Arnault, P., Pepper, B., & Perez, A. (2020). Quantum walks in weak electric fields and Bloch oscillations. Phys. Rev. A, 101(6), 062324–12pp.
Abstract: Bloch oscillations appear when an electric field is superimposed on a quantum particle that evolves on a lattice with a tight-binding Hamiltonian (TBH), i.e., evolves via what we call an electric TBH; this phenomenon will be referred to as TBH Bloch oscillations. A similar phenomenon is known to show up in so-called electric discrete-time quantum walks (DQWs) [C. Cedzich et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 160601 (2013);] this phenomenon will be referred to as DQW Bloch oscillations. This similarity is particularly salient when the electric field of the DQW is weak. For a wide, i.e., spatially extended, initial condition, one numerically observes semiclassical oscillations, i.e., oscillations of a localized particle, for both the electric TBH and the electric DQW. More precisely, the numerical simulations strongly suggest that the semiclassical DQW Bloch oscillations correspond to two counterpropagating semiclassical TBH Bloch oscillations. In this work it is shown that, under certain assumptions, the solution of the electric DQW for a weak electric field and a wide initial condition is well approximated by the superposition of two continuous-time expressions, which are counterpropagating solutions of an electric TBH whose hopping amplitude is the cosine of the arbitrary coin-operator mixing angle. In contrast, if one wishes the continuous-time approximation to hold for spatially localized initial conditions, one needs at least the DQW to be lazy, as suggested by numerical simulations and by the fact that this has been proven in the case of a vanishing electric field [F. W. Strauch, Phys. Rev. A 74, 030301(R) (2006)].
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Esposito, R. et al, & Domingo-Pardo, C. (2021). Design of the third-generation lead-based neutron spallation target for the neutron time-of-flight facility at CERN. Phys. Rev. Accel. Beams, 24(9), 093001–17pp.
Abstract: The neutron time-of-flight (n_TOF) facility at the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN) is a pulsed white-spectrum neutron spallation source producing neutrons for two experimental areas: the Experimental Area 1 (EAR1), located 185 m horizontally from the target, and the Experimental Area 2 (EAR2), located 20 m above the target. The target, based on pure lead, is impacted by a high-intensity 20-GeV/c pulsed proton beam. The facility was conceived to study neutron-nucleus interactions for neutron kinetic energies between a few meV to several GeV, with applications of interest for nuclear astrophysics, nuclear technology, and medical research. After the second-generation target reached the end of its lifetime, the facility underwent a major upgrade during CERN's Long Shutdown 2 (LS2, 2019-2021), which included the installation of the new third-generation neutron target. The first- and second-generation targets were based on water-cooled massive lead blocks and were designed focusing on EAR1, since EAR2 was built later. The new target is cooled by nitrogen gas to avoid erosion-corrosion and contamination of cooling water with radioactive lead spallation products. Moreover, the new design is optimized also for the vertical flight path and EAR2. This paper presents an overview of the target design focused on both physics and thermomechanical performance, and includes a description of the nitrogen cooling circuit and radiation protection studies.
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Guo, J. J., Sun, F. X., Zhu, D. Q., Gessner, M., He, Q. Y., & Fadel, M. (2023). Detecting Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering in non-Gaussian spin states from conditional spin-squeezing parameters. Phys. Rev. A, 108(1), 012435–7pp.
Abstract: We present an experimentally practical method to reveal Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) steering in non-Gaussian spin states by exploiting a connection to quantum metrology. Our criterion is based on the quantum Fisher information, and uses bounds derived from generalized spin-squeezing parameters that involve measurements of higher-order moments. This leads us to introduce the concept of conditional spin-squeezing parameters, which quantify the metrological advantage provided by conditional states, as well as detect the presence of an EPR paradox.
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Mohan, B., Gangwar, R., Pandit, T., Bera, M. L., Lewenstein, M., & Bera, M. N. (2025). Coherent heat transfer leads to genuine quantum enhancement in the performances of continuous engines. Phys. Rev. Appl., 23(4), 044050–25pp.
Abstract: Conventional continuous quantum heat engines with incoherent heat transfer perform poorly as they exploit two-body interactions between the system and hot or cold baths, thus having limited capability to outperform their classical counterparts. We introduce distinct continuous quantum heat engines that utilize coherent heat transfer with baths, yielding genuine quantum enhancement in performance. These coherent engines consist of one qutrit system and two photonic baths and enable coherent heat transfer via two-photon transitions involving three-body interactions between the system and hot and cold baths. We demonstrate that coherent engines deliver significantly higher power output with much greater reliability, i.e., lower signal-to-noise ratio of the power, by hundreds of folds over their incoherent counterparts. Importantly, coherent engines can operate close to or at the maximal achievable reliability allowed by the quantum thermodynamic uncertainty relation. Moreover, coherent engines manifest more nonclassical features than incoherent engines because they violate the classical thermodynamic uncertainty relation by a greater amount and for a wider range of parameters. These genuine enhancements in the performance of coherent engines are directly attributed to their capacity to harness higher energetic coherence for the resonant driving case. The experimental feasibility of coherent engines and the improved understanding of how quantum properties can enhance performance may find applications in quantum enabled technologies.
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Nzongani, U., Eon, N., Marquez-Martin, I., Perez, A., Di Molfetta, G., & Arrighi, P. (2024). Dirac quantum walk on tetrahedra. Phys. Rev. A, 110(4), 042418–15pp.
Abstract: Discrete-time quantum walks (QWs) are transportation models of single quantum particles over a lattice. Their evolution is driven through causal and local unitary operators. QWs are a powerful tool for quantum simulation of fundamental physics, as some of them have a continuum limit converging to well-known physics partial differential equations, such as the Dirac or the Schr & ouml;dinger equation. In this paper, we show how to recover the Dirac equation in (3 + 1) dimensions with a QW evolving in a tetrahedral space. This paves the way to simulate the Dirac equation on a curved space-time. This also suggests an ordered scheme for propagating matter over a spin network, of interest in loop quantum gravity, where matter propagation has remained an open problem.
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