Criterion for quantum Zeno and anti-Zeno effects

Abstract

In this work, we study the decay behavior of a two-level system under the competing influence of a dissipative environment and repetitive measurements. The sign of the second derivative of the environmental spectral density function with respect to the system transition frequency is found to be a sufficient condition to distinguish between the quantum Zeno (negative) and the anti-Zeno (positive) effects raised by the measurements. We check our criterion for practical measurement intervals, which are larger than the conceptual Zeno time, in various environments. In particular, with the Lorentzian spectrum, the quantum Zeno and anti-Zeno phenomena are found to emerge respectively in the near-resonant and off-resonant cases. For the interacting spectra of hydrogenlike atoms, the quantum Zeno effect usually occurs and the anti-Zeno effect can rarely occur unless the transition frequency is close to the cut-off frequency. With a power-law spectrum, we find that sub-Ohmic and super-Ohmic environments lead to the quantum Zeno and anti-Zeno effects, respectively.