English

Decoherence and fluctuations in quantum interference experiments

Quantum Physics 2010-01-31 v1

Abstract

We analyze the notion of quantum coherence in an interference experiment. We let the phase shifts fluctuate according to a given statistical distribution and introduce a decoherence parameter, defined in terms of a generalized visibility of the interference pattern. One might naively expect that a particle ensemble suffers a greater loss of quantum coherence by interacting with an increasingly randomized distribution of shifts. As we shall see, this is not always true.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.quant-ph/0106027,
  title  = {Decoherence and fluctuations in quantum interference experiments},
  author = {A. Mariano and P. Facchi and S. Pascazio},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:quant-ph/0106027},
  year   = {2010}
}

Comments

9 pages, 3 figures