Related papers: The time qubit
Time plays a crucial role in the intuitive understanding of the world around us. Within quantum mechanics, however, time is not usually treated as an observable quantity; it enters merely as a parameter in the laws of motion of physical…
Possible theoretical frameworks for measurement of (arrival) time in the nonrelativistic quantum mechanics are reviewed. It is argued that the ambiguity between indirect measurements by a suitably introduced time operator and direct…
Beginning with the principle that a closed mechanical composite system is timeless, time can be defined by the regular changes in a suitable position coordinate (clock) in the observing part, when one part of the closed composite observes…
Microscopic physical laws are time-symmetric, hence, a priori there exists no preferential temporal direction. However, the second law of thermodynamics allows one to associate the "forward" temporal direction to a positive variation of the…
The phase of matter waves depends on proper time and is therefore susceptible to special-relativistic (kinematic) and gravitational (redshift) time dilation. Hence, it is conceivable that atom interferometers measure general-relativistic…
Both metaphysical and practical considerations related to time inversion have intrigued scientists for generations. Physicists have strived to devise and implement time-inversion protocols, in particular different forms of "time mirrors"…
In the macroscopic world, time is intrinsically asymmetric, flowing in a specific direction, from past to future. However, the same is not necessarily true for quantum systems, as some quantum processes produce valid quantum evolutions…
In quantum mechanics, time is introduced as a non-measurable quantity, as there is no possibility to build a hermitian operator canonically conjugated to the Hamiltonian. We cannot have, therefore, the time operator, which means that the…
We revisit a recent proposal for a definition of time in quantum cosmology, to investigate the effects of having more than one possible type of clock "at the same time". We use as test tube an extension of Einstein gravity with a massless…
We consider how to tell the time-ordering associated with measurement data from quantum experiments at two times and any number of qubits. We define an arrow of time inference problem. We consider conditions on the initial and final states…
We critically discuss the measure of very short time intervals. By means of a Gedankenexperiment, we describe an ideal clock based on the occurrence of completely random events. Many previous thought experiments have suggested fundamental…
We derive the time dilation formula for charged quantum clocks in electromagnetic fields. As a concrete example of non-inertial motion, we consider a cyclotron motion in a uniform magnetic field. Applying the time dilation formula to…
We propose an experimental setup to probe the interplay between the quantum superposition principle and gravitational time dilation arising from the mass-energy equivalence. It capitalizes on state-of-the-art atom interferometers that can…
We present an implementation of a recently proposed procedure for defining time, based on the description of the evolving system and its clock as non-interacting, entangled systems, according to the Page and Wootters approach. We study how…
The extrinsic quantum mechanical arrow of time is understood to be a consequence of the interaction between quantum systems and their environment. A choice of boundary conditions for the Schr\"odinger equation results in a different time…
In an adiabatic rapid passage experiment, the Bloch vector of a two-level system (qubit) is inverted by slowly inverting an external field to which it is coupled, and along which it is initially aligned. In twisted rapid passage, the…
In the last years several theoretical papers discussed if time can be an emergent property deriving from quantum correlations. Here, to provide an insight into how this phenomenon can occur, we present an experiment that illustrates Page…
The time evolution of a two-level quantum mechanical system can be geometrically described using the Bloch sphere. By mapping the Bloch sphere evolution onto the dynamics of oscillating electric dipoles, we provide a physically intuitive…
Quantum theory and relativity offer different conceptions of time. To explore the conflict between them, we study a quantum version of the light-clock commonly used to illustrate relativistic time dilation. This semiclassical model combines…
The statistical state of any (classical or quantum) system with non-trivial time evolution can be interpreted as the pointer of a clock. The quality of such a clock is given by the statistical distinguishability of its states at different…