We analyze the coupling of atoms or atomlike emitters to nanophotonic waveguides in the presence of propagating acoustic waves. Specifically, we show that strong index modulations induced by such waves can drastically modify the effective photonic density of states and thereby influence the strength, the directionality, as well as the overall characteristics of photon emission and absorption processes. These effects enable a complete dynamical control of light-matter interactions in waveguide structures, which even in a two-dimensional system can be used to efficiently exchange individual photons along selected directions and with a very high fidelity. Such a quantum acousto-optical control provides a versatile tool for various quantum networking applications ranging from the distribution of entanglement via directional emitter-emitter interactions to the routing of individual photonic quantum states via acoustic conveyor belts.

Counterfactual communication, i.e., a communication without particles traveling in the transmission channel, is a bizarre quantum effect. Starting from interaction-free measurements many protocols achieving various tasks from counterfactual cryptography to counterfactual transfer of quantum states were proposed and implemented in experiments. However, the meaning of conterfactuality in various protocols remains a controversial topic. A simple error-free counterfactual protocol is proposed. This protocol and its modification are used as a test bed for analysis of the meaning of counterfactuality to clarify the counterfactuality status of various counterfactual proposals.

Randomized benchmarking and variants thereof, which we collectively call RB+, are widely used to characterize the performance of quantum computers because they are simple, scalable, and robust to state-preparation and measurement errors. However, experimental implementations of RB+ allocate resources suboptimally and make ad-hoc assumptions that undermine the reliability of the data analysis. In this paper, we propose a simple modification of RB+ which rigorously eliminates a nuisance parameter and simplifies the experimental design. We then show that, with this modification and specific experimental choices, RB+ efficiently provides estimates of error rates with multiplicative precision. Finally, we provide a simplified rigorous method for obtaining credible regions for parameters of interest and a heuristic approximation for these intervals that performs well in currently relevant regimes.

Using resonant two-step laser excitation of trapped ${}^{232}{\mathrm{Th}}^{+}$ ions, we observe 166 previously unknown energy levels of even parity within the energy range from 7.8 to 9.8 eV and angular momenta from $J=1/2$ to $7/2$. We also classify the high-lying levels observed in our earlier experiments by the total angular momentum and perform multiconfiguration Dirac-Fock calculations to compare their results with the observed level density. The observed levels can be relevant for the excitation or decay of the ${}^{229m}\mathrm{Th}$ isomeric nuclear state which lies in this energy range. The high density of electronic levels promises a strongly enhanced electronic bridge excitation of the isomer in ${}^{229}{\mathrm{Th}}^{+}$.

We systematically construct stationary soliton states in a one-component, two-dimensional, repulsive, Gross-Pitaevskii equation with a ring-shaped targetlike trap similar to the potential used to confine a Bose-Einstein condensate in a recent experiment [R. Mathew, A. Kumar, S. Eckel, F. Jendrzejewski, G. K. Campbell, M. Edwards, and E. Tiesinga, Phys. Rev. A 92, 033602 (2015)]. In addition to the ground-state configuration, we identify a wide variety of excited states involving phase jumps (and associated dark solitons) inside the ring. These configurations are obtained from a systematic bifurcation analysis starting from the linear, small atom density, limit. We study the stability and, when unstable, the dynamics of the most basic configurations. Often these lead to vortical dynamics inside the ring persisting over long time scales in our numerical experiments. To illustrate the relevance of the identified states, we showcase how such dark-soliton configurations (even the unstable ones) can be created in laboratory condensates by using phase-imprinting techniques.

Is there a quantum many-body system that scrambles information as fast as a black hole? The Sachev-Ye-Kitaev model can saturate the conjectured bound for chaos, but it requires random all-to-all couplings of Majorana fermions that are hard to realize in experiments. Here we examine a quantum spin model of randomly oriented dipoles where the spin exchange is governed by dipole-dipole interactions. The model is inspired by recent experiments on dipolar spin systems of magnetic atoms, dipolar molecules, and nitrogen-vacancy centers. We map out the phase diagram of this model by computing the energy-level statistics, spectral form factor, and out-of-time-order correlation (OTOC) functions. We find a broad regime of many-body chaos where the energy levels obey Wigner-Dyson statistics and the OTOC shows distinctive behaviors at different times: Its early-time dynamics is characterized by an exponential growth, while the approach to its saturated value at late times obeys a power law. The temperature scaling of the Lyapunov exponent ${\lambda }_L$ shows that while it is well below the conjectured bound $2\pi T$ at high temperatures, ${\lambda }_L$ approaches the bound at low temperatures and for large number of spins.

We have performed a numerical simulation study of a hybrid regime of anomalous-dispersion-fiber lasers in which passive mode locking occurs simultaneously with the regime of regular undamped spikes induced by an intracavity saturable absorber. Stabilization and reproducibility of the laser radiation is provided by a fiber optical delay line due to which each subsequent spike is formed from the seed radiation of the previous one. The transient evolution and steady-state generation are analyzed. It is found that the number of ultrashort pulses in the steady-state generation depends on the initial conditions of the transient process. In the investigated generation, the spatial-temporal concentration of radiation energy is due to both passive mode locking and $Q$-switch operation. The hybrid regime is of interest for obtaining reproducible high-energy light pulses.

It is well known that orthodox quantum mechanics does not make unambiguous predictions for the statistics in arrival time (or time-of-flight) experiments. Bohmian mechanics (or de Broglie–Bohm theory) offers a distinct conceptual advantage in this regard, owing to the well-defined concepts of point particles and trajectories embedded in this theory. We revisit a recently proposed experiment [S. Das and D. Dürr, Sci. Rep. 9, 2242 (2019)], the numerical analysis of which revealed a striking spin dependence in the (Bohmian) time-of-arrival distributions of a spin-1/2 particle. We present here a mathematically tractable variant of the same experiment, where the predicted effects can be established rigorously. We also obtain some results that can be compared with experiment.

Memory effects can be studied through a conditional past-future correlation, which measures departure with respect to a conditional past-future independence valid in a memoryless Markovian regime. In a quantum regime this property leads to an operational definition of quantum non-Markovianity based on three consecutive system measurement processes and postselection [Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 240401 (2018)]. Here, we study the conditional past-future correlation for a qubit system coupled to different dephasing environments. Exact solutions are obtained for a quantum spin bath as well as for classically fluctuating random Hamiltonian models. The developing of memory effects and departures from Born-Markov or white-noise approximations are related to a measurement back action that changes the system dynamics between consecutive measurements. It is shown that this effect may develop even when the former system evolution is given by a time-independent Lindblad equation. This unusual non-Markovian case arises when the characteristic parameters of the dynamics become Lorentzian random distributed variables.

We demonstrate how the dissipative interaction between a superconducting qubit and a microwave photonic crystal can be used for quantum bath engineering. The photonic crystal is created with a step-impedance transmission line which suppresses and enhances the quantum spectral density of states, influencing decay transitions of a transmon circuit. The qubit interacts with the transmission line indirectly via dispersive coupling to a cavity. We characterize the photonic crystal density of states from both the unitary and dissipative dynamics of the qubit. When the qubit is driven, it dissipates into the frequency dependent density of states of the photonic crystal. Our result is the deterministic preparation of qubit superposition states as the steady state of coherent driving and dissipation near the photonic crystal band edge, which we characterize with quantum state tomography. Our results highlight how the multimode environment from the photonic crystal forms a resource for quantum control.

For some cavity-quantum-electrodynamics systems, such as a single-electron spin coupled to a passive cavity, it is challenging to reach the strong-coupling regime. In such a weak-coupling regime, the conventional dispersive readout technique cannot be used to resolve the quantum states of the spin. Here we propose an improved dispersive readout method to measure the quantum states of a weakly coupled qubit by harnessing either one or two auxiliary cavities linearly coupled to the passive cavity containing the qubit. With appropriate parameters in both cases, the system excluding the qubit can exhibit a parity-time-symmetric phase transition at the exceptional point (EP). Because the EP can amplify the perturbation induced by the qubit and the parity-time symmetry can narrow the linewidths of the peaks in the transmission spectrum of the passive cavity, we can measure the quantum states of the weakly coupled qubit via this transmission spectrum. Owing to the weak coupling between the qubit and the passive cavity, the backaction due to the measurement of the qubit can also be reduced in comparison with the conventional dispersive readout technique in the strong-coupling regime.

Ground states of local Hamiltonians are known to obey the entanglement entropy area law. While area-law violation of a mild kind (logarithmic) is commonly encountered, strong area-law violation (more than logarithmic) is rare. In this paper, we study the long-range quantum spin glass in one dimension whose couplings are disordered and fall off with distance as a power law. We show that this system exhibits more than logarithmic area-law violation in its ground state. Strikingly this feature is found to be true even in the short-range regime, in sharp contrast to the spinless long-range disordered fermionic model. This necessitates the study of large systems for the quantum $XY$ spin glass model, which is challenging since these numerical methods depend on the validity of the area law. This situation lends itself naturally to the exploration of a quantum simulation approach. We present a proof-of-principle implementation of this nontrivially interacting spin model using trapped ions and provide a detailed study of experimentally realistic parameters.

We investigate quantum information masking for arbitrary dimensional quantum states. We show that mutually orthogonal quantum states can always be served for deterministic masking of quantum information. We further construct a probabilistic masking machine for linearly independent states. It is shown that a set of $d$-dimensional states, ${\left\{\right|a_1\rangle }_A,|a_2{\rangle }_A,\cdots ,|a_n{\rangle }_A\}, n\le d$, can be probabilistically masked by a general unitary-reduction operation if they are linearly independent. The maximal successful probability of probabilistic masking is analyzed and derived for the case of two initial states.

We propose a scheme for a deterministic extraction of entanglement by means of a reduction process involving local von Neumann measurements. In an example of a tripartite system, we show that by choosing appropriate measurement bases for a given qubit, one can map an initial three-qubit state into outcome pure bipartite states with the same amount of entanglement of formation. In addition, by optimizing local projective measurements, one can efficiently convert higher-order correlations, contained in a multipartite state, into their lower-order counterparts, and thus significantly enhance the initial (reduced mixed-state) entanglement. We find the analytical expressions for the bounds of the deterministically extracted entanglement and relate them with the initial three-tangle and bipartite (mixed-state) concurrences.

We suggest a formalism to illustrate the entanglement of identical particles in the first quantization language (1QL). Our 1QL formalism enables one to exploit all the well-established quantum information tools to understand the indistinguishable ones, including the reduced density matrix and familiar entanglement measures. The rigorous quantitative relation between the amount of entanglement and the spatial coherence of particles is possible in this formalism. Our entanglement detection process is a generalization of the entanglement extraction protocol for identical particles with mode splitting proposed by Killoran et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 150501 (2014)].

We study the verification of maximally entangled states by virtue of the simplest measurement settings: local projective measurements without adaption. We show that optimal protocols are in one-to-one correspondence with complex projective 2-designs constructed from orthonormal bases. Optimal protocols with minimal measurement settings are in one-to-one correspondence with complete sets of mutually unbiased bases. Based on this observation, optimal protocols are constructed explicitly for any local dimension, which can also be applied to estimating the fidelity with the target state and to detecting entanglement. In addition, we show that incomplete sets of mutually unbiased bases are optimal for verifying maximally entangled states when the number of measurement settings is restricted. Moreover, we construct optimal protocols for the adversarial scenario in which state preparation is not trusted. The number of tests has the same scaling behavior as the counterpart for the nonadversarial scenario; the overhead is no more than three times. We also show that the entanglement of the maximally entangled state can be certified with any given significance level using only one test as long as the local dimension is large enough.

Quantum information technologies require careful control for generating and preserving a desired target quantum state. The biggest practical obstacle is of course decoherence. Therefore, the reachability analysis, which in our scenario aims to estimate the distance between the controlled state under decoherence and the target state, is of great importance to evaluate the realistic performance of those technologies. This paper presents a lower bound of the fidelity-based distance for a general open Markovian quantum system driven by the decoherence process and several types of control including feedback. The lower bound is straightforward to calculate and can be used as a guide for choosing the target state, as demonstrated in some examples. Moreover, the lower bound is applied to derive a theoretical limit in some quantum metrology problems based on a large-size atomic ensemble under control and decoherence.

Given a finite-dimensional pure state transformation restricted by entanglement-assisted local operations and classical communication (ELOCC), we derive minimum and maximum bounds on the entanglement of an ancillary catalyst that allows that transformation. These bounds are nontrivial even when the Schmidt number of both the original and ancillary states becomes large. We identify a lower bound for the dimension of a catalyst allowing a particular ELOCC transformation. Along with these bounds, we present further constraints on ELOCC transformations by identifying restrictions on the Schmidt coefficients of the target state. In addition, an example showing the existence of qubit ELOCC transformations with multiple ranges of potential ancillary states is provided. This example reveals some additional difficulty in finding strict bounds on ELOCC transformations, even in the qubit case. Finally, a comparison of the bounds in this paper with previously discovered bounds is presented.

Entanglement is a key resource for quantum information processing. A widely used tool for detecting entanglement is the entanglement witness, where the measurement of the witness operator is guaranteed to be positive for all separable states and can be negative for certain entangled states. In reality, due to exponentially increasing the Hilbert-space dimension with respect to the system size, it is very challenging to construct an efficient entanglement witness for general multipartite entangled states. For $N$-partite Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ)-like states, the most robust witness scheme requires $N+1$ local measurement settings and can tolerate up to $1/2$ white noise. As a comparison, the most efficient witness for GHZ-like states only needs two local measurement settings and can tolerate up to $1/3$ white noise. There is a tradeoff between the realization efficiency, the number of measurement settings, and the detection robustness, the maximally tolerable white noise. In this paper, we study this tradeoff by proposing a family of entanglement witnesses with $k$ ($2\le k\le N+1$) local measurement settings. Considering symmetric local measurements, we calculate the maximal tolerable noise for any given number of measurement settings. Consequently, we design the optimal witness with a minimal number of settings for any given level of white noise. Our theoretical analysis can be applied to other multipartite entangled states with a strong symmetry. Our witnesses can be easily implemented in experiment and applied in practical multipartite entanglement detection under different noise conditions.

The semiclassical heuristic radiation formula of Baier and Katkov [V. N. Baier and V. M. Katkov, Sov. Phys. JETP 26, 854 (1968)] is well known to describe radiation of an ultrarelativistic electron in strong external fields employing the electron classical trajectory. To find the limitations of the Baier-Katkov approach, we investigate an electron radiation in a strong rotating electric field quantum mechanically using the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin approximation. It is shown that an additional condition except for an ultrarelativistic velocity is required in order to recover this widely used result. A violation of this condition gives rise to a qualitative discrepancy in the harmonic spectra between the two approaches. Furthermore, the same classical trajectory in the rotating electric field and in a plane-wave field is shown to produce substantially different spectra, in contradiction to the semiclassical paradigm. In particular, the number of absorbed field photons, and thus the amount of energy absorbed from the field during emission, are different in these cases.