Temperature dependence of macroscopic quantum effects in non-stationary conditions

Abstract

The temperature dependence of the escape rate out of a metastable state of a macroscopic variable is studied in connection with the problem of the supercurrent decay of a Josephson junction. We find that in the case of non-stationary occupancy probability of the energy levels, some typical quantum effects, such as the energy level discreteness and quantum tunneling, are evident at temperatures much larger than the cross-over temperature.