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Internal Decoherence of a Gaussian Wave Packet in a Harmonic Potential

Quantum Physics 2014-11-11 v1

Abstract

We have studied the quantum dissipative problem of a Gaussian wave packet under the influence of a harmonic potential. A phenomenological approach to dissipation is adopted in the light of the well-known model in which the environment is composed of a bath of non-interacting harmonic oscillators. As one of the effects of the coupling to the bath is the evolution of an initially pure wave packet into a statistical mixture, we estimate the characteristic time elapsed for this to occur for different regimes of temperature, damping, and also different initial states.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1407.4204,
  title  = {Internal Decoherence of a Gaussian Wave Packet in a Harmonic Potential},
  author = {A. Cidrim and F. E. A. dos Santos and A. O. Caldeira},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1407.4204},
  year   = {2014}
}