English

Entropy for Quantum Pure States and Its Dynamical Relaxation

Statistical Mechanics 2015-06-10 v2 Quantum Physics

Abstract

We construct a complete set of Wannier functions which are localized at both given positions and momenta. This allows us to introduce the quantum phase space, onto which a quantum pure state can be mapped unitarily. Using its probability distribution in quantum phase space, we define an entropy for a quantum pure state. We prove an inequality regarding the long time behavior of our entropy's fluctuation. For a typical initial state, this inequality indicates that our entropy can relax dynamically to a maximized value and stay there most of time with small fluctuations. This result echoes the quantum H-theorem proved by von Neumann in [Zeitschrift f\"ur Physik {\bf 57}, 30 (1929)]. Our entropy is different from the standard von Neumann entropy, which is always zero for quantum pure states. According to our definition, a system always has bigger entropy than its subsystem even when the system is described by a pure state. As the construction of the Wannier basis can be implemented numerically, the dynamical evolution of our entropy is illustrated with an example.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1406.6527,
  title  = {Entropy for Quantum Pure States and Its Dynamical Relaxation},
  author = {Xizhi Han and Biao Wu},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1406.6527},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

13 pages, 2 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-22T04:46:46.932Z