2011-12-14
10:15 at HCI J 574

Quantification and control of non-Markovian dynamics in open quantum systems

Heinz-Peter Breuer

Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics and Quantum Statistics, Albert-Ludwigs-Universitaet Freiburg

Realistic quantum mechanical systems are always exposed to an external environment. The presence of the environment often gives rise to a Markovian process in which the system irretrievably loses information to its surroundings. However, many quantum systems exhibit a pronounced non-Markovian behavior which is characterized by a flow of information from the environment back to the open system. This backflow of information implies the presence of memory effects and represents the key feature of non-Markovian quantum dynamics. We introduce a general measure for the degree of non-Markovian behavior in open quantum systems and discuss recent experiments which allow to control the information flow between system and environment, to monitor the transition from the Markovian to the non-Markovian regime, and to directly determine the measure for non-Markovianity by measurements on the open system.