-ph↗

arXiv2006

On the separation principle of quantum control

It is well known that quantum continuous observations and nonlinear filtering can be developed within the framework of the quantum stochastic calculus of Hudson-Parthasarathy. The addition of real-time feedback control has been discussed by many authors, but the foundations of the theory still appear to be relatively undeveloped. Here we introduce the notion of a controlled quantum flow, where feedback is taken into account by allowing the coefficients of the quantum stochastic differential equation to be adapted processes in the observation algebra. We then prove a separation theorem for quantum control: the admissible control that minimizes a given cost function is a memoryless function of the filter, provided that the associated Bellman equation has a sufficiently regular solution. Along the way we obtain results on existence and uniqueness of the solutions of controlled quantum filtering equations and on the innovations problem in the quantum setting.

math-ph↗

arXiv2006

Quantum filtering: a reference probability approach

These notes are intended as an introduction to noncommutative (quantum) filtering theory. An introduction to quantum probability theory is given, focusing on the spectral theorem and the conditional expectation as the least squares estimate, and culminating in the construction of Wiener and Poisson processes on the Fock space. Next we describe the Hudson-Parthasarathy quantum Ito calculus and its use in the modelling of physical systems. Finally, we use a reference probability method to obtain quantum filtering equations, in the Belavkin-Zakai (unnormalized) form, for several system-observation models from quantum optics. The normalized (Belavkin-Kushner-Stratonovich) form is obtained through a noncommutative analogue of the Kallianpur-Striebel formula.

math-ph↗

arXiv2006

An introduction to quantum filtering

This paper provides an introduction to quantum filtering theory. An introduction to quantum probability theory is given, focusing on the spectral theorem and the conditional expectation as a least squares estimate, and culminating in the construction of Wiener and Poisson processes on the Fock space. We describe the quantum Itô calculus and its use in the modelling of physical systems. We use both reference probability and innovations methods to obtain quantum filtering equations for system-probe models from quantum optics.

math.OC↗

arXiv2005

Almost Global Stochastic Stability

We develop a method to prove almost global stability of stochastic differential equations in the sense that almost every initial point (with respect to the Lebesgue measure) is asymptotically attracted to the origin with unit probability. The method can be viewed as a dual to Lyapunov's second method for stochastic differential equations and extends the deterministic result in [A. Rantzer, Syst. Contr. Lett., 42 (2001), pp. 161--168]. The result can also be used in certain cases to find stabilizing controllers for stochastic nonlinear systems using convex optimization. The main technical tool is the theory of stochastic flows of diffeomorphisms.

math.PR↗

arXiv2005

Optimal error tracking via quantum coding and continuous syndrome measurement

We revisit a scenario of continuous quantum error detection proposed by Ahn, Doherty and Landahl [Phys. Rev. A 65, 042301 (2002)] and construct optimal filters for tracking accumulative errors. These filters turn out to be of a canonical form from hybrid control theory; we numerically assess their performance for the bit-flip and five-qubit codes. We show that a tight upper bound on the stochastic decay of encoded fidelity can be computed from the measurement records. Our results provide an informative case study in decoherence suppression with finite-strength measurement.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2005

Stabilizing feedback controls for quantum systems

No quantum measurement can give full information on the state of a quantum system; hence any quantum feedback control problem is neccessarily one with partial observations, and can generally be converted into a completely observed control problem for an appropriate quantum filter as in classical stochastic control theory. Here we study the properties of controlled quantum filtering equations as classical stochastic differential equations. We then develop methods, using a combination of geometric control and classical probabilistic techniques, for global feedback stabilization of a class of quantum filters around a particular eigenstate of the measurement operator.

math-ph↗

arXiv2005

Quantum projection filter for a highly nonlinear model in cavity QED

Both in classical and quantum stochastic control theory a major role is played by the filtering equation, which recursively updates the information state of the system under observation. Unfortunately, the theory is plagued by infinite-dimensionality of the information state which severely limits its practical applicability, except in a few select cases (e.g. the linear Gaussian case.) One solution proposed in classical filtering theory is that of the projection filter. In this scheme, the filter is constrained to evolve in a finite-dimensional family of densities through orthogonal projection on the tangent space with respect to the Fisher metric. Here we apply this approach to the simple but highly nonlinear quantum model of optical phase bistability of a stongly coupled two-level atom in an optical cavity. We observe near-optimal performance of the quantum projection filter, demonstrating the utility of such an approach.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2004

Feedback control of quantum state reduction

Feedback control of quantum mechanical systems must take into account the probabilistic nature of quantum measurement. We formulate quantum feedback control as a problem of stochastic nonlinear control by considering separately a quantum filtering problem and a state feedback control problem for the filter. We explore the use of stochastic Lyapunov techniques for the design of feedback controllers for quantum spin systems and demonstrate the possibility of stabilizing one outcome of a quantum measurement with unit probability.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2004

Deterministic Dicke state preparation with continuous measurement and control

We characterize the long-time projective behavior of the stochastic master equation describing a continuous, collective spin measurement of an atomic ensemble both analytically and numerically. By adding state based feedback, we show that it is possible to prepare highly entangled Dicke states deterministically.

quant-ph↗