In physics, specifically in quantum mechanics, a coherent state is the specific quantum state of the quantum harmonic oscillator, often described as a state which has dynamics most closely resembling the oscillatory behavior of a classical harmonic oscillator. It was the first example of quantum dynamics when Erwin Schrödinger derived it in 1926, while searching for solutions of the Schrödinger equation that satisfy the correspondence principle. The quantum harmonic oscillator (and hence the coherent states) arise in the quantum theory of a wide range of physical systems. For instance, a coherent state describes the oscillating motion of a particle confined in a quadratic potential well (for an early reference, see e.g.
Schiff's textbook). The coherent state describes a state in a system for which the ground-state wavepacket is displaced from the origin of the system. This state can be related to classical solutions by a particle oscillating with an amplitude equivalent to the displacement.
These states, expressed as eigenvectors of the lowering operator and forming an overcomplete family, were introduced in the early papers of John R. Klauder, e. g.
In the quantum theory of light (quantum electrodynamics) and other bosonic quantum field theories, coherent states were introduced by the work of Roy J. Glauber in 1963 and are also known as Glauber states.
The concept of coherent states has been considerably abstracted; it has become a major topic in mathematical physics and in applied mathematics, with applications ranging from quantization to signal processing and (see Coherent states in mathematical physics). For this reason, the coherent states associated to the quantum harmonic oscillator are sometimes referred to as canonical coherent states (CCS), standard coherent states, Gaussian states, or oscillator states.
In quantum optics the coherent state refers to a state of the quantized electromagnetic field, etc. that describes a maximal kind of coherence and a classical kind of behavior.
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.
This lecture describes advanced concepts and applications of quantum optics. It emphasizes the connection with ongoing research, and with the fast growing field of quantum technologies. The topics cov
This course on one hand develops the quantum theory of electromagnetic radiation from the principles of quantum electrodynamics. It will cover basis historic developments (coherent states, squeezed st
This course provides the fundamental knowledge and theoretical tools needed to treat nonlinear optical interactions, covering both classical and quantum theory of nonlinear optics. It presents applica
The phase-space formulation of quantum mechanics places the position and momentum variables on equal footing in phase space. In contrast, the Schrödinger picture uses the position or momentum representations (see also position and momentum space). The two key features of the phase-space formulation are that the quantum state is described by a quasiprobability distribution (instead of a wave function, state vector, or density matrix) and operator multiplication is replaced by a star product.
The Wigner quasiprobability distribution (also called the Wigner function or the Wigner–Ville distribution, after Eugene Wigner and Jean-André Ville) is a quasiprobability distribution. It was introduced by Eugene Wigner in 1932 to study quantum corrections to classical statistical mechanics. The goal was to link the wavefunction that appears in Schrödinger's equation to a probability distribution in phase space. It is a generating function for all spatial autocorrelation functions of a given quantum-mechanical wavefunction ψ(x).
In physics, a squeezed coherent state is a quantum state that is usually described by two non-commuting observables having continuous spectra of eigenvalues. Examples are position and momentum of a particle, and the (dimension-less) electric field in the amplitude (phase 0) and in the mode (phase 90°) of a light wave (the wave's quadratures). The product of the standard deviations of two such operators obeys the uncertainty principle: and , respectively.
We consider the Allen-Cahn equation ?(t)u - ?u = u - u(3) with a rapidly mixing Gaussian field as initial condition. We show that provided that the amplitude of the initial condition is not too large, the equation generates fronts described by nodal sets o ...
An enduring challenge in constructing mechanical-oscillator-based hybrid quantum systems is to ensure engineered coupling to an auxiliary degree of freedom and maintain good mechanical isolation from the environment, that is, low quantum decoherence, consi ...
The interaction of light and matter enables nonlinear frequency conversion and the creation of coherent currents. The optical control of electric currents is of fundamental relevance and prominent research focus in the last decades. These photocurrents ena ...