Spin Bath Research Articles

Generating steady quantum coherence and magic through an autonomous thermodynamic machine by utilizing a spin bath

Generation of steady quantumness in the presence of an environment is of utmost importance if we are to build practical quantum devices. We propose a scheme of generating steady coherence and magic in a qubit system attached to a heat bath at a certain temperature through its interaction with another qubit system attached to a spin bath. Coherence generation in the reduced qubit is always possible in this model. The steady coherence in the reduced qubit attached to the heat bath may be used to enhance the subsequent transient performance of a quantum absorption refrigerator. For the case of generation of magic, which is the quantum resource responsible for implementation of gates which are not simulable via stabilizer computation, we show that there exists a critical temperature of the heat bath beyond which it is not possible to create magic in the reduced qubit attached to the heat bath. Below the critical temperature, the strength of interaction between the qubits must lie within a certain region for creation of magic. We further note that by increasing the strength of coupling of the second qubit to the spin bath, typified by the reset probability, keeping the coupling strength of the first qubit to the heat bath fixed, it is possible to increase the critical temperature of the heat bath for creation of magic.

Driving the quantum speed limit of a central spin model by pulse control

We investigate the quantum speed limit (QSL) time of the central qubit coupled with a thermodynamic Ising spin chain. The external bang–bang (BB) pulse control is applied on the model. We show that the evolution speed of the central system can be enhanced by the BB pulse. Meanwhile, the influence from magnetic field and temperature of bath are also studied, and we find that for the situation of strong external field or low temperature the evolution speed of system can be accelerated. Besides these, the function of the sizes of environment is exhibited in our work and we discover the effect from the qubits numbers of bath on QSL time depends on the coupling strength between central system and bath spins.

Thermodynamics of a quantum Ising system coupled to a spin bath

We study the effect of coupling a spin bath environment to a system which, at low energies, can be modeled as a quantum Ising system. A field theoretic formalism incorporating both thermal and quantum fluctuations is developed to derive results for the thermodynamic properties and response functions, both for a toy model and for the $LiHoF_4$ system, in which spin-8 electronic spins couple to a spin-$7/2$ nuclear spin bath: the phase transition then occurs in a system of electronuclear degrees of freedom, coupled by long-range dipolar interactions. The quantum Ising phase transition still exists, and one hybridized mode of the Ising and bath spins always goes soft at the transition.

Work extraction and Landauer's principle in a quantum spin Hall device

Landauer's principle states that erasure of each bit of information in a system requires at least a unit of energy $k_B T \ln 2$ to be dissipated. In return, the blank bit may possibly be utilized to extract usable work of the amount $k_B T \ln 2$, in keeping with the second law of thermodynamics. While in principle any collection of spins can be utilized as information storage, work extraction by utilizing this resource in principle requires specialized engines that are capable of using this resource. In this work, we focus on heat and charge transport in a quantum spin Hall device in the presence of a spin bath. We show how a properly initialized nuclear spin subsystem can be used as a memory resource for a Maxwell's Demon to harvest available heat energy from the reservoirs to induce charge current that can power an external electrical load. We also show how to initialize the nuclear spin subsystem using applied bias currents which necessarily dissipate energy, hence demonstrating Landauer's principle. This provides an alternative method of "energy storage" in an all-electrical device. We finally propose a realistic setup to experimentally observe a Landauer erasure/work extraction cycle.

Driven dissipative dynamics and topology of quantum impurity systems

In this review, we provide an introduction to and an overview of some more recent advances in real-time dynamics of quantum impurity models and their realizations in quantum devices. We focus on the Ohmic spin–boson and related models, which describe a single spin-1/2 coupled with an infinite collection of harmonic oscillators. The topics are largely drawn from our efforts over the past years, but we also present a few novel results. In the first part of this review, we begin with a pedagogical introduction to the real-time dynamics of a dissipative spin at both high and low temperatures. We then focus on the driven dynamics in the quantum regime beyond the limit of weak spin–bath coupling. In these situations, the non-perturbative stochastic Schrödinger equation method is ideally suited to numerically obtain the spin dynamics as it can incorporate bias fields hz(t) of arbitrary time-dependence in the Hamiltonian. We present different recent applications of this method: (i) how topological properties of the spin such as the Berry curvature and the Chern number can be measured dynamically, and how dissipation affects the topology and the measurement protocol, (ii) how quantum spin chains can experience synchronization dynamics via coupling with a common bath. In the second part of this review, we discuss quantum engineering of spin–boson and related models in circuit quantum electrodynamics (cQED), quantum electrical circuits, and cold-atoms architectures. In different realizations, the Ohmic environment can be represented by a long (microwave) transmission line, a Luttinger liquid, a one-dimensional Bose–Einstein condensate or a chain of superconducting Josephson junctions. We show that the quantum impurity can be used as a quantum sensor to detect properties of a bath at minimal coupling, and how dissipative spin dynamics can lead to new insight in the Mott–superfluid transition. Dans cette revue, nous proposons une introduction et une vue d'ensemble de quelques progrès parmi les plus récents dans le domaine de la dynamique en temps réel des modèles d'impuretés quantiques et de leurs réalisations dans les dispositifs quantiques. Nous nous intéressons au modèle spin–boson avec dissipation ohmique et aux modèles associés, qui décrivent un seul spin 1/2 couplé à une collection infinie d'oscillateurs harmoniques. Les sujets abordés s'inspirent en grande partie de nos travaux de ces dernières années, mais nous présentons également quelques résultats nouveaux. Nous commençons la première partie de cette revue par une introduction pédagogique à la dynamique en temps réel d'un spin dissipatif à hautes et basses températures. Nous nous intéressons ensuite à la dynamique dirigée en régime quantique au-delà de la limite de faible couplage spin–bain. Dans ces situations, la méthode faisant appel à l'équation de Schroedinger stochastique non perturbative est idéale pour obtenir numériquement la dynamique de spin, car elle permet d'incorporer des champs de polarisation hz(t) de dépendance temporelle arbitraire dans le hamiltonien. Nous présentons différentes applications récentes de cette méthode : (i) comment les propriétés topologiques du spin telles que la courbure de Berry et le nombre de Chern peuvent être mesurées dynamiquement, et comment la dissipation affecte la topologie et le protocole de mesure ; (ii) comment les chaînes de spin quantiques suivent la dynamique de synchronisation par couplage avec un bain commun. Dans la deuxième partie de cette revue, nous discutons l'ingénierie quantique du modèle spin-boson et des modèles associés en électrodynamique quantique des circuits (cQED), des circuits électriques quantiques et des architectures d'atomes froids. Dans différentes réalisations, l'environnement ohmique peut être représenté par une longue ligne de transmission (micro-ondes), un liquide de Luttinger, un condensat de Bose–Einstein unidimensionnel, une chaîne de jonctions Josephson supraconductrices. Nous montrons que l'impureté quantique peut être utilisée comme un capteur quantique pour détecter les propriétés d'un bain au couplage minimal, et comment la dynamique de spin dissipative peut conduire à de nouvelles perspectives dans la transition Mott–superfluide.

Discretization of the total magnetic field by the nuclear spin bath in fluorine-doped ZnSe

The coherent spin dynamics of fluorine donor-bound electrons in ZnSe induced by pulsed optical excitation is studied in a perpendicular applied magnetic field. The Larmor precession frequency serves as a measure for the total magnetic field exerted onto the electron spins and, surprisingly, does not increase linearly with the applied field, but shows a step-like behavior with pronounced plateaus, given by multiples of the laser repetition rate. This discretization occurs by a feedback mechanism in which the electron spins polarize the nuclear spins, which in turn generate a local Overhauser field adjusting the total magnetic field accordingly. Varying the optical excitation power, we can control the plateaus, in agreement with our theoretical model. From this model, we trace the observed discretization to the optically induced Stark field, which causes the dynamic nuclear polarization.

Quantum mechanical treatment of large spin baths

The electronic spin in quantum dots can be described by central spin models (CSMs) with a very large number $N_\mathrm{eff} \approx 10^4$ to $10^6$ of bath spins posing a tremendous challenge to theoretical simulations. Here, a fully quantum mechanical theory is developed for the limit $N_\mathrm{eff} \to \infty$ by means of iterated equations of motion (iEoM). We find that the CSM can be mapped to a four-dimensional impurity coupled to a non-interacting bosonic bath in this limit. Remarkably, even for infinite bath the CSM does not become completely classical. The data obtained by the proposed iEoM approach is tested successfully against data from other, established approaches. Thus, the iEoM mapping extends the set of theoretical tools which can be used to understand the spin dynamics in large CSMs.

On the exact solvability of the anisotropic central spin model: An operator approach

Using an operator approach based on a commutator scheme that has been previously applied to Richardson’s reduced BCS model and the inhomogeneous Dicke model, we obtain general exact solvability requirements for an anisotropic central spin model with XXZ-type hyperfine coupling between the central spin and the spin bath, without any prior knowledge of integrability of the model. We outline basic steps of the usage of the operators approach, and pedagogically summarize them into two Lemmas and two Constraints. Through a step-by-step construction of the eigen-problem, we show that the condition gj′2−gj2=c naturally arises for the model to be exactly solvable, where c is a constant independent of the bath-spin index j, and {gj} and {gj′} are the longitudinal and transverse hyperfine interactions, respectively. The obtained conditions and the resulting Bethe ansatz equations are consistent with that in previous literature.

Toward Hyperpolarization of Oil Molecules via Single Nitrogen Vacancy Centers in Diamond.

Efficient polarization of organic molecules is of extraordinary relevance when performing nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and imaging. Commercially available routes to dynamical nuclear polarization (DNP) work at extremely low temperatures, relying on the solidification of organic samples and thus bringing the molecules out of their ambient thermal conditions. In this work, we investigate polarization transfer from optically pumped nitrogen vacancy centers in diamond to external molecules at room temperature. This polarization transfer is described by both an extensive analytical analysis and numerical simulations based on spin bath bosonization and is supported by experimental data in excellent agreement. These results set the route to hyperpolarization of diffusive molecules in different scenarios and consequently, due to an increased signal, to high-resolution NMR.

Reversal of Paramagnetic Effects by Electron Spin Saturation

We present a study in which both significant dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP) enhancement of 7Li NMR and reversal of the paramagnetic effects (PEs) are achieved by microwave (μw) irradiation-induced electron spin saturation of nitroxide radicals at liquid-helium temperatures. The reversal of the PE was manifested in significant narrowing of the 7Li NMR line and reversal of the paramagnetic chemical shift under DNP conditions. The extent of the PE was found to decrease with increased saturation of the electron paramagnetic resonance line, modulated as a function of microwave (μw) power, frequency, duration of irradiation, and gating time between μw irradiation and NMR detection. The defining observation was the shortening of the electron phase memory time, Tm, of the excited observer spins with increasing μw irradiation and concurrent electron spin saturation of the electron spin bath. This and a series of corroborating studies reveal the origin of the NMR line narrowing to be the reversal of paramagneti...

Robustness of Quantum Discord Between Two Noninteracting Qubits in Spin-Star Baths

We study the dynamics of quantum entanglement and discord between two noninteracting qubits, which couple with spin-star baths, obeying the XY Hamiltonian. We compare the dynamics of quantum discord with that of quantum entanglement. For the initial X-type state, in the common spin bath, the quantum discord is more robust than quantum entanglement. It is found that quantum discord of the two noninteracting qubits can be amplified, even in the regimes where entanglement suddenly disappears. This also points to a fact that the absence of entanglement does not necessarily indicate the absence of quantum correlations.

All-Optical Control of the Silicon-Vacancy Spin in Diamond at Millikelvin Temperatures.

The silicon-vacancy center in diamond offers attractive opportunities in quantum photonics due to its favorable optical properties and optically addressable electronic spin. Here, we combine both to achieve all-optical coherent control of its spin states. We utilize this method to explore spin dephasing effects in an impurity-rich sample beyond the limit of phonon-induced decoherence: Employing Ramsey and Hahn-echo techniques at temperatures down to 40mK we identify resonant coupling to a substitutional nitrogen spin bath as limiting decoherence source for the electron spin.

Decoherence and control of a qubit in spin baths: an exact master equation study

In spin-based nanosystems for quantum information processing, electron spin qubits are subject to decoherence due to their interactions with nuclear spin environments. In this paper, we present an exact master equation for a central spin-1/2 system in time-dependent external fields and coupled to a spin-half bath in terms of hyperfine interaction. The master equation provides a unified description for free and controlled dynamics of the central spin and is formally independent of the details and size of spin environments. Different from the previous approaches, the master equation remains exact even in the presence of external control fields. Using the parameters for realistic nanosystems with nonzero nuclear spins, such as GaAs, we investigate the Overhauser’s effect on the decoherence dynamics of the central spin under different distributions of bath-spin frequencies and system-bath coupling strengths. Furthermore, we apply the leakage elimination operator, in a nonperturbative manner, to this system to suppress the decoherence induced by hyperfine interaction.

Determinant representations of spin-operator matrix elements in the XX spin chain and their applications

For the one-dimensional spin-1/2 XX model with either periodic or open boundary conditions, it is shown by using a fermionic approach that the matrix element of the spin operator $S^-_j$ ($S^-_{j}S^+_{j'}$) between two eigenstates with numbers of excitations $n$ and $n+1$ ($n$ and $n$) can be expressed as the determinant of an appropriate $(n+1)\times (n+1)$ matrix whose entries involve the coefficients of the canonical transformations diagonalizing the model. In the special case of a homogeneous periodic XX chain, the matrix element of $S^-_j$ reduces to a variant of the Cauchy determinant that can be evaluated analytically to yield a factorized expression. The obtained compact representations of these matrix elements are then applied to two physical scenarios: (i) Nonlinear optical response of molecular aggregates, for which the determinant representation of the transition dipole matrix elements between eigenstates provides a convenient way to calculate the third-order nonlinear responses for aggregates from small to large sizes compared with the optical wavelength, and (ii) real-time dynamics of an interacting Dicke model consisting of a single bosonic mode coupled to a one-dimensional XX spin bath. In this setup, full quantum calculation up to $N\leq 16$ spins for vanishing intrabath coupling shows that the decay of the reduced bosonic occupation number approaches a finite plateau value (in the long-time limit) that depends on the ratio between the number of excitations and the total number of spins. Our results can find useful applications in various "system-bath" systems, with the system part inhomogeneously coupled to an interacting XX chain.

A unified stochastic formulation of dissipative quantum dynamics. II. Beyond linear response of spin baths.

We use the "generalized hierarchical equation of motion" proposed in Paper I [C.-Y. Hsieh and J. Cao, J. Chem. Phys. 148, 014103 (2018)] to study decoherence in a system coupled to a spin bath. The present methodology allows a systematic incorporation of higher-order anharmonic effects of the bath in dynamical calculations. We investigate the leading order corrections to the linear response approximations for spin bath models. Two kinds of spin-based environments are considered: (1) a bath of spins discretized from a continuous spectral density and (2) a bath of localized nuclear or electron spins. The main difference resides with how the bath frequency and the system-bath coupling parameters are distributed in an environment. When discretized from a continuous spectral density, the system-bath coupling typically scales as ∼1/NB where NB is the number of bath spins. This scaling suppresses the non-Gaussian characteristics of the spin bath and justifies the linear response approximations in the thermodynamic limit. For the nuclear/electron spin bath models, system-bath couplings are directly deduced from spin-spin interactions and do not necessarily obey the 1/NB scaling. It is not always possible to justify the linear response approximations in this case. Furthermore, if the spin-spin Hamiltonian is highly symmetrical, there exist additional constraints that generate highly non-Markovian and persistent dynamics that is beyond the linear response treatments.

A unified stochastic formulation of dissipative quantum dynamics. I. Generalized hierarchical equations.

We extend a standard stochastic theory to study open quantum systems coupled to a generic quantum environment. We exemplify the general framework by studying a two-level quantum system coupled bilinearly to the three fundamental classes of non-interacting particles: bosons, fermions, and spins. In this unified stochastic approach, the generalized stochastic Liouville equation (SLE) formally captures the exact quantum dissipations when noise variables with appropriate statistics for different bath models are applied. Anharmonic effects of a non-Gaussian bath are precisely encoded in the bath multi-time correlation functions that noise variables have to satisfy. Starting from the SLE, we devise a family of generalized hierarchical equations by averaging out the noise variables and expand bath multi-time correlation functions in a complete basis of orthonormal functions. The general hierarchical equations constitute systems of linear equations that provide numerically exact simulations of quantum dynamics. For bosonic bath models, our general hierarchical equation of motion reduces exactly to an extended version of hierarchical equation of motion which allows efficient simulation for arbitrary spectral densities and temperature regimes. Similar efficiency and flexibility can be achieved for the fermionic bath models within our formalism. The spin bath models can be simulated with two complementary approaches in the present formalism. (I) They can be viewed as an example of non-Gaussian bath models and be directly handled with the general hierarchical equation approach given their multi-time correlation functions. (II) Alternatively, each bath spin can be first mapped onto a pair of fermions and be treated as fermionic environments within the present formalism.

Correlation and coherence for two-qubit system coupled to XY spin chains

Quantum coherence has played a decisive role in quantum information processing. On the other hand, quantum correlation can be considered as a powerful resource for delivering quantum information. Both quantum coherence and quantum correlation may occur in an information propagating process, which challenges us to understand the relationship between coherence and correlation. This is also an important procedure for physicists to know the features of quantum resources. Any quantum system interacting with its surrounding environment will destroy the quantum coherence and fail to fulfil any task of delivering quantum information. In this sense, studying the dynamics of quantum correlation and quantum coherence is very fascinating. In this paper, we investigate the dynamics of the quantum correlation and quantum coherence for two central qubits coupled to their own spin baths modeled by the XY spin chain with Dzyaloshinsky-Moriya interaction. We employ the quantum discord to characterize the quantum correlation, and use the relative entropy to measure quantum coherence. In this way the evolution law of the quantum discord and the relative entropy of quantum coherence of two-qubit system are derived, and the evolution law depends not only on the Dzyaloshinsky-Moriya interaction, the anisotropy parameter and the total number of spin chain sites, but also on the coupling strength between the central spin and its spin chain. Our findings are as follows. Firstly, we find that near the critical point of spin chain the quantum coherence abruptly changes, which can be used to detect the existence of quantum phase transition. Secondly, at the critical point, the relative entropy of quantum coherence is the same as that of classical correlation when time tt0, and it is the same as that of quantum discord when time tt0. At time t0, the sudden transition from quantum discord to classical correlation occurs. All in all, the relative entropy of quantum coherence reflects the behaviors of classical correlation and quantum discord for times tt0 and tt0, respectively, which is caused by the change of the optimal basis for quantum discord. Thirdly, the dynamics of quantum correlation and quantum coherence keep invariant under the scaling variation of the total number of spin chain sites and the coupling strength. Moreover, we find that all the Dzyaloshinsky-Moriya interactions and the anisotropy parameters, as well as the coupling strengths will enhance the decay of quantum coherence and quantum correlation, while they have no obvious effect on the relationship between dynamics of coherence and correlation. The above discussion reveals some new features of quantum coherence and quantum correlation, which may be useful in further developing quantum information theory.

Robust techniques for polarization and detection of nuclear spin ensembles

Highly sensitive nuclear spin detection is crucial in many scientific areas including nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR), imaging (MRI) and quantum computing. The tiny thermal nuclear spin polarization represents a major obstacle towards this goal which may be overcome by Dynamic Nuclear Spin Polarization (DNP) methods. The latter often rely on the transfer of the thermally polarized electron spins to nearby nuclear spins, which is limited by the Boltzmann distribution of the former. Here we demonstrate the polarization and read out of a nuclear spin bath consisting of $^{13}$C nuclear spins in diamond by using a single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center. Our method utilizes microwave dressed states to transfer the NV's high ($>$~92~\%) non-equilibrium electron spin polarization induced by short laser pulses to the surrounding carbon nuclear spins, where the NV is repeatedly repolarized optically, thus providing an effectively infinite polarization reservoir. A saturation of the polarization in the nuclear "frozen core" is achieved, which is confirmed by the decay of the polarization transfer signal and shows an excellent agreement with theoretical simulations. Hereby we introduce the Polarization Read Out by Polarization Inversion (PROPI) method as a quantitative magnetization measure of the nuclear spin bath. Moreover, we show that using the integrated solid effect both for single and double quantum transitions a nuclear spin polarization can be achieved even when the static magnetic field is not aligned along the NV's crystal axis. This opens a path for the application of our DNP technique to spins in and outside of nanodiamonds, enabling their application as MRI tracers.

Dynamics and thermodynamics of a central spin immersed in a spin bath

An exact reduced dynamical map along with its operator sum representation is derived for a central spin interacting with a thermal spin environment. The dynamics of the central spin shows high sustainability of quantum traits such as coherence and entanglement in the low-temperature regime. However, for sufficiently high temperature and when the number of bath particles approaches the thermodynamic limit, this feature vanishes and the dynamics closely mimics Markovian evolution. The properties of the long-time-averaged state and the trapped information of the initial state for the central qubit are also investigated in detail, confirming that the nonergodicity of the dynamics can be attributed to the finite temperature and finite size of the bath. It is shown that if a certain stringent resonance condition is satisfied, the long-time-averaged state retains quantum coherence, which can have far reaching technological implications in engineering quantum devices. An exact time-local master equation of the canonical form is derived. With the help of this master equation, the nonequilibrium properties of the central spin system are studied by investigating the detailed balance condition and irreversible entropy production rate. The result reveals that the central qubit thermalizes only in the limit of very high temperature and large number of bath spins.

Relaxation, thermalization, and Markovian dynamics of two spins coupled to a spin bath.

It is shown that by fitting a Markovian quantum master equation to the numerical solution of the time-dependent Schrödinger equation of a system of two spin-1/2 particles interacting with a bath of up to 34 spin-1/2 particles, the former can describe the dynamics of the two-spin system rather well. The fitting procedure that yields this Markovian quantum master equation accounts for all non-Markovian effects in as much the general structure of this equation allows and yields a description that is incompatible with the Lindblad equation.