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in nanoscale systems in the presence of single-electron excitations generated by Lorentzian voltage drives, termed \textit{Levitons}. These excitations allow to realize the analog of quantum optics experiments using electrons instead of photons. Importantly, electrons in condensed matter systems are strongly affected by the presence of different types of non-trivial correlations, with no counterpart in the domain of photonic quantum optics. After providing a short introduction about Levitons in non-interacting systems, we focus on how they operate in the presence of two types of strong electronic correlations in nanoscale systems, such as those arising in the fractional quantum Hall effect or in superconducting systems. Specifically, we consider Levitons in a quantum Hall bar of the fractional quantum Hall effect, pinched by a quantum point contact, where anyons with fractional charge and statistics tunnel between opposite edges. In this case, a Leviton-Leviton interaction can be induced by the strongly correlated background. Concerning the effect of superconducting correlations on Levitons, we show that, in a normal metal system coupled to BCS superconductors, half integer Levitons minimize the excess noise in the Andreev regime. Interestingly, energy-entangled electron states can be realized on-demand in this type of hybrid setups by exploiting crossed Andreev reflection. The results exposed in this review have potential applications in the context of quantum information and computation with single-electron flying qubits., Comment: 19 pages, 9 figures, Special issue in honor of the 80th birthday of D.K. Campbell

A classical queuing theory result states that in a parallel-queue single-server model, the maximum stability region does not depend on the scheduling decision epochs, and in particular is the same for preemptive and non-preemptive systems. We consider here the case in which each of the queues may be connected to the server or not, depending on an exogenous process. In our main result, we show that the maximum stability region now does strongly depend on how the decision epochs are defined. We compare the setting where decisions can be made at any moment in time (the unconstrained setting), to two other settings: decisions are taken either (i) at moments of a departure (non-preemptive scheduling), or (ii) when an exponentially clock rings with rate $\gamma$. We characterise the maximum stability region for the two constrained configurations, allowing us to observe a reduction compared to the unconstrained configuration. In the non-preemptive setting, the maximum stability region is drastically reduced compared to the unconstrained setting and we conclude that a non-preemptive scheduler cannot take opportunistically advantage (in terms of stability) of the random varying connectivity. Instead, for the $\gamma$ decision epochs, we observe that the maximum stability region is monotone in the rate of the decision moments $\gamma$, and that one can be arbitrarily close to the maximum stability region in the unconstrained setting if we choose $\gamma$ large enough. We further show that Serve Longest Connected (SLC) queue is maximum stable in both constrained settings, within the set of policies that select a queue among the connected ones. From a methodological viewpoint, we introduce a novel theoretical tool termed a ``test for fluid limits'' (TFL) that might be of independent interest. TFL is a simple test that, if satisfied by the fluid limit, allows us to conclude for stability.

We study asynchronous federated learning mechanisms with nodes having potentially different computational speeds. In such an environment, each node is allowed to work on models with potential delays and contribute to updates to the central server at its own pace. Existing analyses of such algorithms typically depend on intractable quantities such as the maximum node delay and do not consider the underlying queuing dynamics of the system. In this paper, we propose a non-uniform sampling scheme for the central server that allows for lower delays with better complexity, taking into account the closed Jackson network structure of the associated computational graph. Our experiments clearly show a significant improvement of our method over current state-of-the-art asynchronous algorithms on an image classification problem.

Dynamic control via optimized, piecewise-constant pulses is a common paradigm for open-loop control to implement quantum gates. While numerous methods exist for the synthesis of such controls, there are many open questions regarding the robustness of the resulting control schemes in the presence of model uncertainty; unlike in classical control, there are generally no analytical guarantees on the control performance with respect to inexact modeling of the system. In this paper a new robustness measure based on the differential sensitivity of the gate fidelity error to parametric (structured) uncertainties is introduced, and bounds on the differential sensitivity to parametric uncertainties are used to establish performance guarantees for optimal controllers for a variety of quantum gate types, system sizes, and control implementations. Specifically, it is shown how a maximum allowable perturbation over a set of Hamiltonian uncertainties that guarantees a given fidelity error, can be reliably computed. This measure of robustness is inversely proportional to the upper bound on the differential sensitivity of the fidelity error evaluated under nominal operating conditions. Finally, the results show that the nominal fidelity error and differential sensitivity upper bound are positively correlated across a wide range of problems and control implementations, suggesting that in the high-fidelity control regime, rather than there being a trade-off between fidelity and robustness, higher nominal gate fidelities are positively correlated with increased robustness of the controls in the presence of parametric uncertainties., Comment: Previous version was missing a paragraph (highlighted in blue)

Robust control of quantum systems is an increasingly relevant field of study amidst the second quantum revolution, but there remains a gap between taming quantum physics and robust control in its modern analytical form that culminated in fundamental performance bounds. With certain exceptions such as quantum optical systems that can be modeled as linear stochastic differential equations, quantum systems are not amenable to linear, time-invariant, measurement-based robust control techniques, and thus novel gap-bridging techniques must be developed. This survey is written for control theorists to provide a review of the current state of quantum control and outline the challenges faced in trying to apply modern robust control to quantum systems. We present issues that arise when applying classical robust control theory to quantum systems, typical methods used by quantum physicists to explore such systems and their robustness, as well as a discussion of open problems to be addressed in the field. We focus on general, practical applications and recent work to enable control researchers to contribute to advancing this burgeoning field., Comment: Minor revisions to earlier version

In this paper, we introduce a policy-gradient method for model-based reinforcement learning (RL) that exploits a type of stationary distributions commonly obtained from Markov decision processes (MDPs) in stochastic networks, queueing systems, and statistical mechanics. Specifically, when the stationary distribution of the MDP belongs to an exponential family that is parametrized by policy parameters, we can improve existing policy gradient methods for average-reward RL. Our key identification is a family of gradient estimators, called score-aware gradient estimators (SAGEs), that enable policy gradient estimation without relying on value-function approximation in the aforementioned setting. This contrasts with other common policy-gradient algorithms such as actor-critic methods. We first show that policy-gradient with SAGE locally converges, including in cases when the objective function is nonconvex, presents multiple maximizers, and the state space of the MDP is not finite. Under appropriate assumptions such as starting sufficiently close to a maximizer, the policy under stochastic gradient ascent with SAGE has an overwhelming probability of converging to the associated optimal policy. Other key assumptions are that a local Lyapunov function exists, and a nondegeneracy property of the Hessian of the objective function holds locally around a maximizer. Furthermore, we conduct a numerical comparison between a SAGE-based policy-gradient method and an actor-critic method. We specifically focus on several examples inspired from stochastic networks, queueing systems, and models derived from statistical physics, where parametrizable exponential families are commonplace. Our results demonstrate that a SAGE-based method finds close-to-optimal policies faster than an actor-critic method., Comment: 60 pages, 5 figures. Extended numerical results in section 6 and included sample complexity in section 5

Andreev reflection is a fundamental transport process occurring at the junction between a normal metal and a superconductor (a N-S junction), when an incident electron from the normal side can only be transmitted in the superconductor as a Cooper pair, with the reflection of a hole in the normal metal. As a consequence of the spin singlet nature of the BCS Cooper pairs, the current due to Andreev reflection at a N-S junction is always symmetric in spin. Using a Keldysh Nambu Floquet approach, combining analytical and numerical calculations, we study in details the AC transport at a N-S junction, when the two spin components in the normal metal are driven by different periodic drives. We show that, in the Andreev regime, i.e. when the superconducting gap is much larger than the frequency of the drives, the spin-resolved photo-assisted currents are always equal even if the two drives are different. In addition, we show that in this regime the excess noise depends only on the sum of the periodic drives, and we consider in particular the case of Lorentzian pulses (Levitons). We also show how these properties get modified when going beyond the Andreev regime. Finally we give a simple analytical proof of the special properties of the Andreev regime using an exact mapping to a particular N-N junction., Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures

Anyons are particles intermediate between fermions and bosons, characterized by a nontrivial exchange phase, yielding remarkable braiding statistics. Recent experiments have shown that anyonic braiding has observable consequences on edge transport in the fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE). Here, we study transport signatures of anyonic braiding when the anyons have a finite width. We show that the width of the anyons, even extremely small, can have a tremendous impact on transport properties and braiding signatures. In particular, we find that taking the finite width into account allows us to explain recent experimental results on FQHE at filling factor $2/5$ [Ruelle et al., Phys. Rev. X \textbf{13}, 011031 (2023)]. Our work shows that the finite width of anyons crucially influences setups involving anyonic braiding, especially when the exchange phase is larger than $\pi/2$., Comment: 5 pages + supplemental material

It is shown that the gap that limits the speed of a quantum annealing process can take three salient morphologies: (i) the supersteep gap where both the ground and the first excited eigenenergy level curves have topologically related pairs of nearby inflection points giving both the maximum and the minimum a steep aspect, (ii) the steep gap where only the first excited eigenenergy level curve has a pair of inflection points giving its minimum a steep aspect while the maximum of the ground level does not exhibit inflection points, and (iii) the mild gap that has no related inflection points. Classification of the various singularities betrayed by the inflection points relies on the critical value curves of the quadratic numerical range mapping of the matrix H0+iH1, where H0 is the transverse field Hamiltonian and H1 the problem Hamiltonian. It is shown that the ground level is mapped to the generically smooth boundary of the numerical range, while the first excited level is mapped to an interior non-smooth critical value curve exhibiting swallow tails. The major result is that the position of the swallow tails relative to the boundary allows the supersteep versus steep discrimination, while the absence of swallow tail-boundary interaction characterizes the mild gap. As a corollary of the singularity analysis, the highly structured initial and final Hamiltonians of the Grover search create unstable singularities that break into stable swallow tails under perturbation, with the consequence of invalidating the gap scaling estimates computed around the unstable singularity. Classification of all stable singularities from a global viewpoint requires the Legendrian approach where the energy level curves become Legendrian knots in the contact space. Last but not least, it will be shown that a supersteep swallow tail previews tunneling., Comment: Section 3 has been substantially revised with deeper analysis of the curvature of the singular value curves

Although linear and quadratic discriminant analysis are widely recognized classical methods, they can encounter significant challenges when dealing with non-Gaussian distributions or contaminated datasets. This is primarily due to their reliance on the Gaussian assumption, which lacks robustness. We first explain and review the classical methods to address this limitation and then present a novel approach that overcomes these issues. In this new approach, the model considered is an arbitrary Elliptically Symmetrical (ES) distribution per cluster with its own arbitrary scale parameter. This flexible model allows for potentially diverse and independent samples that may not follow identical distributions. By deriving a new decision rule, we demonstrate that maximum-likelihood parameter estimation and classification are simple, efficient, and robust compared to state-of-the-art methods.

Structured reinforcement learning leverages policies with advantageous properties to reach better performance, particularly in scenarios where exploration poses challenges. We explore this field through the concept of orchestration, where a (small) set of expert policies guides decision-making; the modeling thereof constitutes our first contribution. We then establish value-functions regret bounds for orchestration in the tabular setting by transferring regret-bound results from adversarial settings. We generalize and extend the analysis of natural policy gradient in Agarwal et al. [2021, Section 5.3] to arbitrary adversarial aggregation strategies. We also extend it to the case of estimated advantage functions, providing insights into sample complexity both in expectation and high probability. A key point of our approach lies in its arguably more transparent proofs compared to existing methods. Finally, we present simulations for a stochastic matching toy model.

Control of quantum systems via time-varying external fields optimized to maximize a fidelity measure at a given time is a mainstay in modern quantum control. However, save for specific systems, current analysis techniques for such quantum controllers provide no analytical robustness guarantees. In this letter we provide analytical bounds on the differential sensitivity of the gate fidelity error to structured uncertainties for a closed quantum system controlled by piecewise-constant, optimal control fields. We additionally determine those uncertainty structures that result in this worst-case maximal sensitivity. We then use these differential sensitivity bounds to provide conditions that guarantee performance, quantified by the fidelity error, in the face of parameter uncertainty., Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures

Andreev reflection occurs in a normal metal-superconductor junction, when an electron on the normal side can only be transmitted as a Cooper pair in the superconductor, with the reflection of a hole on the normal side. A similar phenomenon can occur in strongly correlated systems, in particular in the fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE), as the system quasiparticles have a charge $e/m$ different from the electron charge. We study theoretically a setup involving two quantum point contacts (QPC) in the FQHE where Andreev reflection occurs, as charges $e/m$ impinging on the second QPC can only be transmitted as charges $e$, with the reflection of holes of charge $e (1-m)/m $. Using the bosonization formalism, and out-of-equilibrium Keldysh Green function techniques, we provide a full analytical calculation of the current correlations at the outputs of the QPC, both at zero and finite temperature. The ratio between the auto- and cross-correlations of the output currents is a direct manifestation of Andreev reflection. Our results agree with recent experimental observations, and give precious information on the temperature dependence of this ratio.

We consider a two-dimensional electron system in the Laughlin sequence of the fractional quantum Hall regime to investigate the effect of strong correlations on the mutual interaction between two Levitons, single-electron excitations generated by trains of quantized Lorentzian pulses. We focus on two-Leviton states injected in a single period with a time separation $\Delta t$. In the presence of a quantum point contact operating in the weak-backscattering regime, we compute the backscattered charge by means of the Keldysh technique. In the limit of an infinite period and zero temperature, we show that the backscattered charge for a two-Leviton state is not equal to twice the backscattered charge for a single Leviton. We present an interpretation for this result in terms of the wave-packet formalism for Levitons, thus proposing that an effective interaction between the two Levitons is induced by the strongly-correlated background. Finally, we perform numerical calculations in the periodic case by using the Floquet formalism for photo-assisted transport. By varying the system parameters such as pulse width, filling factor and temperature we show that the value of the backscattered charge for two-Leviton states is strongly dependent on the pulse separation, thus opening scenarios where the effective interaction between Levitons can be controllably tuned., Comment: 12 pages, 7 figures, all comments are welcome!

We study charge transport in voltage-biased single-channel junctions involving helical superconductors with finite Cooper pair momentum. For a Josephson junction, the equilibrium current-phase relation shows a superconducting diode effect: the critical current depends on the propagation direction. We formulate a scattering theory for voltage-biased Josephson diodes and show that multiple Andreev reflection processes cause a rich subharmonic structure in the DC current-voltage curve at low temperatures and small voltages due to Doppler shifts of the spectral gap. In the current-biased case, the diode efficiency has maximal rectification efficiency $\eta_0\approx 0.4$ for this model. In the voltage-biased case, however, the rectification efficiency can reach the ideal value $\eta=1$. We also discuss charge transport for NS junctions between a normal metal and a helical superconductor and comment on related models with spin-orbit interactions and magnetic Zeeman fields., Comment: 21 pages, 9 figures. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2307.14698

We analyze the rectification properties of voltage-biased Josephson junctions exhibiting the superconducting diode effect. Taking into account multiple Andreev reflection (MAR) processes in our scattering theory, we consider a short weak link of arbitrary transparency between two superconductors with finite Cooper pair momentum $2q$. In equilibrium, the diode efficiency is bounded from above in this model, with maximal efficiency $\eta_0\approx 0.4$. Out of equilibrium, we find a rich subharmonic structure in the current-voltage curve. For high transparency and low bias voltage $V$, the rectification efficiency $\eta(V)$ approaches the ideal value $\eta=1$ for $q\xi\to 1$ (with coherence length $\xi$)., Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures. All material now contained in Phys. Rev. B 109, 024504 (2024)

We study theoretically the effect of electronic interactions in 1d systems on electron injection using periodic Lorentzian pulses, known as Levitons. We consider specifically a system composed of a metallic single-wall carbon nanotube, described with the Luttinger liquid formalism, a scanning tunneling microscope (STM) tip, and metallic leads. Using the out-of-equilibrium Keldysh Green function formalism, we compute the current and current noise in the system. We prove that the excess noise vanishes when each Leviton injects an integer number of electrons from the STM tip into the nanotube. This extends the concept of minimal injection with Levitons to strongly correlated, uni-dimensional non-chiral systems. We also study the time-dependent current profile, and show how it is the result of interferences between pulses non-trivially reflected at the nanotube-lead interface., Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures

Biasing a three-terminal Josephson junction (TTJ) with symmetrical voltages $0,V,-V$ leads to new kinds of DC currents, namely quartet Josephson currents and phase-dependent multiple Andreev reflection (MAR) currents. We study these currents in a system where a normal diffusive metallic node $N$ is connected to three terminals $S_{0,1,2}$ by barriers of arbitrary transparency. We use the quantum circuit theory to calculate the current in each terminal, including decoherence. In addition to the stationary combination $\varphi_Q=\varphi_1+\varphi_2-2\varphi_0$ of the terminal phases $\varphi_i$, the bias voltage $V$ appears as a new and unusual control variable for a DC Josephson current. A general feature is the sign changes of the current-phase characteristics, manifesting in minima of the quartet ``critical current". Those sign changes can be triggered by the voltage, by the junction transparency or by decoherence. We study the possible separation of quartet currents from MAR currents in different regimes of parameters, including an "funnel" regime with very asymmetric couplings to $S_{0,1,2}$. In the regime of low transparency and asymetric couplings, we provide an analytic perturbative expression for the currents which shows an excellent agreement with the full numerical results.

Photons are emitted or absorbed by a nano-circuit under both equilibrium and non-equilibrium situations. Here, we focus on the non-equilibrium situation arising due to a temperature difference between the leads of a quantum point contact, and study the finite frequency (colored) noise. We explore this delta-$T$ noise in the finite frequency regime for two systems: conventional conductors described by Fermi liquid scattering theory and the fractional quantum Hall system at Laughlin filling fractions, described by the chiral Luttinger liquid formalism. We study the emission noise, its expansion in the temperature difference (focusing on the quadratic component) as well as the excess emission noise defined with respect to a properly chosen equilibrium situation. The behavior of these quantities are markedly different for the fractional quantum Hall system compared to Fermi liquids, signalling the role of strong correlations. We briefly treat the strong backscattering regime of the fractional quantum Hall liquid, where a behavior closer to the Fermi liquid case is observed.

Linear and Quadratic Discriminant Analysis (LDA and QDA) are well-known classical methods but can heavily suffer from non-Gaussian distributions and/or contaminated datasets, mainly because of the underlying Gaussian assumption that is not robust. This paper studies the robustness to scale changes in the data of a new discriminant analysis technique where each data point is drawn by its own arbitrary Elliptically Symmetrical (ES) distribution and its own arbitrary scale parameter. Such a model allows for possibly very heterogeneous, independent but non-identically distributed samples. The new decision rule derived is simple, fast, and robust to scale changes in the data compared to other state-of-the-art method, Comment: in French language

A method to quantify robust performance for situations where structured parameter variations and initial state errors rather than extraneous disturbances are the main performance limiting factors is presented. The approach is based on the error dynamics, the difference between nominal and perturbed dynamics, driven by either the unperturbed or perturbed state, rather than an artificially imposed disturbance. The unperturbed versus perturbed dichotomy can be interpreted as the relative error dynamics scaled by either the unperturbed or perturbed dynamics. The error dynamics driven by unperturbed state has the unique feature of decoupling the effect of physically meaningful uncertainties from an additive disturbance. The perturbed case offers the possibility to side-step Structured Singular Value (SSV) computations. Applications to a lightly damped mechanical system and a slowly dephasing quantum system demonstrate the usefulness of the concepts across a broad range of systems. Finally, a fixed-point algorithm specifically developed for quantum systems with state transitions depending in a nonlinear fashion on uncertainties is proposed as the substitute for classical SSV., Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, and 1 table

We propose a model-based reinforcement learning (RL) approach for noisy time-dependent gate optimization with improved sample complexity over model-free RL. Sample complexity is the number of controller interactions with the physical system. Leveraging an inductive bias, inspired by recent advances in neural ordinary differential equations (ODEs), we use an auto-differentiable ODE parametrised by a learnable Hamiltonian ansatz to represent the model approximating the environment whose time-dependent part, including the control, is fully known. Control alongside Hamiltonian learning of continuous time-independent parameters is addressed through interactions with the system. We demonstrate an order of magnitude advantage in the sample complexity of our method over standard model-free RL in preparing some standard unitary gates with closed and open system dynamics, in realistic numerical experiments incorporating single shot measurements, arbitrary Hilbert space truncations and uncertainty in Hamiltonian parameters. Also, the learned Hamiltonian can be leveraged by existing control methods like GRAPE for further gradient-based optimization with the controllers found by RL as initializations. Our algorithm that we apply on nitrogen vacancy (NV) centers and transmons in this paper is well suited for controlling partially characterised one and two qubit systems., Comment: 14+10 pages, 6+6 figures, revised version

We consider the problem of sequential matching in a stochastic block model with several classes of nodes and generic compatibility constraints. When the probabilities of connections do not scale with the size of the graph, we show that under the NCOND condition, a simple max-weight type policy allows to attain an asymptotically perfect matching while no sequential algorithm attain perfect matching otherwise. The proof relies on a specific Markovian representation of the dynamics associated with Lyapunov techniques.

Recent achievements in quantum control have resulted in advanced techniques for designing controllers for applications in quantum communication, computing, and sensing. However, the susceptibility of such systems to noise and uncertainties necessitates robust controllers that perform effectively under these conditions to realize the full potential of quantum devices. The time-domain log-sensitivity and a recently introduced robustness infidelity measure (RIM) are two means to quantify controller robustness in quantum systems. The former can be found analytically, while the latter requires Monte-Carlo sampling. In this work, the correlation between the log-sensitivity and the RIM for evaluating the robustness of single excitation transfer fidelity in spin chains and rings in the presence of dephasing is investigated. We show that the expected differential sensitivity of the error agrees with the differential sensitivity of the RIM, where the expectation is over the error probability distribution. Statistical analysis also demonstrates that the log-sensitivity and the RIM are linked via the differential sensitivity, and that the differential sensitivity and RIM are highly concordant. This unification of two means (one analytic and one via sampling) to assess controller robustness in a variety of realistic scenarios provides a first step in unifying various tools to model and assess robustness of quantum controllers., Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables, comments welcome

As shown in previous work, in some cases closed quantum systems exhibit a non-conventional trade-off in performance and robustness in the sense that controllers with the highest fidelity can also provide the best robustness to parameter uncertainty. As the dephasing induced by the interaction of the system with the environment guides the evolution to a more classically mixed state, it is worth investigating what effect the introduction of dephasing has on the relationship between performance and robustness. In this paper we analyze the robustness of the fidelity error, as measured by the logarithmic sensitivity function, to dephasing processes. We show that introduction of dephasing as a perturbation to the nominal unitary dynamics requires a modification of the log-sensitivity formulation used to measure robustness about an uncertain parameter with non-zero nominal value used in previous work. We consider controllers optimized for a number of target objectives ranging from fidelity under coherent evolution to fidelity under dephasing dynamics to determine the extent to which optimizing for a specific regime has desirable effects in terms of robustness. Our analysis is based on two independent computations of the log-sensitivity: a statistical Monte Carlo approach and an analytic calculation. We show that despite the different log sensitivity calculations employed in this study, both demonstrate that the log-sensitivity of the fidelity error to dephasing results in a conventional trade-off between performance and robustness., Comment: 11 pages, four figures, and three tables

We theoretically study spin pumping from a ferromagnetic insulator (FI) into a carbon nanotube (CNT). By employing the bosonization method, we formulate the Gilbert damping induced by the FI/CNT junction, which can be measured by ferromagnetic resonance. We show that the increase in the Gilbert damping has a temperature dependence characteristic of a Luttinger liquid and is highly sensitive to the Luttinger parameter of the spin sector for a clean interface. We also discuss the experimental relevance of our findings based on numerical estimates, using realistic parameters., Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures

The design and analysis of controllers to regulate excitation transport in quantum spin rings presents challenges in the application of classical feedback control techniques to synthesize effective control, and generates results in contradiction to the expectations of classical control theory. In this paper, we examine the robustness of controllers designed to optimize the fidelity of an excitation transfer to uncertainty in system and control parameters. We use the logarithmic sensitivity of the fidelity error as the measure of robustness, drawing on the classical control analog of the sensitivity of the tracking error. In our analysis we demonstrate that quantum systems optimized for coherent transport demonstrate significantly different correlation between error and the log-sensitivity depending on whether the controller is optimized for readout at an exact time T or over a time-window about T., Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables

We propose a device where Electronic Quantum Optics (EQO) is combined with a BCS superconductor -- a reservoir of Cooper pairs. With spin polarized wave guides, this version of the Cooper pair beam splitter is driven by an AC drive, and observables such as period-averaged noise are computed using a Keldysh-Nambu-Floquet formalism. When the (low frequency) voltage applied to the superconductor consists of a train of periodic Lorentzian pulses and the Andreev regime is specified (large gap limit), this allows to propose an on-demand source of non-local energy-entangled states (which we characterise with perturbation theory) operating in the AC regime. We study realistic experimental parameters for our device in order to examine its feasibility.

We consider a non-chiral Luttinger liquid in the presence of a backscattering Hamiltonian which has an extended range. Right/left moving fermions at a given location can thus be converted as left/right moving fermions at a different location, within a specific range. We perform a momentum shell renormalization group treatment which gives the evolution of the relative degrees of freedom of this Hamiltonian contribution under the renormalization flow, and we study a few realistic examples of this extended backscattering Hamiltonian. We find that, for repulsive Coulomb interaction in the Luttinger liquid, any such Hamiltonian contribution evolves into a delta-like scalar potential upon renormalization to a zero temperature cutoff. On the opposite, for attractive couplings, the amplitude of this kinetic Hamiltonian is suppressed, rendering the junction fully transparent. As the renormalization procedure may have to be stopped because of experimental constraints such as finite temperature, we predict the actual spatial shape of the kinetic Hamiltonian at different stages of the renormalization procedure, as a function of the position and the Luttinger interaction parameter, and show that it undergoes structural changes. This renormalized kinetic Hamiltonian has thus to be used as an input for the perturbative calculation of the current, for which we provide analytic expressions in imaginary time. We discuss the experimental relevance of this work by looking at one-dimensional systems consisting of carbon nanotubes or semiconductor nanowires., Comment: 27 pages, 8 figures

We study photo-assisted transport for the edge states of a two dimensional electron gas in the fractional quantum Hall regime, pinched by a single quantum point contact. We provide a general expression of the photo-assisted current using a Keldysh-Floquet approach, when the AC drive is applied either directly to the edge states, or when it modulates the tunneling amplitude at the quantum point contact. Strikingly, for a simple cosine modulation of the tunneling amplitude, the phase shift of the second harmonic of the photoassisted current is directly related to the scaling dimension of the quasiparticle operators describing the fractional excitations. As the scaling dimension is intimately related to the statistics, our proposal of a gate modulation of the backscattered current provides a diagnosis of the statistics of Laughlin quasiparticles using a simple quantum point contact geometry., Comment: 18 pages, 4 figures

Bode integrals of sensitivity and sensitivity-like functions along with complementary sensitivity and complementary sensitivity-like functions are conventionally used for describing performance limitations of a feedback control system. In this paper, we investigate the Bode integral and evaluate what happens when a fractional order Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) controller is used in a feedback control system. We extend our analysis to when fractal PID controllers are applied to irrational systems. We split this into two cases: when the sequence of infinitely many right half plane open-loop poles doesn't have any limit points and when it does have a limit point. In both cases, we prove that the structure of the Bode Integral is similar to the classical version under certain conditions of convergence. We also provide a sufficient condition for the controller to lower the Bode sensitivity integral., Comment: 13 pages, 7 figures

A strictly time-domain formulation of the log-sensitivity of the error signal to structured plant uncertainty is presented and analyzed through simple but representative classical and quantum systems. Results demonstrate that across a wide range of physical systems, maximization of performance (minimization of the error signal) asymptotically or at a specific time comes at the cost of increased log-sensitivity, implying a time-domain constraint analogous to the frequency-domain identity $\mathbf{S(s) + T(s) = I}$. While of limited value in classical problems based on asymptotic stabilization or tracking, such a time-domain formulation is valuable in assessing the reduced robustness cost concomitant with high-fidelity quantum control schemes predicated on time-based performance measures., Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures, 1 table. in IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control. Scheduled for publication Feb 2024

Clustering based on the random walk operator has been proven effective for undirected graphs, but its generalization to directed graphs (digraphs) is much more challenging. Although the random walk operator is well-defined for digraphs, in most cases such graphs are not strongly connected, and hence the associated random walks are not irreducible, which is a crucial property for clustering that exists naturally in the undirected setting. To remedy this, the usual workaround is to either naively symmetrize the adjacency matrix or to replace the natural random walk operator by the teleporting random walk operator, but this can lead to the loss of valuable information carried by edge directionality. In this paper, we introduce a new clustering framework, the Parametrized Random Walk Diffusion Kernel Clustering (P-RWDKC), which is suitable for handling both directed and undirected graphs. Our framework is based on the diffusion geometry and the generalized spectral clustering framework. Accordingly, we propose an algorithm that automatically reveals the cluster structure at a given scale, by considering the random walk dynamics associated with a parametrized kernel operator, and by estimating its critical diffusion time. Experiments on $K$-NN graphs constructed from real-world datasets and real-world graphs show that our clustering approach performs well in all tested cases, and outperforms existing approaches in most of them.

Development of robust quantum control has been challenging and there are numerous obstacles to applying classical robust control to quantum system including bilinearity, marginal stability, state preparation errors, nonlinear figures of merit. The requirement of marginal stability, while not satisfied for closed quantum systems, can be satisfied for open quantum systems where Lindbladian behavior leads to non-unitary evolution, and allows for nonzero classical stability margins, but it remains difficult to extract physical insight when classical robust control tools are applied to these systems. We consider a straightforward example of the entanglement between two qubits dissipatively coupled to a lossy cavity and analyze it using the classical stability margin and structured perturbations. We attempt, where possible, to extract physical insight from these analyses. Our aim is to highlight where classical robust control can assist in the analysis of quantum systems and identify areas where more work needs to be done to develop specific methods for quantum robust control., Comment: Accepted to IEEE CDC 2022

Robustness of quantum operations or controls is important to build reliable quantum devices. The robustness-infidelity measure (RIM$_p$) is introduced to statistically quantify the robustness and fidelity of a controller as the p-order Wasserstein distance between the fidelity distribution of the controller under any uncertainty and an ideal fidelity distribution. The RIM$_p$ is the p-th root of the p-th raw moment of the infidelity distribution. Using a metrization argument, we justify why RIM$_1$ (the average infidelity) suffices as a practical robustness measure. Based on the RIM$_p$, an algorithmic robustness-infidelity measure (ARIM) is developed to quantify the expected robustness and fidelity of controllers found by a control algorithm. The utility of the RIM and ARIM is demonstrated by considering the problem of robust control of spin-$\tfrac{1}{2}$ networks using energy landscape shaping subject to Hamiltonian uncertainty. The robustness and fidelity of individual control solutions as well as the expected robustness and fidelity of controllers found by different popular quantum control algorithms are characterized. For algorithm comparisons, stochastic and non-stochastic optimization objectives are considered, with the goal of effective RIM optimization in the latter. Although high fidelity and robustness are often conflicting objectives, some high fidelity, robust controllers can usually be found, irrespective of the choice of the quantum control algorithm. However, for noisy optimization objectives, adaptive sequential decision making approaches such as reinforcement learning have a cost advantage compared to standard control algorithms and, in contrast, the infidelities obtained are more consistent with higher RIM values for low noise levels., Comment: 13+11 pages, 6+10 figures, revised version, accepted by Phys. Rev. A

The fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE) is known to host anyons, quasiparticles whose statistics is intermediate between bosonic and fermionic. We show here that Hong-Ou-Mandel (HOM) interferences between excitations created by narrow voltage pulses on the edge states of a FQHE system at low temperature show a direct signature of anyonic statistics. The width of the HOM dip is universally fixed by the thermal time scale, independently of the intrinsic width of the excited fractional wavepackets. This universal width can be related to the anyonic braiding of the incoming excitations with thermal fluctuations created at the quantum point contact. We show that this effect could be realistically observed with periodic trains of narrow voltage pulses using current experimental techniques.

The current fluctuations due to a temperature bias, i.e. the delta-$T$ noise, allow one to access properties of strongly interacting systems which cannot be addressed by the usual voltage-induced noise. In this work, we study the full delta-$T$ noise between two different fractional quantum Hall edge states, with filling factors $(\nu_L,\nu_R)$ in the Laughlin sequence, coupled through a quantum point contact and connected to two reservoirs at different temperatures. We are able to solve exactly the problem for all couplings and for any set of temperatures in the specific case of an hybrid junction $(1/3,1)$. Moreover, we derive a universal analytical expression which connects the delta-$T$ noise to the equilibrium one valid for all generic pairs $(\nu_L,\nu_R)$ up to the first order in the temperature mismatch. We expect that the linear term can be accessible in nowadays experimental set-ups. We describe the two opposite coupling regimes focusing on the strong one which correspond to a non-trivial situation. Our analysis on delta-$T$ noise allows us to better understand the transport properties of strongly interacting systems and to move toward more involved investigation concerning the statistics and scaling dimension of their emergent excitations., Comment: 16 pages, 4 figures

The analysis of sound and vibrations is often performed in the frequency domain, implying the assumption of steady-state behaviour and time-harmonic excitation. External excitations, however, may be transient rather than time-harmonic, requiring time-domain analysis. Some material properties, e.g.\ often used to represent for damping treatments, are still described in the frequency domain, which complicates simulation in time. In this paper, we present a method for the linearization of finite element models with nonlinear frequency dependencies. The linearization relies on the rational approximation of the finite element matrices by the AAA method. We introduce the Extended AAA method, which is classical AAA combined with a degree two polynomial term to capture the second order behaviour of the models. A filtering step is added for removing unstable poles.

The third data release by the Gaia mission of the European Space (DR3) is the first release to provide the community with a large sample of observations for more than 150 thousand Solar System objects, including asteroids and natural planetary satellites. The release contains astrometry (over 23 million epochs) and photometry, along with average reflectance spectra of 60518 asteroids and osculating elements. We present an overview of the procedures that have been implemented over several years of development and tests to process Solar System data at the level of accuracy that Gaia can reach. We illustrate the data properties and potential with some practical examples. In order to allow the users of DR3 to best exploit the data, we explain the assumptions and approaches followed in the implementation of the data processing pipeline for Solar System processing, and their effects in terms of data filtering, optimisation, and performances. We then test the data quality by analysing post-fit residuals to adjusted orbits, the capacity of detecting subtle dynamical effects (wobbling due to satellites or shape and Yarkovsky acceleration), and to reproduce known properties of asteroid photometry (phase curves and rotational light curves). The DR3 astrometric accuracy is a clear improvement over the data published in DR2, which concerned a very limited sample of asteroids. The performance of the data reduction is met, and is illustrated by the capacity of detecting milliarcsecond-level wobbling of the asteroid photocentre that is due to satellite or shape effects and contributes to Yarkovsky effect measurements. The third data release can in terms of data completeness and accuracy be considered the first full-scale realisation of the Solar System survey by Gaia., Comment: Gaia DR3 article

Transactions involving multiple blockchains are implemented by cross-chain protocols. These protocols are based on smart contracts, programs that run on blockchains, executed by a network of computers. Because smart contracts can automatically transfer ownership of cryptocurrencies, electronic securities, and other valuable assets among untrusting parties, verifying the runtime correctness of smart contracts is a problem of compelling practical interest. Such verification is challenging since smart contract execution is time-sensitive, and the clocks on different blockchains may not be perfectly synchronized. This paper describes a method for runtime monitoring of blockchain executions. First, we propose a generalized runtime verification technique for verifying partially synchronous distributed computations for the metric temporal logic (MTL) by exploiting bounded-skew clock synchronization. Second, we introduce a progression-based formula rewriting scheme for monitoring \MTL specifications which employ SMT solving techniques and report experimental results., Comment: 2022 IEEE 42nd International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS)

We investigate photo assisted electronic transport in a normal-metal/BCS-superconductor junction with a microscopic Hamiltonian approach, for several types of periodic voltage drives applied on the normal-metal side. The time-dependent current and the photo-assisted noise are computed to all orders of the tunneling Hamiltonian using a Keldysh-Nambu-Floquet approach. An excess noise analysis allows one to determine to what extent pure electronic excitations with a small number of electrons per period can be generated by the different drives. When the superconducting gap is small compared to the drive frequency, the junction behaves like a normal-metal junction and minimal excess noise is reached for Lorentzian voltage drives carrying an integer charge (levitons). In the opposite regime of a large-gap, the excess noise vanishes for half-quantized levitons, giving rise to the perfect transmission of a Cooper pair on the superconducting side. This microscopic approach also allows us to address the intermediate regime, when the drive frequency is comparable to the gap, allowing us to study the non-trivial interplay between Andreev reflection and quasiparticle-transfer processes. Our analysis also shows the appearance of Tien-Gordon-type relations connecting the current and noise in the AC-driven junction to their DC counterpart, which we investigate in details. Finally, the possibility to build a reliable on-demand source of Cooper pairs with this setup is examined using realistic experimental parameters.

Spectral clustering is a popular approach for clustering undirected graphs, but its extension to directed graphs (digraphs) is much more challenging. A typical workaround is to naively symmetrize the adjacency matrix of the directed graph, which can however lead to discarding valuable information carried by edge directionality. In this paper, we present a generalized spectral clustering framework that can address both directed and undirected graphs. Our approach is based on the spectral relaxation of a new functional that we introduce as the generalized Dirichlet energy of a graph function, with respect to an arbitrary positive regularizing measure on the graph edges. We also propose a practical parametrization of the regularizing measure constructed from the iterated powers of the natural random walk on the graph. We present theoretical arguments to explain the efficiency of our framework in the challenging setting of unbalanced classes. Experiments using directed K-NN graphs constructed from real datasets show that our graph partitioning method performs consistently well in all cases, while outperforming existing approaches in most of them.

Linear and Quadratic Discriminant Analysis are well-known classical methods but can heavily suffer from non-Gaussian distributions and/or contaminated datasets, mainly because of the underlying Gaussian assumption that is not robust. To fill this gap, this paper presents a new robust discriminant analysis where each data point is drawn by its own arbitrary Elliptically Symmetrical (ES) distribution and its own arbitrary scale parameter. Such a model allows for possibly very heterogeneous, independent but non-identically distributed samples. After deriving a new decision rule, it is shown that maximum-likelihood parameter estimation and classification are very simple, fast and robust compared to state-of-the-art methods., Comment: ICASSP conference paper, 5 pages

We prove a large deviation principle for the greedy exploration of configuration models, building on a time-discretized version of the method proposed by Bermolen et al. and Brightwell et al. for jointly constructing a random graph from a given degree sequence and its exploration. The proof of this result follows the general strategy to study large deviations of processes proposed by Feng and Kurtz, based on the convergence of non-linear semigroups. We provide an intuitive interpretation of the LD cost function using Cramer's theorem for the average of random variables with appropriate distribution, depending on the degree distribution of explored nodes. The rate function can be expressed in a closed-form formula, and the large deviations trajectories can be obtained through explicit associated optimization problems. We then deduce large deviations results for the size of the independent set constructed by the algorithm. As a particular case, we analyze these results for d-regular graphs., Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures