J. H. Eberly

Finite-Time Disentanglement Via Spontaneous Emission

We show that under the influence of pure vacuum noise two entangled qubits become completely disentangled in a finite-time, and in a specific example we find the time to be given by ln((2+sqrt[2] / 2) times the usual spontaneous lifetime.

Sudden death of entanglement.

A new development in the dynamical behavior of elementary quantum systems is the surprising discovery that correlation between two quantum units of information called qubits can be degraded by environmental noise in a way not seen previously in studies of dissipation. This new route for dissipation attacks quantum entanglement, the essential resource for quantum information as well as the central feature in the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen so-called paradox and in discussions of the fate of Schrödingers cat. The effect has been labeled ESD, which stands for early-stage disentanglement or, more frequently, entanglement sudden death. We review recent progress in studies focused on this phenomenon.

Quantum open system theory: bipartite aspects.

We demonstrate in straightforward calculations that even under ideally weak noise the relaxation of bipartite open quantum systems contains elements not previously encountered in quantum noise physics. While additivity of decay rates is known to be generic for decoherence of a single system, we demonstrate that it breaks down for bipartite coherence of even the simplest composite systems.

The time-dependent physical spectrum of light*

We investigate the time-dependent spectrum of light from an observational point of view and define a time-dependent “physical spectrum” of light based on the counting rate of a photodetector. The tunable element, the filter, that allows observation of different spectral components of the light is shown to play an essential role in the time-dependent spectrum. Its bandwidth cannot be taken arbitrarily narrow. We establish the connection between our physical spectrum and other time-dependent spectra associated with Page, Lampard, Silverman, and Kolmogorov, as well as with the Wiener-Khintchine power spectrum. Also, we show the conditions under which these earlier definitions can be used as the first approximations to the complete physical spectrum, and give an expression for the correction terms.

Coherent states, squeezed fluctuations, and the SU(2) am SU(1,1) groups in quantum-optics applications

The theory of generalized coherent states associated with the SU(2) and SU(1,1) Lie algebras is discussed and applied in an investigation of possible reductions of fluctuations. In the framework of a system of N two-level atoms the squeezing of angular-momentum [SU(2)] fluctuations is exhibited for optical coherent transients involving the photon echo. The SU(1,1) fluctuations are discussed and established for general two-photon processes involving dynamical variables different from the creation and annihilation operators.

Analysis and Interpretation of High Transverse Entanglement in Optical Parametric Down Conversion

Quantum entanglement associated with transverse wave vectors of down conversion photons is investigated based on the Schmidt decomposition method. We show that transverse entanglement involves two variables: orbital angular momentum and transverse frequency. We show that in the monochromatic limit high values of entanglement are closely controlled by a single parameter resulting from the competition between (transverse) momentum conservation and longitudinal phase matching. We examine the features of the Schmidt eigenmodes, and indicate how entanglement can be enhanced by suitable mode selection methods.

Sudden death of entanglement: Classical noise effects

When a composite quantum state interacts with its surroundings, both quantum coherence of individual particles and quantum entanglement will decay. We have shown that under vacuum noise, i.e., during spontaneous emission, two-qubit entanglement may terminate abruptly in a finite time [T. Yu, J.H. Eberly, Phys. Rev. Lett. 93 (2004) 140404], a phenomenon termed entanglement sudden death (ESD). An open issue is the behavior of mixed-state entanglement under the influence of classical noise. In this paper we investigate entanglement sudden death as it arises from the influence of classical phase noise on two qubits that are initially entangled but have no further mutual interaction.

Comparison of Bessel and Gaussian beams

A comparison of beam divergence and power-transport efficiency is made between Gaussian and Bessel beams when both beams have the same initial total power and the same initial full width at half-maximum.

Sudden death of entanglement of two Jaynes–Cummings atoms

We investigate entanglement dynamics of two isolated atoms, each in its own Jaynes–Cummings cavity. We show analytically that initial entanglement has an interesting subsequent time evolution, including the so-called sudden death effect.

Qubit disentanglement and decoherence via dephasing

We consider whether quantum coherence in the form of mutual entanglement between a pair of qubits is susceptible to decay that may be more rapid than the decay of the coherence of either qubit individually. An instance ofpotential importance for solid-state quantum computing arises if embedded qubits (spins, quantum dots, Cooper pair boxes, etc.) are exposed to global and local noise at the same time. Here we allow separate phase-noisy channels to affect local and nonlocal measures of system coherence. We find that the time for decay of the qubit entanglement can be significantly shorter than the time for local dephasing of the individual qubits.