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The quantum three-box paradox considers a ball prepared in a superposition of being in any one of three boxes. Bob makes measurements by opening either box 1 or box 2. After performing some unitary operations (shuffling), Alice can infer with certainty that the ball was detected by Bob, regardless of which box he opened, if she detects the ball after opening box 3. The paradox is that the ball would have been found with certainty by Bob in either box if that box had been opened. Resolutions of the paradox include that Bob's measurement cannot be made non-invasively or else that realism cannot be assumed at the quantum level. Here, we strengthen the case for the former argument by constructing macroscopic versions of the paradox. Macroscopic realism implies that the ball is in one of the boxes prior to Bob or Alice opening any boxes. We demonstrate the consistency of the paradox with macroscopic realism, if carefully defined (as weak macroscopic realism, wMR) to apply to the system at the times prior to Alice or Bob opening any boxes but after the unitary operations associated with preparation or shuffling. By solving for the dynamics of the unitary operations and comparing with mixed states, we demonstrate agreement between the predictions of wMR and quantum mechanics: the paradox only manifests if Alice's shuffling combines both local operations (on box 3) and nonlocal operations, on the other boxes. Following previous work, the macroscopic paradox is shown to correspond to a violation of a Leggett–Garg inequality, which implies failure of non-invasive measurability if wMR holds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] The novel quantum effects induced by the free-electron–photons interaction have attracted increasing interest due to their potential applications in ultrafast quantum information processing. Here, we propose a scheme to generate optical cat states based on the quantum interference of multi-path free-electron–photons interactions that take place simultaneously with strong coupling strength. By performing a projection measurement on the electron, the state of light changes significantly from a coherent state into a non-Gaussian state with either Wigner negativity or squeezing property, both possess metrological power to achieve quantum advantage. More importantly, we show that the Wigner negativity oscillates with the coupling strength, and the optical cat states are successfully generated with high fidelity at all the oscillation peaks. This oscillation reveals the quantum interference effect of the multiple quantum pathways in the interaction of the electron with photons, by that various nonclassical states of light are promising to be fast prepared and manipulated. These findings inspire further exploration of emergent quantum phenomena and advanced quantum technologies with free electrons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new time‐domain method for subcycle metrology of quantum electric fields using a combination of a third order nonlinear optical process and homodyne detection with a local oscillator (LO) field is proposed and analyzed. The new method enables isolation of intrinsically weak quantum noise contribution by subtraction of the shot noise of the LO on a pulse‐by‐pulse basis. Together with the centro‐symmetric character of the nonlinearity, this method unlocks novel opportunities toward terahertz and mid‐infrared quantum field metrologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate theoretically the superfluidity of a one-dimensional boson system whose hopping energy is periodically modulated with a zero time average, which results in the suppression of first-order single-particle hopping processes. The dynamics of this Floquet-engineered flat-band system is entirely driven by correlations and described by exotic Hamiltonian and current operators. We employ exact diagonalization and compare our results with those of the conventional, undriven Bose–Hubbard system. We focus on the two main manifestations of superfluidity, the Hess-Fairbank effect and the metastability of supercurrents, with explicit inclusion of an impurity when relevant. Among the novel superfluid features, we highlight the presence of a cat-like ground state, with branches that have opposite crystal momentum but carry the same flux-dependent current, and the essential role of the interference between the collective components of the ground-state wave function. Calculation of the dynamic form factor reveals the presence of an acoustic mode that guarantees superfluidity in the thermodynamic limit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, cat states have been used to heuristically improve the runtime of a classical simulator of quantum circuits based on the diagrammatic ZX -calculus. Here we investigate the use of cat-state injection within the quantum circuit model. We explore a family of cat states, $\left| \mathrm{cat}_m^* \right\rangle$ , and describe circuit gadgets using them to concurrently inject non-stabilizerness (also known as magic) and entanglement into any quantum circuit. We provide numerical evidence that cat-state injection does not lead to speed-up in classical simulation. On the other hand, we show that our gadgets can be used to widen the scope of compelling applications of cat states. Specifically, we show how to leverage them to achieve savings in the number of injected qubits, and also to induce scrambling dynamics in otherwise non-entangling Clifford circuits in a controlled manner.

In this paper, we generalize the shortcuts to adiabacity for the quantum Rabi model by simultaneously modulating its two components, namely, the two-level system and the cavity mode. This will eliminate the counterrotating terms which in turn helps to simulate the Rabi model by the Jaynes-Cummings model without requiring a largely detuned light-matter coupling. We focus on the low-frequency modulations since it is easy to realize them experimentally. The results show that these modulations can significantly shorten the evaluation time, generate much larger entanglement cat states, and robust against imperfection of time evaluation and dissipation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Macroscopic cat states have been widely studied to illustrate fundamental principles of quantum physics as well as their applications in quantum information processing. In this paper, we propose a quantum speed-up method for the creation of cat states in a Kerr nonlinear resonator (KNR) via optimal adiabatic control. By simultaneously adiabatic tuning the cavity-field detuning and driving field strength, the width of the minimum energy gap between the target trajectory and non-adiabatic trajectory can be widened, which allows us to accelerate the evolution along the adiabatic path. Compared with the previous proposal, preparing cat states only by controlling two-photon pumping strength, our method can prepare the target state with a shorter time, a high-fidelity and a large non-classical volume. It is worth noting that the cat state prepared here is also robust against single-photon loss. Moreover, when we consider the KNR with a large initial detuning, our proposal will create a large-size cat state successfully. This proposal for preparing cat states can be implemented in superconducting quantum circuits, which provides a quantum state resource for quantum information encoding and fault-tolerant quantum computing.

In this work, we examine a nonlinear version of the Tavis–Cummings model for two two-level atoms interacting with a single-mode field within a cavity in the context of power-law potentials. We consider the effect of the particle position that depends on the velocity and acceleration, and the coupling parameter is supposed to be time-dependent. We examine the effect of velocity and acceleration on the dynamical behavior of some quantumness measures, namely as von Neumann entropy, concurrence and Mandel parameter. We have found that the entanglement of subsystem states and the photon statistics are largely dependent on the choice of the qubit motion and power-law exponent. The obtained results present potential applications for quantum information and optics with optimal conditions.

We consider a system consisting of magnons in an isotropic ferromagnet interacting with a thermal reservoir and proceed to investigate the dissipative dynamics of the magnons under various physical conditions. We show how bunched, antibunched and coherent magnons can be realized by manipulating the thermal reservoir, a driving field as well as the initial state of the system. Our results show that when the system is initiated with the thermal state, the magnons do not obtain nonclassical properties, while for Schrödinger cat states, the magnons acquire nonclassical characteristics. Besides, the magnon blockade phenomenon is observed after the onset of interaction especially when the system is initialized with the nonclassical states, i.e., the odd Schrödinger cat state. However, the classical magnons prevail in the steady state regime. This work provides theoretical support for the realization of quantum–classical transitions in real magnonic systems and may be fruitful for designing the single-magnon sources. • We investigate the dissipative dynamics of the magnons under various physical conditions. • Antibunched, bunched, and coherent magnons can be realized. • Magnon blockade phenomenon occurs when the system is initialized with the nonclassical states. • Classical magnons prevail at steady state regime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We extend the approach in Ref. 5 [Y.-X. Liu, L. F. Wei and F. Nori, Phys. Rev. A 71 (2005) 063820] for preparing superposition states of a cavity field interacting with a superconducting charge qubit. We study effects of the nonlinearity on the creation of such states. We show that the main contribution of nonlinear effects is to shorten the time necessary to build the superposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cat states are coherent quantum superpositions of macroscopically distinct states and are useful for understanding the boundary between the classical and the quantum world. Due to their macroscopic nature, cat states are difficult to prepare in physical systems. We propose a method to create cat states in one-dimensional quantum walks using delocalized initial states of the walker. Since the quantum walks can be performed on any quantum system, our proposal enables a platform-independent realization of the cat states. We further show that the linear dispersion relation of the effective quantum walk Hamiltonian, which governs the dynamics of the delocalized states, is responsible for the formation of the cat states. We analyze the robustness of these states against environmental interactions and present methods to control and manipulate the cat states in the photonic implementation of quantum walks.

Perfect deterministic amplification of arbitrary quantum states is prohibited by quantum mechanics, but determinism can be achieved by compromising between fidelity and amplification power. We propose a dynamical scheme for deterministically amplifying photonic Schrödinger cat states, which show great promise as a tool for quantum information processing. Our protocol is designed for strongly coupled circuit quantum electrodynamics and utilizes artificial atomic states and external microwave controls to engineer a set of optimal state transfers and achieve high fidelity amplification. We compare analytical results with full simulations of the open, driven Jaynes–Cummings model, using realistic device parameters for state of the art superconducting circuits. Amplification with a fidelity of 0.9 can be achieved for sizable cat states in the presence of cavity and atomic-level decoherence. This tool could be applied to practical continuous-variable information processing for the purification and stabilization of cat states in the presence of photon losses.

We study number distribution and two kinds of multimode higher-order squeezing in the even and odd trio coherent states which are new types of multimode Schro¨dinger cat states. We show that, unlike the trio coherent state, these cat-type states possess oscillatory number distribution and odd-order sum-squeezing. The even and odd trio coherent states are also more favorable for three-mode quadrature-squeezing than the trio coherent state is. Finally, we propose an experimental scheme to realize the cat states employing cavity QED phenomena. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]