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Center for Nonlinear Studies |
We show how quantum correlations to the environment provide bounds to the time rate of purity change, which in turn can be used to estimate dissipation rates for general non-Markovian open quantum systems. To achieve this, we find the set of all system-environment states that are the sufficient and necessary for the time derivative of the purity of the system to be zero under any system-environment interaction. We name them lazy states, and show that they are a generalization of states with only classical correlations as measured by quantum discord to projective measurements of any rank. The concept of lazy states permits the construction of a protocol for detecting global quantum correlations using only local dynamical information. The mathematical structure of lazy states provides insight into the pervasive nature of decoherence.
Host: Wojciech H. Zurek, whz@lanl.gov, 7-6837