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Characterizing the nature of many-body localization transitions (MBLTs) and their potential critical behaviors has remained a challenging problem. In this work, we study the dynamics of the displacement, quantifying the spread of the radial probability distribution in the Fock space, for systems with MBLTs, and perform a finite-size scaling analysis. We find that the scaling exponents satisfy theoretical bounds, and can identify universality classes. We show that reliable extrapolations to the thermodynamic limit for the MBLT induced by quasiperiodic fields is possible even for computationally accessible system sizes. Our work highlights that the displacement is a valuable tool for studying MBLTs, as relevant to ongoing experimental efforts.

Isolated interacting quantum systems generally thermalize, yet there are several counterexamples for the breakdown of ergodicity, such as many-body localization and quantum scars. Recently, ergodicity breaking has been observed in systems subjected to linear potentials, termed Stark many-body localization. This phenomenon is closely associated with Hilbert-space fragmentation, characterized by a strong dependence of dynamics on initial conditions. Here, we experimentally explore initial-state dependent dynamics using a ladder-type superconducting processor with up to 24 qubits, which enables precise control of the qubit frequency and initial state preparation. In systems with linear potentials, we observe distinct non-equilibrium dynamics for initial states with the same quantum numbers and energy, but with varying domain wall numbers. This distinction becomes increasingly pronounced as the system size grows, in contrast with disordered interacting systems. Our results provide convincing experimental evidence of the fragmentation in Stark systems, enriching our understanding of the weak breakdown of ergodicity., Comment: main text: 7 pages, 4 figures; supplementary: 13 pages, 14 figures

Characterizing the nature of hydrodynamical transport properties in quantum dynamics provides valuable insights into the fundamental understanding of exotic non-equilibrium phases of matter. Experimentally simulating infinite-temperature transport on large-scale complex quantum systems is of considerable interest. Here, using a controllable and coherent superconducting quantum simulator, we experimentally realize the analog quantum circuit, which can efficiently prepare the Haar-random states, and probe spin transport at infinite temperature. We observe diffusive spin transport during the unitary evolution of the ladder-type quantum simulator with ergodic dynamics. Moreover, we explore the transport properties of the systems subjected to strong disorder or a tilted potential, revealing signatures of anomalous subdiffusion in accompany with the breakdown of thermalization. Our work demonstrates a scalable method of probing infinite-temperature spin transport on analog quantum simulators, which paves the way to study other intriguing out-of-equilibrium phenomena from the perspective of transport., Comment: Main text: 13 pages, 5 figures; Supplementary: 17 pages, 16 figures, 1 table

Efficient preparation of spin-squeezed states is important for quantum-enhanced metrology. Current protocols for generating strong spin squeezing rely on either high dimensionality or long-range interactions. A key challenge is how to generate considerable spin squeezing in one-dimensional systems with only nearest-neighbor interactions. Here, we develop variational spin-squeezing algorithms to solve this problem. We consider both digital and analog quantum circuits for these variational algorithms. After the closed optimization loop of the variational spin-squeezing algorithms, the generated squeezing can be comparable to the strongest squeezing created from two-axis twisting. By analyzing the experimental imperfections, the variational spin-squeezing algorithms proposed in this work are feasible in recent developed noisy intermediate-scale quantum computers.

We study the resonance and dynamics of a qubit exposed to a strong aperiodic bichromatic field by using a periodic counter-rotating hybridized rotating wave (CHRW) Hamiltonian, which is derived from the original Hamiltonian with the unitary transformations under a reasonable approximation and enables the application of the Floquet theory. It is found that the consistency between the CHRW results and numerically exact generalized-Floquet-theory (GFT) results in the valid regime of the former while the widely used rotating-wave approximation (RWA) breaks down. We illustrate that the resonance exhibits band structure and the Bloch-Siegert shifts induced by the counter-rotating couplings of the bichromatic field become notable at the multiphoton resonance band. In addition, the CHRW method is found to have a great advantage of efficiency over the GFT approach particularly in the low beat-frequency case where the latter converges very slowly. The present CHRW method provides a highly efficient way to calculate the resonance frequency incorporating the Bloch-Siegert shift and provides insights into the effects of the counter-rotating couplings of the bichromatic field in the strong-driving regimes., Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures

The variational preparation of complex quantum states using the quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) is of fundamental interest, and becomes a promising application of quantum computers. Here, we systematically study the performance of QAOA for preparing ground states of target Hamiltonians near the critical points of their quantum phase transitions, and generating Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) states. We reveal that the performance of QAOA is related to the translational invariance of the target Hamiltonian: Without the translational symmetry, for instance due to the open boundary condition (OBC) or randomness in the system, the QAOA becomes less efficient. We then propose a generalized QAOA assisted by the parameterized resource Hamiltonian (PRH-QAOA), to achieve a better performance. In addition, based on the PRH-QAOA, we design a low-depth quantum circuit beyond one-dimensional geometry, to generate GHZ states with perfect fidelity. The experimental realization of the proposed scheme for generating GHZ states on Rydberg-dressed atoms is discussed. Our work paves the way for performing QAOA on programmable quantum processors without translational symmetry, especially for recently developed two-dimensional quantum processors with OBC., Comment: 21 pages, 15 figures

We investigate the steering dissipative dynamics of a two-level system (qubit) by means of the modulation of an assisted tunneling degree of freedom which is described by a quantum-oscillator spin-boson model. Our results reveal that the decoherence rate of the qubit can be significantly suppressed and simultaneously its quality factor is enhanced. Moreover, the modulated dynamical susceptibility exhibits a multi-peak feature which is indicative of the underlying structure and measurable in experiment. Our findings demonstrate that the interplay between the combined degrees of freedom and the qubit is crucial for reducing the dissipation of qubit and expanding the coherent regime of quantum operation much large. The strategy might be used to fight against deterioration of quantum coherence in quantum information processing., Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures

We investigate the effects of counterrotating terms on geometric phase and its relation to the resonance of the Rabi model. We apply the unitary transformation with a single parameter to the Rabi model and obtain the transformed Hamiltonian involving multiple harmonic terms. By combining the counter-rotating-hybridized rotating-wave method with time-dependent perturbation theory, we solve systematically time evolution operator and then obtain the geometric phase of the two-level system. Our results are beyond adiabatic approximation and rotating-wave approximation (RWA). Higher-order harmonic resonance happens when driving frequency is equal to higher-order subharmonic of the Rabi frequency. In comparison with numerically exact results, our calculated results are accurate over a wide range of parameters space, especially in higher-order harmonic resonance regimes. In these regimes we demonstrate geometric phases change dramatically while those of the RWA are smooth. The RWA is thoroughly invalid even if the driving strength is extremely weak. We find it is the higher-order harmonic terms that play an important role on the cyclic state and demonstrate the characters of geometric phase in higher-order harmonic resonance regime. We also present analytical formalism of the change rate of geometric phase and quasienergies, which agree well with numerically exact ones even in the strong driving case. The developed method can be applied to explore the dynamics of strongly driven qubits and physical properties of higher-order harmonic processes., Comment: 22 pages, 5 figures

Recent numerical and experimental works have revealed a disorder-free many-body localization (MBL) in an interacting system subjecting to a linear potential, known as the Stark MBL. The conventional MBL, induced by disorder, has been widely studied by using quantum simulations based on superconducting circuits. Here, we consider the Stark MBL in two types of superconducting circuits, i.e., the 1D array of superconducting qubits, and the circuit where non-local interactions between qubits are mediated by a resonator bus. We calculate the entanglement entropy and participate entropy of the highly-excited eigenstates, and obtain the lower bound of the critical linear potential $\gamma_{c}$, using the finite-size scaling collapse. Moreover, we study the non-equilibrium properties of the Stark MBL. In particular, we observe an anomalous relaxation of the imbalance, dominated by the power-law decay $t^{-\xi}$. The exponent $\xi$ satisfies $\xi\propto|\gamma-\gamma_{c}|^{\nu}$ when $\gamma<\gamma_{c}$, and vanishes for $\gamma\geq \gamma_{c}$, which can be employed to estimate the $\gamma_{c}$. Our work indicates that superconducting circuits are a promising platform for investigating the critical properties of the Stark MBL transition., Comment: 9+7 pages, 10+7 figures, 2 tables

The development of modern technology extends human presence beyond cislunar space and onto other planets, which presents an urgent need for high-capacity, long-distance and interplanetary communication. Communication using photons as carriers has a high channel capacity, but the optical diffraction limit in deep space leads to inevitable huge geometric loss, setting an insurmountable transmission distance for existing optical communication technologies. Here, we propose and experimentally demonstrate a photon-inter-correlation optical communication (PICOC) against an ultra-high channel loss. We treat light as a stream of photons, and retrieve the additional information of internal correlation and photon statistics globally from extremely weak pulse sequences. We successfully manage to build high-fidelity communication channel with a loss up to 160dB by separating a single-photon signal embedded in a noise ten times higher. With only commercially available telescopes, PICOC allows establishment of communication links from Mars to Earth communication using a milliwatt laser, and from the edge of the solar system to Earth using a few watts laser., Comment: Main Text: 19 pages, 5 figures, 1 table; Supplemental Material: 15 pages, 10 figures

Multipartite entangled states are significant resources for both quantum information processing and quantum metrology. In particular, non-Gaussian entangled states are predicted to achieve a higher sensitivity of precision measurements than Gaussian states. On the basis of metrological sensitivity, the conventional linear Ramsey squeezing parameter (RSP) efficiently characterises the Gaussian entangled atomic states but fails for much wider classes of highly sensitive non-Gaussian states. These complex non-Gaussian entangled states can be classified by the nonlinear squeezing parameter (NLSP), as a generalisation of the RSP with respect to nonlinear observables, and identified via the Fisher information. However, the NLSP has never been measured experimentally. Using a 19-qubit programmable superconducting processor, here we report the characterisation of multiparticle entangled states generated during its nonlinear dynamics. First, selecting 10 qubits, we measure the RSP and the NLSP by single-shot readouts of collective spin operators in several different directions. Then, by extracting the Fisher information of the time-evolved state of all 19 qubits, we observe a large metrological gain of 9.89$^{+0.28}_{-0.29}$ dB over the standard quantum limit, indicating a high level of multiparticle entanglement for quantum-enhanced phase sensitivity. Benefiting from high-fidelity full controls and addressable single-shot readouts, the superconducting processor with interconnected qubits provides an ideal platform for engineering and benchmarking non-Gaussian entangled states that are useful for quantum-enhanced metrology., Comment: 13+12 pages, 10+2 figures

We experimentally study the ergodic dynamics of a 1D array of 12 superconducting qubits with a transverse field, and identify the regimes of strong and weak thermalization with different initial states. We observe convergence of the local observable to its thermal expectation value in the strong-thermalizaion regime. For weak thermalization, the dynamics of local observable exhibits an oscillation around the thermal value, which can only be attained by the time average. We also demonstrate that the entanglement entropy and concurrence can characterize the regimes of strong and weak thermalization. Our work provides an essential step towards a generic understanding of thermalization in quantum systems., Comment: 6+6 pages, 4+8 figures

Understanding various phenomena in non-equilibrium dynamics of closed quantum many-body systems, such as quantum thermalization, information scrambling, and nonergodic dynamics, is a crucial for modern physics. Using a ladder-type superconducting quantum processor, we perform analog quantum simulations of both the $XX$ ladder and one-dimensional (1D) $XX$ model. By measuring the dynamics of local observables, entanglement entropy and tripartite mutual information, we signal quantum thermalization and information scrambling in the $XX$ ladder. In contrast, we show that the $XX$ chain, as free fermions on a 1D lattice, fails to thermalize, and local information does not scramble in the integrable channel. Our experiments reveal ergodicity and scrambling in the controllable qubit ladder, and opens the door to further investigations on the thermodynamics and chaos in quantum many-body systems., Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, and supplementary materials with 10 pages, 3 tables and 14 figures

We present an interesting dynamical temporal localization of a strongly driven two-level system (TLS), a plateau with quantized oscillation, by an analytical and transparent method, the counter-rotating-hybridized rotating-wave (CHRW) method. This approach, which is based on unitary transformations with a single parameter, treats the rotating and counter-rotating terms on equal footing. In the unitarily transformed representation, we find that it is the multiple-harmonic terms shown in the transformed Hamiltonian that make a crucial contribution to the generation of the exotic plateau phenomenon. By comparing the results of the numerically exact calculation and several other methods, we show that the CHRW results obtained by analytical formalism involving the collective effects of multiple harmonics are in good agreement with the numerical results, which illustrates not only the general tendency of the dynamical evolution of strongly driven TLS, but also the interesting phenomena of plateaus. The developed CHRW method reveals two kinds of plateau patterns: zigzag plateau and armchair plateau. The plateau phenomenon has a periodical pattern whose frequency is double the driving frequency, and possesses quantized oscillations the number of which has a certain, precise value. Besides, fast oscillation is produced on every plateau which is determined by the relevant driving parameters of the TLS. Our main results are as follows: (i) in the large-amplitude oscillatory case, it turns out that the collective effects of all even harmonics contribute to the generation of zigzag plateau with quantized oscillation; (ii) in the small-amplitude oscillatory case, the dynamics of the coherent destruction of tunneling under strong driving is exactly exhibited by including the odd-harmonic effect, namely, armchair plateau possessing a two-stair structure rather than the complete destruction., Comment: Accepted by Phys.Rev. A

Quantum information scrambling under many-body dynamics is of fundamental interest. The tripartite mutual information can quantify the scrambling via its negative value. Here, we first study the quench dynamics of tripartite mutual information in a non-integrable Ising model where the strong and weak thermalization are observed with different initial states. We numerically show that the fastest scrambling can occur when the energy density of the chosen initial state possesses the maximum density of states. We then present an experimental protocol for observing weak and strong thermalization in a superconducting qubit array. Based on the protocol, the relation between scrambling and thermalization revealed in this work can be directly verified by superconducting quantum simulations.

We study the origin of the symmetry of the fluorescence spectrum from the two-level system subjected to a low-frequency periodic modulation and a near-resonant high-frequency monochromatic excitation by using the analytical and numerical methods based on the Floquet theory. We find that the fundamental origin of symmetry of the spectrum can be attributed to the presence of the generalized parity of the Floquet states, which depends on the driving parameters. The absence of the generalized parity can lead to the asymmetry of the spectrum. Based on the generalized parity, the conditions for the symmetry and asymmetry of the spectrum can be derived, which succeeds in predicting symmetry and asymmetry of the spectrum for the harmonic, biharmonic, and multiharmonic modulations. Moreover, we find that the secular approximation widely used in the analytical calculation may lead to artifact symmetry of the spectrum that vanishes when such approximation is avoided. The present study provides a significant perspective on the origin of the symmetry of the spectrum., Comment: 6 figures

Graphene with honeycomb structure, being critically important in understanding physics of matter, exhibits exceptionally unusual half-integer quantum Hall effect and unconventional electronic spectrum with quantum relativistic phenomena. Particularly, graphene-like structure can be used for realizing topological insulator which inspires an intrinsic topological protection mechanism with strong immunity for maintaining coherence of quantum information. These various peculiar physics arise from the unique properties of Dirac cones which show high hole degeneracy, massless charge carriers and linear intersection of bands. Experimental observation of Dirac cones conventionally focuses on the energy-momentum space with bulk measurement. Recently, the wave function and band structure have been mapped into the real-space in photonic system, and made flexible control possible. Here, we demonstrate a direct observation of the movement of Dirac cones from single-photon dynamics in photonic graphene under different biaxial strains. Sharing the same spirit of wave-particle nature in quantum mechanics, we identify the movement of Dirac cones by dynamically detecting the edge modes and extracting the diffusing distance of the packets with accumulation and statistics on individual single-particle registrations. Our results of observing movement of Dirac cones from single-photon dynamics, together with the method of direct observation in real space by mapping the band structure defined in momentum space, pave the way to understand a variety of artificial structures in quantum regime., Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, Comments welcome

Non-equilibrium quantum many-body systems, which are difficult to study via classical computation, have attracted wide interest. Quantum simulation can provide insights into these problems. Here, using a programmable quantum simulator with 16 all-to-all connected superconducting qubits, we investigate the dynamical phase transition in the Lipkin-Meshkov-Glick model with a quenched transverse field. Clear signatures of the dynamical phase transition, merging different concepts of dynamical criticality, are observed by measuring the non-equilibrium order parameter, nonlocal correlations, and the Loschmidt echo. Moreover, near the dynamical critical point, we obtain the optimal spin squeezing of $-7.0\pm 0.8$ decibels, showing multipartite entanglement useful for measurements with precision five-fold beyond the standard quantum limit. Based on the capability of entangling qubits simultaneously and the accurate single-shot readout of multi-qubit states, this superconducting quantum simulator can be used to study other problems in non-equilibrium quantum many-body systems., Comment: 13 pages, 13 figures

We study the quench dynamics of entanglement spectra in the Kitaev chain with variable-range pairing quantified by power-law decay rate $\alpha$. Considering the post-quench Hamiltonians with flat bands, we demonstrate that the presence of entanglement-spectrum crossings during its dynamics is able to characterize the topological phase transitions (TPTs) in both short-range ($\alpha$ > 1) or long-range ($\alpha$ < 1) sector. Properties of entanglement-spectrum dynamics are revealed for the quench protocols in the long-range sector or with $\alpha$ as the quench parameter. In particular, when the lowest upper-half entanglement-spectrum value of the initial Hamiltonian is smaller than the final one, the TPTs can also be diagnosed by the difference between the lowest two upper-half entanglement-spectrum values if the halfway winding number is not equal to that of the initial Hamiltonian. Moreover, we discuss the stability of characterizing the TPTs via entanglement-spectrum crossings against energy dispersion in the long-range model., Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures

Many-body localization (MBL) describes a quantum phase where an isolated interacting system subject to sufficient disorder displays non-ergodic behavior, evading thermal equilibrium that occurs under its own dynamics. Previously, the thermalization-MBL transition has been largely characterized with the growth of disorder. Here, we explore a new axis, reporting on an energy resolved MBL transition using a 19-qubit programmable superconducting processor, which enables precise control and flexibility of both disorder strength and initial state preparations. We observe that the onset of localization occurs at different disorder strengths, with distinguishable energy scales, by measuring time-evolved observables and many-body wavefunctions related quantities. Our results open avenues for the experimental exploration of many-body mobility edges in MBL systems, whose existence is widely debated due to system size finiteness, and where exact simulations in classical computers become unfeasible., Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures + supplementary information

We develop a systematic variational coherent-squeezed-state expansion for the ground state of the quantum Rabi model, which includes an additional squeezing effect with comparisons to previous coherent-state approach. For finite large ratio between the atomic and field frequency, the essential feature of the ground-state wave function in the super-radiant phase appears, which has a structure of two delocalized wake packets. The single-peaked wave function with one coherent-squeezed state works well even around the critical regime, exhibiting the advantage over the coherent-state method. As the coupling increases to form strong correlations physics in the vicinity of phase transition, we develop an improved wave function with a structure of two Gaussian wave packets, which is a linear superposition of two coherent-squeezed state. The ground-state energy and the average photon number agree well with numerical ones even in the strong-correlated regimes, exhibiting a substantial improvement over the coherent-state expansion. The advantage of the coherent-squeezed-state expansion lies in the inclusion of the second coherent-squeezed state and the additional squeezed deformation of the wave function, providing a useful tool for multi-modes spin-boson coupling systems of greater complexity., Comment: 6pages,4 figures

The out-of-time-order correlators (OTOCs) is used to study the quantum phase transitions (QPTs) between the normal phase and the superradiant phase in the Rabi and few-body Dicke models with large frequency ratio of theatomic level splitting to the single-mode electromagnetic radiation field frequency. The focus is on the OTOC thermally averaged with infinite temperature, which is an experimentally feasible quantity. It is shown that thecritical points can be identified by long-time averaging of the OTOC via observing its local minimum behavior. More importantly, the scaling laws of the OTOC for QPTs are revealed by studying the experimentally accessible conditions with finite frequency ratio and finite number of atoms in the studied models. The critical exponents extracted from the scaling laws of OTOC indicate that the QPTs in the Rabi and Dicke models belong to the same universality class., Comment: 9 pages, 10 figures, v3: published version added; v2: supplemental material added, more results added

We investigate the diagonal entropy for ground states of the extended Kitaev chains with extensive pairing and hopping terms. The systems contain rich topological phases equivalently represented by topological invariant winding numbers and Majorana zero modes. Both the finite size scaling law and block scaling law of the diagonal entropy are studied, which indicates that the diagonal entropy demonstrates volume effect. The parameter of volume term is regarded as the diagonal entropy density, which can identify the critical points of symmetry-protected topological phase transitions efficiently in the studied models, even for those with higher winding numbers. The formulation of block scaling law and the capability of diagonal entropy density in detecting topological phase transitions are independent of the chosen bases. In order to manifest the advantage of diagonal entropy, we also calculate the global entanglement, which can not show clear signatures of the topological phase transitions. This work provides a new quantum-informatic approach to characterize the feature of the topologically ordered states and may motivate a deep understanding of the quantum coherence and diagonal entropy in various condensed matter systems.

We investigate the dynamics of a driven two-level system (classical Rabi model) using the counter-rotating-hybridized rotating wave method (CHRW), which is a simple method based on a unitary transformation with a parameter $\xi$. This approach is beyond the traditional rotating-wave approximation (Rabi-RWA) and more importantly, remains the RWA form with a renormalized tunneling strength and a modified driving strength. The reformulated rotating wave method not only possesses the same mathematical simplicity as the Rabi-RWA but also allows us to explore the effects of counter-rotating (CR) components. We focus on the properties of off-resonance cases for which the Rabi-RWA method breaks down. After comparing the results of different RWA schemes and those of the numerically exact method in a wide range of parameter regime, we show that the CHRW method gives the accurate driven dynamics which is in good agreement with the numerical method. Moreover, the other RWA methods appear as various limiting cases of the CHRW method. The CHRW method reveals the effects of the CR terms clearly by means of coherent destruction of tunneling and Bloch-Siegert shift. Our main results are as follows: (i) the dynamics of the coherent destruction of tunneling is explicitly given and its dependence on $\Delta$ is clarified, which is quantitatively in good agreement with the exact results; (ii) the CR modulated Rabi frequency and the Bloch-Siegert shift are analytically calculated, which is the same as the exact results up to fourth order; (iii) the validity of parameter regions of different RWA methods are given and the comparison of dynamics of these methods are shown. Since the CHRW approach is mathematically simple as well as tractable and physically clear, it may be extended to some complicated problems where it is difficult to do a numerical study., Comment: 28pages,6 figures. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1602.04413

We investigate the diagonal entropy(DE) of the ground state for quantum many-body systems, including the XY model and the Ising model with next nearest neighbour interactions. We focus on the DE of a subsystem of L continuous spins. We show that the DE in many-body systems, regardless of integrability, can be represented as a volume term plus a logarithmic correction and a constant offset. Quantum phase transition points can be explicitly identified by the three coefficients thereof. Besides, by combining entanglement entropy and the relative entropy of quantum coherence, as two celebrated representatives of quantumness, we simply obtain the DE, which naturally has the potential to reveal the information of quantumness. More importantly, the DE is concerning only the diagonal form of the ground state reduced density matrix, making it feasible to measure in real experiments, and therefore it has immediate applications in demonstrating quantum supremacy on state-of-the-art quantum simulators., Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures

We put forward a scheme based on reservoir engineering to protect quantum coherence from leaking to bath, in which we intensely disturb the Lorentzian bath by N harmonic oscillators. We show that the intense disturbance changes the spectrum of the bath and reduces the qubit-bath interaction. Furthermore, we give the exact time evolution with the Lorentzian spectrum by a master equation, and calculate the concurrence and survival probability of the qubits to demonstrate the effect of the intense bath disturbance on the protection of coherence. Meanwhile, we reveal the dynamic effects of counter-rotating interaction on the qubits as compared to the results of the rotating wave approximation., Comment: 19 pages, 8 figures; Accepted by Quantum Inf. Process

Traditional approach on quantum Zeno effect (QZE) and quantum anti-Zeno effect (QAZE) in open quantum systems (implicitly) assumes the bath (environment) state returning to its original state after each instantaneous projective measurement on the system and thus ignores the cross-correlations of the bath operators between different Zeno intervals. However, this assumption is not generally true, especially for a bath with a considerably non-negligible memory effect and for a system repeatedly projected into an initial general superposition state. We find that in stark contrast to the result of a constant value found in the traditional approach, the scaled average decay rate in unit Zeno interval of the survival probability is generally time-dependent or has an oscillatory behavior. In the case of strong bath correlation, the transition between the QZE and QAZE depends sensitively on the number of measurements $N$. For a fixed $N$, a QZE region predicted by the tradition approach may be in fact already in the QAZE region. We illustrate our findings using an exactly solvable open qubit system model with a Lorentzian bath spectral density, which is directly related to realistic circuit cavity quantum electrodynamics systems. Thus the results and dynamics presented here can be verified by current superconducting circuit technology., Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures; Accepted by Phys. Rev. A

We construct an artificial U(1) gauge field in the cold atom system to form a monopole along with vortices. It is supposed that the cold atoms are confined on a spherical surface, and two sets of identical laser beams in the opposite propagating directions shine on two sides of the sphere. Arbitrary Chern number CN, proportional to the quantized magnetic flux, can be obtained by selecting proper laser modes. This construction meets the condition of Chern's theorem, so that the vortices of the atom wave function will emerge on the sphere, whose winding number equals CN. It is found that a geometric symmetry is broken spontaneously for odd CN, which corresponds to a topology-induced quantum phase transition. In particular for CN=1, the ground state of the cold atoms are double-degenerate and can be applied to make a stable qubit. Since the ground-state degeneracy is protected by topology-induced symmetry breaking against dissipation, the proposed topological structure has vast potential in quantum storage.

We study the quantum Zeno effect (QZE) and quantum anti-Zeno effect (QAZE) of a two-level system interacting with an environment of harmonic oscillators, the spin-boson model. By applying a numerically exact method based on matrix product states, the previously obtained picture on the influence of counter-rotating terms has to be modified: For physical bath initial states, the transition from QZE to QAZE with increasing measurement interval is only absent at weak coupling, while present at strong coupling. Furthermore, we find that the transition occurs always for the widely used bare bath initial state. Within a more realistic measurement scheme where only the qubit is projectively measured, the above scenario for the bare bath initial state remains qualitatively unchanged, apart from accelerated decay for intermediate measurement intervals., Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures

We investigate the bias-modulated dynamics of a strongly driven two-level system using the counter-rotating-hybridized rotating-wave (CHRW) method. This CHRW method treats the driving field and the bias on equal footing by a unitary transformation with two parameters $\xi$ and $\zeta$, and is nonperturbative in driving strength, tunneling amplitude or bias. In addition, this CHRW method is beyond the traditional rotating-wave approximation (Rabi-RWA) and yet by properly choosing the two parameters $\xi$ and $\zeta$, the transformed Hamiltonian takes the RWA form with a renormalized energy splitting and a renormalized driving strength. The reformulated CHRW method possesses the same mathematical simplicity as the Rabi-RWA approach and thus allows us to calculate analytically the dynamics and explore explicitly the effect of the bias. We show that the CHRW method gives the accurate driven dynamics for a wide range of parameters as compared to the numerically exact results. When energy scales of the driving are comparable to the intrinsic energy scale of the two-level systems, the counter-rotating interactions and static bias profoundly influence the generalized Rabi frequency. In this regime, where ordinary perturbation approaches fail, the CHRW works very well and efficiently. We also demonstrate the dynamics of the system in the strong-driving and off-resonance cases for which the Rabi-RWA method breaks down but the CHRW method remains valid. We obtain analytical expressions for the generalized Rabi frequency and bias-modulated Bloch-Siegert shift as functions of the bias, tunneling and driving field parameters. The CHRW approach is a mathematically simple and physically clear method. It can be applied to treat some complicated problems for which a numerical study is difficult to perform., Comment: 15pages,7figures, Phys. Rev. A accepted

We present a theoretical formalism for resonance fluorescence radiating from a two-level system (TLS) driven by any periodic driving and coupled to multiple reservoirs. The formalism is derived analytically based on the combination of Floquet theory and Born-Markov master equation. The formalism allows us to calculate the spectrum when the Floquet states and quasienergies are analytically or numerically solved for simple or complicated driving fields. We can systematically explore the spectral features by implementing the present formalism. To exemplify this theory, we apply the unified formalism to comprehensively study a generic model that a harmonically driven TLS is simultaneously coupled to a radiative reservoir and a dephasing reservoir. We demonstrate that the significant features of the fluorescence spectra, the driving-induced asymmetry and the dephasing-induced asymmetry, can be attributed to the violation of detailed balance condition, and explained in terms of the driving-related transition quantities between Floquet-states and their steady populations. In addition, we find the distinguished features of the fluorescence spectra under the biharmonic and multiharmonic driving fields in contrast with that of the harmonic driving case. In the case of the biharmonic driving, we find that the spectra is significantly different from the result of the rotating-wave approximation (RWA) under the multiple resonance conditions. By the three concrete applications, we illustrate that the present formalism provides a routine tool for comprehensively exploring the fluorescence spectrum of periodically strongly driven TLSs., Comment: 22 pages, 13 figures

We apply a simple analytical method based on a unitary transformation to calculate the Bloch-Siegert (BS) shift over the entire driving-strength range. In quantitative comparison with the numerically exact BS shift obtained by Floquet formalism as well as the previous BS results, we confirm that our calculated results are not only accurate in the weak-driving regime but also correct in strong-driving limit. In the intermediate strong-driving regime, the calculated values of the BS shift are nearly the same as the exact ones. It turns out that our calculation for the BS shift is beyond perturbation. Meanwhile, we demonstrate the signatures caused by the BS shift by monitoring the excited-state population and the probe-pump spectrum under the experiment accessible conditions. In particular, we find that when the driving frequency is fixed at the transition frequency of the system, the lineshape of the probe-pump spectrum becomes asymmetric with the increase of the driving strength, which may be verified experimentally., Comment: 5 figures

By means of a unitary transformation, we propose an ansatz to study quantum phase transitions in the ground state of a two-qubit system interacting with a dissipative reservoir. First, the ground state phase diagram is analyzed in the presence of the Ohmic and sub-Ohmic bath using an analytic ground state wave function which takes into account the competition between intrasite tunneling and intersite correlation. The quantum critical point is determined as the transition point from non-degenerate to degenerate ground state and our calculated critical coupling strength $\alpha_c$ agrees with that from the numerical renormalization group method. Moreover, by computing the entanglement entropy between the qubits and the bath as well as the qubit-qubit correlation function in the ground state, we explore the nature of the quantum phase transition between the delocalized and localized states., Comment: 20 pages, 10 figures

An analytic ground state is proposed for the unbiased spin-boson Hamiltonian, which is non-Gaussian and beyond the Silbey-Harris ground state with lower ground state energy. The infrared catastrophe in Ohmic and sub-Ohmic bosonic bath plays an important role in determining the degeneracy of the ground state. We show that the infrared divergence associated with the displacement of the nonadiabatic modes in bath may be removed from the proposed ground state for the coupling $\alpha<\alpha_c$. Then $\alpha_c$ is the quantum critical point of a transition from non-degenerate to degenerate ground state and our calculated $\alpha_c$ agrees with previous numerical results., Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures

The dynamics of a qubit under the decoherence of a two level fluctuator (TLF) in addition to its coupling to a bosonic bath is investigated theoretically. Two different methods are applied and compared for this problem. One is a perturbation method based on a unitary transformation. With the merit of our unitary transformation, non-adiabatic effect can be taken into account efficiently. And the other one is the numerically exact method, namely the quasi-adiabatic path-integral (QUAPI) propagator technique. We find that the analytical method works well for a wide parameter range and show good agreement with QUAPI. On the other hand, The enhancement and the reduction of quantum decoherence of the qubit is checked with varying bath temperature $T$ and TLF-bath coupling., Comment: 5 figures

The dynamics of a qubit in a structured environment is investigated theoretically. One point of view of the model is the spin-boson model with a Lorentz shaped spectral density. An alternative view is a qubit coupled to harmonic oscillator (HO), which in turn coupled to a Ohmic environment. Two different methods are applied and compared for this problem. One is a perturbation method based on a unitary transformation. Since the transformed hamiltonian is of rotating wave approximation (RWA) form, we call it the transformed rotating wave approximation (TRWA) method. And the other one is the numerically exact method of the quasi-adiabatic propagator path-integral (QUAPI) method. TRWA method can be applied from the first point of view. And the QUAPI method can applied from both points of views. We find that from the 1st point of view QUAPI only works well for large $\Gamma$. Since the memory time is too long for the practical evaluation of QUAPI when $\Gamma$ is small. We call this treatment as QUAPI1. And from the 2nd point of view, QUAPI works well for small $\Gamma$, since the non-adiabatic effect become more important as $\Gamma$ increases, one need smaller time-step and more steps to obtain accurate result which also quickly runs out the computational resources. This treatment is called QUAPI2. We find that the TRWA method works well for the whole parameter range of $\Gamma$ and show good agreement with QUAPI1 and QUAPI2. On the other hand, we find that the decoherence of the qubit can be reduced with increasing coupling between HO and bath. This result may be relevant to the design of quantum computer., Comment: 5 figures

We investigate the spontaneous emission spectrum of a qubit in a lossy resonant cavity. We use neither the rotating-wave approximation nor the Markov approximation. The qubit-cavity coupling strength is varied from weak, to strong, even to lower bound of the ultra-strong. For the weak-coupling case, the spontaneous emission spectrum of the qubit is a single peak, with its location depending on the spectral density of the qubit environment. Increasing the qubit-cavity coupling increases the asymmetry (the positions about the qubit energy spacing and heights of the two peaks) of the two spontaneous emission peaks (which are related to the vacuum Rabi splitting) more. Explicitly, for a qubit in a low-frequency intrinsic bath, the height asymmetry of the splitting peaks becomes larger, when the qubit-cavity coupling strength is increased. However, for a qubit in an Ohmic bath, the height asymmetry of the spectral peaks is inverted from the same case of the low-frequency bath, when the qubit is strongly coupled to the cavity. Increasing the qubit-cavity coupling to the lower bound of the ultra-strong regime, the height asymmetry of the left and right peak heights are inverted, which is consistent with the same case of low-frequency bath, only relatively weak. Therefore, our results explicitly show how the height asymmetry in the spontaneous emission spectrum peaks depends not only on the qubit-cavity coupling, but also on the type of intrinsic noise experienced by the qubit., Comment: 10pages, 5 figures

In this paper, we systematically study the spontaneous decay phenomenon of a two-level system under the influences of both its environment and continuous measurements. In order to clarify some well-established conclusions about the quantum Zeno effect (QZE) and the quantum anti-Zeno effect (QAZE), we do not use the rotating wave approximation (RWA) in obtaining an effective Hamiltonian. We examine various spectral distributions by making use of our present approach in comparison with other approaches. It is found that with respect to a bare excited state even without the RWA, the QAZE can still happen for some cases, e.g., the interacting spectra of hydrogen. But for a physical excited state, which is a renormalized dressed state of the atomic state, the QAZE disappears and only the QZE remains. These discoveries inevitably show a transition from the QZE to the QAZE as the measurement interval changes., Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures

The dynamics of a qubit in two different environments are investigated theoretically. The first environment is a two level system coupled to a bosonic bath. And the second one is a damped harmonic oscillator. Based on a unitary transformation, we find that the decoherence of the qubit can be reduced with increasing temperature $T$ in the first case, which agree with the results in [Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 120401], whereas, it can not be reduced with $T$ in the second case. In both cases, the qubit dynamics are changed substantially as the coupling increases or finite detuning appears., Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures

For studying the dynamics of a two-level system coupled to a quantum oscillator we have presented an analytical approach, the transformed rotating-wave approximation, which takes into account the effect of the counter-rotating terms but still keeps the simple mathematical structure of the ordinary rotating-wave approximation. We have calculated the energy levels of ground and lower-lying excited states, as well as the time-dependent quantum dynamics. It is obvious that the approach is quite simple and can be easily extended to more complicated situation. Besides, the results are compared with the numerically exact ones to show that for weak and intermediate coupling and moderate detuning our analytic calculations are quantitatively in good agreement with the exact ones., Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures

The decoherence of a two-state system coupled with a sub-Ohmic bath is investigated theoretically by means of the perturbation approach based on a unitary transformation. It is shown that the decoherence depends strongly and sensitively on the structure of environment. Nonadiabatic effect is treated through the introduction of a function $\xi_k$ which depends on the boson frequency and renormalized tunneling. The results are as follows:(1) the non-equilibrium correlation function $P(t)$, the dynamical susceptibility $\chi''(\omega)$ and the equilibrium correlation function $C(t)$ are analytically obtained for $s\leq 1$; (2) the phase diagram of thermodynamic transition shows the delocalized-localized transition point $\alpha_l$ which agrees with exact results and numerical data from the Numerical Renormalization Group; (3) the dynamical transition point $\alpha_c$ between coherent and incoherent phase is explicitly given for the first time. A crossover from the coherent oscillation to incoherent relaxation appears with increasing coupling (for $\alpha > \alpha_c $, the coherent dynamics disappear); (4) the Shiba's relation and sum rule are exactly satisfied when $\alpha \leq \alpha_c $; (5) an underdamping-overdamping transition point $\alpha_c^{*}$ exists in the function $S(\omega)$. Consequently, the dynamical phase diagrams in both ohmic and sub-Ohmic case are mapped out. For $\Delta \ll \omega_c$, the critical couplings ($\alpha_l, \alpha_c$ and $\alpha_c^{*}$) are proportional to $\Delta^{1-s}$., Comment: 26pages,13figures,submitted to Phys. Rev. B