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# 1. INTRODUCTION

## 1. INTRODUCTION

There are several problems surrounding the interpretation of quantum mechanics, mainly involving the measuring process: What does the collapse of the wave function mean? What causes it? And so on. In this paper we argue that many of these problems are essentially present in classical mechanics as well. If one accepts that the nature of information in quantum mechanics differs from that in classical mechanics in the way to be explained below, then quantum mechanics does not introduce conceptual problems not already present in the measuring process in classical mechanics.

In classical mechanics a measurement is nothing strange. It is merely an event where the observer obtains information about some physical system. A measurement therefore changes the observer’s information regarding the system. One can then ask: What does the change in the observer’s information mean? What causes it? And so on. These questions correspond to the questions above, but now they seem tautological rather than mysterious, since our intuitive idea of information tells us that the change in the observer’s information simply means that he has received new data, and that the change is caused by the reception of the new data. We will see that the quantum case is no different, except that the nature of information in quantum mechanics differs from that in classical mechanics. We now first describe the basic idea.

Let’s say an observer has information regarding the pure state (the point in phase space) of a classical system, but not necessarily complete information (this is the typical case, since precise measurements are not possible in practice). Now the observer performs a measurement on the system to receive new data (for example he might have information regarding a particle’s position, now he measures the particle’s momentum). The observer’s information after this measurement then differs from his information before the measurement. In other words, a measurement “disturbs” the observer’s information.

In classical mechanics we know that an observer’s information isn’t merely changed, but is actually increased by a measurement (assuming the measurement provides data not already accounted for in the observer’s information). We will view this as an assumption regarding the nature of information which does not hold in quantum mechanics. On an operational level, this can be seen as the essential difference between quantum mechanics and classical mechanics: In both quantum and classical mechanics the observer’s information is changed by a measurement if the measurement provides new data, but in classical mechanics the observer’s information before the measurement is compatible with his information after the measurement, while in quantum mechanics this is not necessarily the case. (Also see Heisenberg,(1) p. 20.)

More precisely, we view the observer’s information about a physical system as a set of probabilities which he assigns to the outcomes of all measurements which he can perform on the system. When the observer performs a measurement to receive new data concerning the system, these probabilities generally change. In the classical case the probabilities change according to conditional probability, also known as the Bayes rule. Roughly this can be seen as the minimum change necessary to bring the observer’s set of probabilities up to date with the result of the measurement. By the word “compatible” above, we mean that any probability which is zero just before the measurement (say the probability for some particle to be in a certain region in space), will still be zero just after the measurement. In this sense the observer’s information can only increase due to a measurement of a classical system. In quantum mechanics however, we have the projection postulate instead of the classical conditional probability. The projection postulate can change a zero probability, and when this happens we can say that the observer’s information before the measurement has been *invalidated*. (If the observer expresses his set of probabilities in terms of a probability density function, and a density of zero at some point changes due to a measurement, then we can likewise say that his information has been invalidated, since the classical conditional probability would not cause such a change.) The basic idea of this paper is to view the projection postulate as a “quantum Bayes rule,” as has also been done by Bub,(2) Fuchs,(3) and others.(4)

In Section 2 we show how this point of view is actually an outgrowth of the mathematics of quantum and classical mechanics formulated statistically in a suitable (and general) way in terms of $``$-algebras. Mathematically speaking, an observer’s information in quantum mechanics is noncommutative, while in classical mechanics it is commutative. Section 3 shows how the idea of noncommutative information can clarify conceptual problems surrounding the measuring process in quantum mechanics.

## 2. PROBABILISTIC DESCRIPTION OF INFORMATION

In this section we present a unified statistical setting for quantum and classical mechanics using the language of $``$-algebras. We consider a physical system (quantum or classical), and an observer who can perform measurements on the system. Our goal is essentially to describe the observer’s information regarding the system. In this vein we say that:

> A *measurement* on a system by an observer, is by definition the reception of data by the observer which can change his information about the system.

Of course, we have to assume that a measurement is *accurate* (i.e. the data is correct), even though the measurement may *not be precise* (i.e. the data is not maximal), for example when the position of a classical particle is measured, a set of possible values is obtained rather than a single value, but the value of the position at the time of the measurement is contained in this set.

We will view all measurements as yes/no experiments. For example, if a particle’s position is measured, and the only data the observer receives is that the position is in the interval $`[a,b]`$, then we view this as a “yes” obtained for the yes/no experiment “Is the particle’s position in $`[a,b]`$?” Furthermore, we assume that a measurement is ideal in the sense that a repetition of a yes/no experiment would give the same result (assuming that no time-evolution or other measurements takes place between the two yes/no experiments). This is related to the accuracy of a measurement mentioned above, since if we say that the information obtained in a measurement is correct, it means that if we could repeat the measurement (yes/no experiment) then we would with probability one get the same result. (We can therefore also view a measurement as a preparation.) Note that in practice it is not necessarily possible to repeat a yes/no experiment, since the second measurement of position, say, might only give an interval overlapping with the interval obtained in the first measurement, rather than giving exactly the same interval (this would depend on the experimental setup however). Below we will be able to give a better formal definition of an ideal measurement. Meanwhile we note that a series of ideal measurements of the same observable, with each measurement giving a set of values similar to the position measurement above, should at least be consistent with each other (assuming there’s no time-evolution, measurements of other observables, or outside influences on the system), in the sense that the intersection of the sets obtained in the measurements should be non-empty.

### 2.1. General structure

Here we treat the general mathematical structure of a statistical setting for mechanics (classical and quantum). We have to give a mathematical description of four things:

(a) The observables of the system (i.e. that which can be measured by the observer).

(b) The state of the system (i.e. the observer’s information regarding the system). We can say that by definition the *state* of the system is a mathematical object which for each possible outcome of each measurement that can be performed on the system, provides the observer with the probability for obtaining that outcome when performing that measurement (these probabilities constitute the observer’s information). In the rest of this paper, this is what the term “state” (of the system) will mean. The state of the system must be constructed from measurements previously performed on the system by the observer.

(c) The measuring process. A measurement generally changes an observer’s information about the system on which he performed the measurement, in other words it generally changes the state of the system.

(d) The time-evolution of the system (dynamics).This describes how the probabilities mentioned in (b) change as we move forward (or backward) in time.

We give the following set of postulates as a mathematical description of (a)-(d):

(i) The observables of the system are described by a unital $``$-algebra $`𝔄`$, called the *observable algebra* of the system, in the sense that for every yes/no experiment that can be performed on the system at a given point in time, $`𝔄`$ contains a corresponding projection $`P`$, called *the* projection of the yes/no experiment (at that point in time).

*Remark:* A $``$*-algebra* is a complex vector space with a multiplication law (that need not be commutative) and an adjoint operation $`AA^{}`$. A $``$-algebra is called *unital* if it contains a unit element $`1`$, meaning $`1A=A1=A`$ for all $`A`$ in the algebra. A *projection* is an element $`P`$ having the properties $`P^2=P=P^{}`$. See for example Refs. 5 and 6 for more on $``$-algebras.

(ii) The state of the system is described by a state $`\omega `$ on $`𝔄`$ such that for every yes/no experiment, $`\omega (P)`$ is the probability of getting “yes,” where $`P`$ is the projection of the yes/no experiment at the time at which it is performed.

*Remark:* A *state* on $`𝔄`$ is a linear functional $`\omega `$:$`𝔄`$ which is positive \[$`\omega (A^{}A)0`$\] and normalized \[$`\omega (1)=1`$\].

(iii) Suppose the observer obtains a “yes” for a yes/no experiment performed on the system. After the experiment the state of the system is then given by the state $`\omega ^{}`$ on $`𝔄`$ defined by

$$\omega ^{}(A)=\omega (PAP)/\omega (P)$$
(1)
for all $`A`$ in $`𝔄`$, where $`P`$ is the projection of the yes/no experiment at the point in time at which the experiment was performed. We can view this as the formal definition of an *ideal* measurement.

*Remarks:* As will be explained in Subsections 2.2, 2.3 and 2.4, Eq. (1) is a noncommutative generalization of conditional probability. So, the probabilities which constitute the observer’s information, change according to this (in general noncommutative) conditional probability, when the observer performs a measurement on the system. This change, which happens in both classical and quantum mechanics, does not refer to any influence the measuring instruments might have on the system being measured. Such influences are not described by the (noncommutative) conditional probability (1), but rather by a suitable time-evolution resulting from the interaction between system and measuring instrument, if the interaction is not negligible.

Furthermore, in the case of commuting projections $`P_1`$ and $`P_2`$, we have $`(P_2P_1P_2P_1)^{}(P_2P_1P_2P_1)=P_2P_1P_2P_1`$ (in fact, $`P_2P_1P_2P_1`$ is a projection), hence $`\omega (P_2P_1P_2P_1)0`$, which means that $`0\omega (P_1P_2P_1)\omega (P_2)`$, since $`P_1P_2P_1=(P_2P_1)^{}(P_2P_1)`$. This ensures the compatibility mentioned in the Introduction, namely that $`\omega (P_2)=0`$ implies $`\omega ^{}(P_2)=0`$, where $`\omega ^{}`$ is the state given by Eq. (1) with $`P=P_1`$ after a “yes” in a yes/no experiment with projection $`P_1`$. This always happens in the classical case, since the observable algebra is commutative. A well-known counter example in the quantum case is a sequence of measurements of the polarization of light.

(iv) The time-evolution of the system is given by a one-parameter $``$-automorphism group $`\tau `$ of $`𝔄`$, such that if at time $`0`$ the projection of a given yes/no experiment is $`P`$, then at time $`t`$ the projection of the same yes/no experiment will be $`\tau _t(P)`$. (The choice of when time $`0`$ is, is arbitrary, since $`\tau `$ is a group.) So we’re using the “Heisenberg picture,” namely the time-evolution does not act on the state of the system.

*Remark:* Mathematically this means that $`\tau _t`$ is a $``$-automorphism \[a linear bijection $`𝔄𝔄`$ such that $`\tau _t(AB)=\tau _t(A)\tau _t(B)`$ and $`\tau _t(A^{})=\tau _t(A)^{}`$\] for each $`t`$, with $`\tau _0`$ the identity mapping on $`𝔄`$, and $`\tau _{t+s}=\tau _t\tau _s`$.

These postulates can be viewed as *the general structure of mechanics* in a statistical setting. We now briefly discuss how quantum and classical mechanics fit into this picture.

### 2.2. Classical mechanics

Assume that the system is classical, and that its phase space is $`F`$, which we view purely as a measurable space (in the sense of measure theory; see Ref. 7 for an exposition of the measure theoretic ideas we will use here). The *pure state* of the system is by definition the system’s point in the phase space $`F`$. The state of the system (in the sense of Subsection 2.1) represents the observer’s information regarding the pure state. (The pure state is the state of maximal information.)

We then take the observable algebra as $`𝔄=B_{\mathrm{}}(F)`$, which is the unital $``$-algebra of all bounded complex-valued measurable functions on $`F`$. The multiplication law of $`𝔄`$ is just pointwise multiplication of functions, and the adjoint operation is simply complex conjugation. Note that $`𝔄`$ is commutative (or abelian), in other words $`fg=gf`$ for all $`f,g𝔄`$.

The projections of $`𝔄`$ are the characteristic functions, which we will denote by $`\chi `$. For any measurable set $`SF`$, the *characteristic function* $`\chi _S`$ is the real-valued function on $`F`$ assuming the value $`1`$ on $`S`$, and zero everywhere else. A yes/no experiment can then be viewed as having the form “Is the pure state of the system in $`S`$?” and the projection of this yes/no experiment is $`\chi _S`$. This happens as follows: Any observable $`f`$ of the system can be represented as a measurable function $`f:F`$. (Note that this function can be unbounded, and is therefore not necessarily contained in $`𝔄`$.) If $`f`$ is measured when the pure state is $`x`$, then the precise result would be $`f(x)`$. A yes/no experiment concerning this observable in general has the form “Is the value of $`f`$ in $`V`$?” where $`V`$ is some Borel set in $``$. The projection of this yes/no experiment is $`\chi _{f^1(V)}`$, since $`f^1(V)`$ is the set in phase space corresponding to a value of $`f`$ in $`V`$.

We can describe the observer’s information regarding the pure state of the system by a probability measure $`\mu `$ on $`F`$ such that $`\mu (S)`$ is the probability that the pure state is contained in the measurable set $`S`$. This gives a state $`\omega `$ on $`𝔄`$ defined by

$$\omega (g)=g𝑑\mu \text{.}$$

This indeed describes the system’s state in the sense of postulate (ii), since

$$\omega (\chi _S)=\mu (S)\text{.}$$

For the yes/no experiment with projection $`\chi _S`$, postulate (iii) is equivalent to the probability measure changing in the case of a “yes” to $`\mu ^{}`$ defined by

$$\mu ^{}(U)=\mu (US)/\mu (S)$$
(2)
for any measurable set $`U`$ in $`F`$. Here $`\mu ^{}`$ is the probability measure describing the observer’s information after the yes/no experiment. This equivalence, namely that $`\mu ^{}`$ is the (necessarily unique) probability measure giving the state $`\omega ^{}(g)=g𝑑\mu ^{}`$ on $`𝔄`$ satisfying Eq. (1), follows from standard measure theoretic arguments involving Lebesgue convergence.

From Eq. (2) it is clear that in the classical case postulate (iii) is merely a conditional probability. We therefore view postulate (iii) as a generalization of a conditional probability to the case where the observable algebra can be noncommutative (as is the case for quantum mechanics discussed in Subsection 2.3).

The time-evolution of the system is given by a *flow* $`T_t:FF`$ which for every $`t`$ maps measurable sets to measurable sets, and has the group property $`T_{s+t}=T_sT_t`$ with $`T_0`$ the identity mapping on $`F`$ (which implies that $`T_t`$ is bijective for every $`t`$). This indeed defines a one-parameter $``$-automorphism group on $`𝔄`$ by the Koopman(8) construction

$$\tau _t(g)=gT_t$$

which then gives the time-evolution in the sense of postulate (iv).

It should be clear that what we have described here is little more than probability theory. Physics really only enter once we specify $`F`$ and $`T_t`$. Even so, this is how the general structure can be used as a statistical setting for classical mechanics.

*Remark:* We can in principle consider the state $`\omega `$ and the projections of the various yes/no experiments of the system as being fundamental concepts. The point in phase space is then nothing more than a convenient theoretical construct which can be viewed as the objective state of the system, since it is not changed by the conditional probability during a measurement. When we move to the more general noncommutative setting of quantum mechanics, the idea of an objective state is not possible anymore. The noncommutative conditional probability simply does not allow it. (We return to this in Subsection 2.3.) It therefore seems conceptually sensible not to view the point in phase of a classical system as having fundamental physical significance. This line of thought was also promoted by Born,(9) pp.164-170.

### 2.3. Quantum mechanics

Assume that the system is quantum mechanical, and that its state space is $``$, which is a Hilbert space (for example an $`L^2`$-space containing wave functions). We then take the observable algebra as $`𝔄=𝔏()`$, which is the unital $``$-algebra of all bounded linear operators $``$. Since the observables of the system (represented as linear operators in $``$) can be unbounded, they are not necessarily contained in $`𝔄`$. Rather, $`𝔄`$ contains the spectral projections of the observables. The multiplication law of $`𝔄`$ is usual multiplication of operators, and the adjoint operation is the usual Hilbert adjoint. Note that $`𝔄`$ is noncommutative, in other words there are $`A`$ and $`B`$ in $`𝔄`$ such that $`ABBA`$. (We are assuming that $``$ is a non-trivial state space, that is to say its dimension is greater than one.)

We can describe the observer’s information regarding the system by a density operator (or density matrix) $`\rho `$ on $``$. \[By definition, $`\rho `$ is an element of $`𝔏()`$ with the properties $`\rho 0`$ and Tr$`(\rho )=1`$, where Tr denotes the trace of an operator.\] This gives a state $`\omega `$ on $`𝔄`$ defined by

$$\omega (A)=\text{Tr}(\rho A)$$

which describes the system’s state in the sense of postulate (ii).

For the yes/no experiment with projection $`P`$, postulate (iii) is equivalent to the well known projection postulate

$$\rho ^{}=P\rho P/\text{Tr}(\rho P)$$
(3)
of quantum mechanics, where $`\rho ^{}`$ is the density operator describing the observer’s information after a “yes” was obtained for the yes/no experiment. The equivalence follows from the fact that if Tr$`(\rho _1A)=`$ Tr$`(\rho _2A)`$ for all $`A𝔏()`$ for two density operators $`\rho _1`$ and $`\rho _2`$ on $``$, then setting $`A=\rho _1\rho _2`$ gives

$$(\rho _1\rho _2)^2_1=\text{Tr}((\rho _1\rho _2)^2)=0$$

where $`_1`$ denotes the trace-class norm.(6) Hence $`(\rho _1\rho _2)^2=0`$ and therefore $`\rho _1\rho _2^2=(\rho _1\rho _2)^2=0`$, where $``$ denotes the usual operator norm. So $`\rho _1=\rho _2`$, proving the equivalence, namely that $`\rho ^{}`$ is the *unique* density operator insuring that $`\omega ^{}(A)=`$ Tr$`(\rho ^{}A)`$ satisfies Eq. (1).

Our comments concerning the classical case lead us to conclude that the projection postulate of quantum mechanics is a generalization of conditional probability to the case of a noncommutative observable algebra (also see Bub(2)). So the projection postulate is indeed a quantum Bayes rule, as mentioned in the Introduction. Also see Ref. 10 for a short survey of the closely related idea of noncommutative conditional expectations.

Eq. (3) of course contains the projection postulate for a state vector (and in particular the collapse of a wave function) as a special case. \[One can in fact also work the other way around, deriving postulate (iii) from the projection postulate for a state vector in Hilbert space, through a heuristic argument using the GNS construction.(11)\] Since a measurement generally changes a state vector by the projection postulate, we have to conclude in the framework that we have set up so far, that a state vector is observer dependent rather than being a property of the system (unlike the pure state of a classical system, which can be viewed as having an objective reality). In other words, even when the system’s state $`\omega `$ is given by a state vector $`\psi `$, namely $`\omega (A)=\psi ,A\psi `$, the state is still nothing more than the observer’s information, which changes via the noncommutative conditional probability when a measurement is made. This point of view was also taken by Fuchs and Peres.(12) Another way to see it is as follows: The same density matrix can be obtained from two different sets of state vectors (the two sets having no scalar multiples of state vectors in common), where the vectors from such a set is weighed by probabilities to give the density matrix. Since a density matrix represents the observer’s information, it therefore does not make sense for the observer to say that the system has a state vector when he does not know what the state vector is.

The time-evolution of the system is given in the sense of postulate (iv) by the one-parameter $``$-automorphism group on $`𝔄`$ defined by

$$\tau _t(A)=e^{iHt/\mathrm{}}Ae^{iHt/\mathrm{}}$$

where $`H`$ is the Hamiltonian of the system.

*Remark:* For an observable represented by a (possibly unbounded) self-adjoint linear operator $`A`$ in $``$, the projection of the yes/no experiment “Is the value of $`A`$ in $`V`$?” can be taken as the spectral projection $`\chi _V(A)`$ in terms of the Borel functional calculus on self-adjoint operators; see Ref. 13, pp. 197-200 and 230, for the construction and properties of this calculus. Loosely speaking, this projection represents the part of $`A`$ whose spectrum is contained in the Borel subset $`V`$ of $``$. It is interesting to note that this is very similar to the classical case in Subsection 2.2, where we used $`\chi _{f^1(V)}=\chi _Vf`$ instead of $`\chi _V(A)`$. We can write $`\chi _V(f):=\chi _Vf`$ to complete the analogy, where more generally $`g(f):=gf`$ defines a Borel functional calculus on the measurable functions $`f:F`$ for Borel measurable $`g:`$. Furthermore, for two disjoint Borel sets $`U`$ and $`V`$ in $``$, we have $`\chi _U(A)\chi _V(A)=\chi _{UV}(A)=0`$, so by Eq. (1) two consecutive measurements of the observable $`A`$ (quantum or classical) cannot give contradicting results (namely that $`A`$’s value is in both $`U`$ and $`V`$), as was mentioned just before Subsection 2.1.

The $``$-algebraic (or C\*-algebraic) approach to quantum physics is described at length in Haag.(14)

### 2.4. Information

As mentioned in Subsection 2.2, in the classical case the general structure that we’ve described is actually just probability theory. One can shift the perspective somewhat by saying that in the classical case this general structure is a probabilistic description of information. We also saw that quantum mechanics has exactly the same the general structure, except that it is noncommutative. In particular, the projection postulate of quantum mechanics is a noncommutative conditional probability. The mathematics therefore seem to tell us that the general structure of quantum mechanics is a mathematical framework for the probabilistic description of “noncommutative information.” This noncommutative nature of information in quantum mechanics is what causes the essential difference between quantum mechanics and classical mechanics.

We can view (i)-(iv) as the abstract axioms for a probabilistic description of information. We can define an observer’s *information* as being (the probabilities given by) the state on the observable algebra, along with a rule describing how these probabilities change when new data is received, namely the (noncommutative) conditional probability (iii). The information is called *noncommutative* in the case of the general noncommutative conditional probability. If we were to add to axioms (i)-(iv) the assumption that the observable algebra is commutative, then we get an abstract formulation of classical probability theory with the usual conditional probability, in which case the information can be called *commutative*. The algebras $`B_{\mathrm{}}(F)`$ and $`𝔏()`$ are nothing more than convenient representations (of the commutative and noncommutative cases respectively), suitable for doing physics.

## 3. THE MEASURING PROCESS

Interpreting quantum mechanics as a probabilistic description of noncommutative information, implies that an (ideal) measurement changes an observer’s information, rather than disturbing the system as is often argued (for example in Ref. 15, p. 46). This renders many problems surrounding the measuring process in quantum mechanics no more difficult than in classical mechanics. The answer to both question at the beginning of this paper is simply that the observer’s information changed (i.e., the observer received new data), exactly as for the corresponding classical questions. (In particular this means that consciousness has no role to play in the measuring process. The observer could be a computer connected to a measuring instrument, or the measuring instrument itself, as long as it can obtain information about the system.) We give a few more examples:

(a) The Heisenberg cut. This refers to an imaginary dividing line between the observer and the system being observed (see for example Ref. 16, pp. 419-421 and 439-445, and Ref. 14, p. 295). It can be seen as the place where information crosses from the system to the observer, but it leads to the question of where exactly it should be; where does the observer begin? In practice it’s not really a problem: It doesn’t matter where the cut is. It is merely a philosophical question which is already present in classical mechanics, since in the classical case information also passes from the system to the observer and one could again ask where the observer begins. The Heisenberg cut is therefore no more problematic in quantum mechanics than in classical mechanics.

(b) When does the collapse of the wave function take place and how long does it take? This is essentially the Heisenberg cut with space replaced by time. One can pose the question as follows: When does an observer “absorb” the data (i.e., when does the measurement take place, or when does the observer’s information change), and how long does it take? Again the quantum case is no different from the classical case, and moreover, in practice it is no more of a problem than in the classical case.

(c) Continuous observation (see Refs. 17 and 18 for example). The ideal measurement discussed in Section 2 refers to a single measurement made at some point in time. It can therefore not be applied directly to continuous observation, i.e. when the observer’s information is continually changing. However, in classical mechanics this is not considered a conceptual problem, since one could in principle describe such a situation as a continual change in the probability distribution (probability measure) describing the information, even though it might be a difficult technical problem in practice. The same is true in quantum mechanics, with the probability distribution replaced by a state representing noncommutative information. (In quantum mechanics however, the idea of continuous observation is probably an idealization, for example watching something without blinking your eyes is not a continuous measurement, since the photons registered by your retina are discrete.)

The “paradox of the watched pot that never boils” (called *Zeno’s paradox* by Misra and Sudarshan(19)) is resolved by noting that if an observer continuously measures a certain observable, then the system can still evolve in time to produce other values for the observable if the measurement is not precise (as is typically the case). Say the observer measures an observable $`A`$ which has a discrete spectrum, and he can only determine its value up to some interval containing (at a point in time) a number of eigenvalues of the observable, say $`a_1,\mathrm{},a_n`$. Then the state vector is projected onto the subspace spanned by the eigenstates (at that point in time) corresponding to $`a_1,\mathrm{},a_n`$, in other words, onto the subspace which at that point in time corresponds to the interval (keep in mind that time-evolution acts on the observable algebra, and hence on the eigenstates of the observable). This happens according to postulate (iii); see for example Ref. 20, pp. 260-266. To clarify our argument, we assume here that before the continuous measurement starts, the observer has maximal information, i.e. his information is a state vector \[the general case does not differ significantly, since it is still handled with the same projection postulate (iii)\]. Note that the state is now still a state vector, and not a mixture of the eigenstates corresponding to $`a_1,\mathrm{},a_n`$. The interval which is measured (and hence the eigenvalues of $`A`$ contained in it) can change in the course of time (for example it can drift up and down the real line), simply because of the lack of precision in the continuous measurement. Therefore the value of $`A`$ can change within this drifting interval, in turn allowing the drifting interval’s average location to change accordingly, which is what the observer sees. In the mathematics this looks as follows: The continuous measurement confines the state vector via the projection postulate to the “drifting” subspace corresponding to the drifting interval. The observable’s eigenstates are evolving in time, but since this drifting subspace contains many eigenstates of the observable at any point in time, the projection postulate does not cause the state vector to be “dragged along” by one of the time-evolving eigenstates. Also, since the interval is drifting, eigenstates are moving in and out of the subspace. Therefore the state vector can be projected onto subspaces containing new eigenstates (corresponding to new eigenvalues), with eigenstates brought closer to the state vector by time-evolution having higher probability. (This argument becomes somewhat clearer in the Schrödinger picture, where the eigenstates are fixed, but the subspace is still drifting.)

If the continuous measurement is precise enough, then quantum mechanics indeed predict that “a watched pot never boils” if the observable’s eigenvalues are discrete (precise measurement of a continuous observable is impossible in practice). This happens because a quantum measurement can invalidate previous information (i.e. the state vector can change by projection) which then “cancels out” the changes due to time-evolution acting on the observable algebra (and thus on the observable’s eigenvectors onto which projection of the state vector occurs). In effect the state vector is dragged along by the time-evolving eigenstate corresponding to the measured value. In classical mechanics on the other hand, previous information is not invalidated by measurement, hence the pure state of a system will not change because of continuous observation, and therefore the values of observables can change as time-evolution acts on the observable algebra. Note that this is true even if the classical observable being observed is discrete (for example “number of particles in the left half of the container”). So no matter how closely we watch a classical pot, it can still boil.

(d) The EPR “paradox.” Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen(21) described a now famous experiment in which two particles are created together (or interact) and then move away from each other (which ends any interaction between them) before a measurement is performed on one of the particles. This measurement then gives corresponding data about the other particle as well. \[This is the result of an entanglement of the two particles’ states (for example due to a conservation law), which can occur since the state space is the tensor product of the two particles’ state spaces.\] EPR argued that this means that the second particle simultaneously has values for two noncommuting observables like position and momentum, since only the first particle is measured (either its position or its momentum is measured, but not both), and hence quantum mechanics must be incomplete, since it says that a particle does not simultaneously have values for position and momentum. They based this on the idea that a measurement on the first particle does not disturb the second. However, we have viewed a measurement as the reception of data by the observer; it has nothing to do with the observer “directly” observing (and disturbing) the system. Measuring the first particle gives the observer data regarding the second particle as well (and hence *is* a measurement of the second particle), which is mathematically described by the second particle’s state vector (representing the observer’s *noncommutative* information about this particle) now being in an eigenspace of the observable which was measured. This is no different from the analogous situation in classical mechanics where for example conservation of momentum can give the second particle’s momentum when the first particle’s momentum is measured, except that in this case information is commutative.

We can even have two observers A and B measuring the same observable of the two particles respectively. A’s measurement is then also a measurement of the value B will get (A receives data about what B’s result will be) and so there’s nothing strange in them getting correlated results (say opposite values for momentum). No signal need travel faster than the speed of light to B’s particle to “tell” it to have the opposite value to A’s result, in the same way that no such signal is needed in the classical case. From A’s point of view, B is part of the system along with the two particles, and so this experiment is really no different from the original one observer EPR experiment above. The particles *along with* B are in a superposition of states from A’s point of view until A measures his particle, which reduces (by projection) the state vector of the combined system of particles and B, with B then in the eigenspace “B gets the opposite value.”

(e) System and observer as a combined system (see Ref. 22, pp. 175-183, for a short and clear discussion). Here the time-evolution of the combined system is supposed to account for the projection postulate of quantum mechanics. This is not possible in a natural way, since time-evolution is the result of a one-parameter $``$-automorphism group. In classical mechanics the combined system evolves according to classical dynamics (the observer being thought of as a classical system in this case), and this then similarly would have to account for the change in the observer’s information via a conditional probability due to a measurement he performs on the system. Again this is not possible in a natural way, since here too we have the same projection postulate, namely the conditional probability (1), acting on the state (of the system without observer), while the time-evolution acts as a one-parameter $``$-automorphism group on the observable algebra. The solution is that the state of the combined system has to contain from the start the fact that the observer will perform a measurement on the system at a given point in time and will subsequently experience a change of information (this change is a physical process in the observer, described by the combined system’s time-evolution, for example some neural activity in a human observer’s brain), otherwise such a measurement and the change of information would not take place. This is clear, since time-evolution does not act on the state, but on the observable algebra, hence the state of the combined system is the state “for all time” and does not change when the observer performs a measurement. Exactly the same is true for quantum mechanics (where the observer is then also viewed as a quantum system). The (noncommutative) conditional probability, that is to say the projection postulate, is only relevant when the observer is not considered to be part of the system, in which case the conditional probability says what the change in the observer’s information will be, it does not describe the physical process taking place in the observer to accommodate (or store) the new information.

The point we attempt to make with these examples is that, even though there might be certain problems surrounding the measuring process, quantum mechanics does not introduce any conceptual problems not already present in classical mechanics, as long as we assume that information is noncommutative in quantum mechanics.

In connection with the two-slit experiment we can mention the following: Assume that the probability density function for the position of detection of a particle on the screen in the two-slit experiment is given by an interference pattern when no measurement is performed at the two open slits. This density function represents the observer’s information about where on the screen the particle will be detected. In the light of our discussion thus far, it should then not be too surprising that this density function (i.e. the observer’s information) can be invalidated via the noncommutative conditional probability (1), if the observer does measure through which slit the particle goes (i.e. if the observer receives new data), giving a completely different probability density function at the screen, for example points that had zero probability density now having positive probability density, as mentioned in the Introduction. This is unlike the classical case where a measurement at the slits gives the observer more information, rather than invalidating previous information. (Also see Ref. 2.)

We can also consider the case of more than one observer touched upon in (d). Say three observers A, B and C are observing the same system, but B and C are not aware of each other or of A. B and C measure two noncommuting observables $`P`$ and $`Q`$ respectively, in the order $`P`$, $`Q`$, $`P`$, and A in turn measures B and C’s results in this order ( he “sees” each of their results at the time they obtain them). We ignore the time-evolution of the system. Say the results are $`p_1`$, $`q`$, $`p_2`$ (in this order), then clearly $`p_1`$ and $`p_2`$ need not be the same since $`P`$ and $`Q`$ do not commute. So from B’s point of view it seems that something disturbed the system between his two measurements of $`P`$. However, in our interpretation it is actually B’s information that has been invalidated by A and C’s measurement of $`Q`$. This is not too strange, since B and C are merely A’s measuring instruments. One could ask what would happen if A wasn’t there. Would B then get $`p_1=p_2`$ with probability one? In the absence of A, does it even make sense to talk of the time order $`P`$, $`Q`$, $`P`$ if B and C are not aware of each other? In our interpretation time ordering should probably be viewed as in some way defined by events where data is received by an observer, and in this case it seems possible that B would get $`p_1=p_2`$ with probability one in the absence of A and no other way to define the time ordering. (Note that in the two-slit experiment for example, there is a time ordering in the sense that a measurement on a particle at the slits is performed before a measurement on the same particle at the screen, even if the measurements are performed by two different observers not aware of each other, so the interference pattern at the screen can still be destroyed in this setup.) The idea of defining time ordering in terms of a series of events (an event in our case being the reception of data by an observer, or alternatively, a change in an observer’s information) was introduced by Finkelstein.(23)

## 4. DISCUSSION

We have now seen that the general structure of quantum mechanics is actually a mathematical framework for handling noncommutative information, rather than being a physical theory in itself.

If we assume that information in our physical world is described by quantum mechanics, this leads us to conclude that information is actually a noncommutative phenomenon. Perhaps this means that since information “lives” in spacetime (and possibly in some way defines spacetime structure as was alluded to at the end of Section 3), spacetime itself is noncommutative, as has been suggested in attempts to construct quantum spacetime and quantum gravity; see for example Ref. 24. On the other extreme, the term “noncommutative information” may be a “purely grammatical trick” of the sort Marsden,(25) p. 188, mused might “be the ultimate solution of the quantum measurement problem”; this possibility seems somewhat less interesting however.

It also explains the linearity of quantum mechanics. The general structure of classical mechanics in Section 2 is linear, since it is nothing more than probability theory, even though it can be applied to physical systems where nonlinear aspects might be involved. It is the statistical point of view that makes everything linear (this boils down to the use of averages, which are integrals and hence linear). The same goes for quantum mechanics. Its linear structure should not be viewed as an approximation to an underlying nonlinear world, but simply as a result of the fact that it is a mathematical framework for probability theory (i.e. statistics, averages), where the information involved happens to be noncommutative. The appearance of a Hilbert space as the state space is simply a mathematical way of representing the noncommutative $``$-algebraic general structure in Section 2. So the linearity of (and hence superpositions in) the state space is just a convenient way to express the fact that a measurement can invalidate the information the observer had before the measurement, or more precisely, to express noncommutative conditional probabilities. Also see Ref. 14, p. 309, and Ref. 26, p. 175, for similar remarks concerning the linearity of quantum mechanics.

A review of quantum mechanics viewed as a generalization of classical probability theory can be found in Ref. 27.

We cannot claim that this noncommutative information interpretation solves all the conceptual problems of quantum physics, but for the general situation of a quantum mechanical system being observed by an observer, it does seem to clarify many issues without causing any new problems (except if you consider the idea of noncommutative information itself to be a problem).

## ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I thank the National Research Foundation, as well as the Mellon Foundation Mentoring Programme at the University of Pretoria, for financial support.

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text:
# Multipulse Control of Decoherence

## I Introduction

The reliability of quantum information rests on the stability of quantum superposed state. Since the quantum superposition is vulnerable to the effect of the environment, the degradation of the superposed state would affect the accuracy of the quantum information, especially in quantum computation.

In order to reduce errors caused by the environmental effects, many methods have been proposed. These are roughly divided into two categories whether the methods requires ancillary bits or not. Since the first proposal by Shorshor , considerable works on the methods with additional qubits have been done to overcome the error by distributing the information of a qubit over several qubits gottesman ; laflamme ; calderbank ; steane ; zanardi1 ; zanardi2  including experimental studies of NMRcory ; viola ; fortunato  and trapped ions kielpinski . However, in these methods, it has been a main problem to keep the coherence of all the qubits including ancillary bits, which may be an obstacle for scale up of quantum computer.

Two distinctive approaches have been taken to attain strategies for control of decoherence without additional bits. Firstly, closed-loop control (quantum feedback) method has been proposedvitali1 ; vitali2 ; vitali3 ; vitali4 . Since they require the measurement on the system to control the error, the quantum detection efficiency gives a limitation to execution of the control. The other method to suppress the error by decoherence without ancillary bit has been called the open-loop controlllyod1 ; ban ; luming . In the pioneering works of Viola and Lloydllyod1 , and Banban , they have proposed that a pulse train can be used to eliminate pure dephasing of a spin caused by interaction with a quantum reservoir. They assume that the spin linearly interacts with boson reservoir. The pure dephasing of superposed state is successfully suppressed by applying many successive short $`\pi `$ pulses. An actual evaluation has been done by using the coupling function for the macroscopic tunneling phenomena as proposed by Caldeira and LeggettCaldeira . Although the pulse methods have been well known in the field of NMR to decouple unnecessary spin-spin interactionernst , their formulation can also be applied to suppress decoherence in various systems other than the nuclear spin system. The applicability has been generally discussed in lloyd2 . Application of a $`2\pi `$ pulse train to a two-level system, which interacts with a boson reservoir by continuous coupling function, has been studied to discuss the controllability of unwanted spontaneous emissionagarwal1 ; agarwal2 . The magnetic state decoherence by collisions in a vapor has been analyzed to be suppressed by ultra fast pulsessearch1 ; search2 . Moreover, the method is applied to the damped vibrational mode of a chain of trapped ionsvitali .

It is however noted that, in the analysis llyod1 ; ban , the interaction between the spin and bosons are assumed to be linear in the boson field amplitude. We should recall that in many systems the dephasing phenomena cannot be described with the linearly interacting spin-boson model, except for the ohmic case of the Caldeira-Leggett model. This is because the dephasing rate is given by the zero-frequency component of the power spectrum of interaction amplitude aihara1 ; aihara2 . A typical example is a localized-electron phonon system in which the phonon with zero frequency (i.e., translation of a whole crystal) does not interact with the $`\frac{1}{2}`$ spin (the two-level electron). The nonlinear interaction between the spin and phonons, where simultaneous multiple absorption and emission of phonons occurs, should be taken into account for the correct description of the dephasing phenomenon. In order to discuss the effectiveness and generality of the multipulse control of qubits, a spin-boson model that includes nonlinear interaction is necessary.

In this paper, we present a general formulation free from a specific form of interaction, and apply this to the two cases (1)a phenomenological two-level model where the correlation function of the interaction decays exponentially and (2)a quadratically interacting localized-electron phonon system.

This paper is composed as follows: In section II , a general formula which describes spin dynamics under multipulse control is obtained for an arbitrary interaction with the cumulant expansion method. The expression is written with the correlation function of interaction amplitude. In section III, we first apply the formula to a simple case of the exponentially decaying correlation function in order to generally discuss the memory effect of the reservoir causing the spin dephasing. We next apply the formula to a quadratically interacting localized-electron phonon system, and the dynamical behavior of spin is analyzed. Discussion and concluding remarks for the usefulness of the multipulse control of spin dephasing are given in section IV.

## II A General Formula of the multipulse control

We consider the pure dephasing phenomena of a $`\frac{1}{2}`$ spin caused by an interaction with a reservoir. Here and hence force, we use the term “spin” as an arbitrary two-level quantum system with energy difference $`\mathrm{¯}h\omega `$. The Hamiltonian of this system is

$$_R=_0+_{SB},$$
(1)
where $`_0`$ and $`_{SB}`$ are defined by

$`_0`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{¯}h\omega S_z+_B,`$ (2)
$`_{SB}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{¯}hS_zB.`$ (3)
Here $`S_z`$ is the z-component of the $`\frac{1}{2}`$ spin, $`_B`$ is a Hamiltonian of the reservoir and $`B`$ is an interaction amplitude operator which consists of reservoir operators and causes the energy change in the energy difference between two states due to reservoir.

It is our purpose to study effectiveness of a multipulse control on this spin system. Assuming that pulse duration is so short that the spin-reservoir interaction is ignored during pulse excitation, we write the corresponding Hamiltonian $`_P`$ during a pulse as

$$_P(t)=_0+W_P(t),$$
(4)
where $`W_P(t)`$ denotes:

$$W_P(t)=\frac{1}{2}\stackrel{}{H}\stackrel{}{\mu }(S_+e^{i\omega t}+S_{}e^{i\omega t}).$$
(5)
Here we consider the case where an applied square pulse of the magnetic field $`\stackrel{}{H}`$ is on resonance with the spin whose magnetic moment is defined by $`\stackrel{}{\mu }`$. Using an electric field instead of the magnetic field $`\stackrel{}{H}`$ and a dielectric moment instead of the magnetic moment $`\stackrel{}{\mu }`$, we can apply the following formulation to an electronic state in a quantum dot.

The phase information of the spin is obtained by calculating the off-diagonal element of the reduced density operator, $`1|Tr_R\rho (t)|0`$ where $`|1(|0)`$ is the upper (lower) state of the spin, $`\rho (t)`$ is the density operator of the total system and $`Tr_R`$ denotes the trace operation over the degrees of the freedom of the reservoir. When we apply regular multiple pulses with an interval $`\tau _s`$ and a pulse duration $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ after applying a pulse at an initial time ($`t=0`$), the quantity is written as

$`1|Tr_R\rho (t)|0`$
$`=Tr_R1|e^{iL_R(t(N\tau _s+\mathrm{\Delta }t))}T_+[e^{i_{N\tau _s}^{N\tau _s+\mathrm{\Delta }t}𝑑t^{}L_{P,j}(t^{})}]`$
$`\times \{{\displaystyle \underset{j=0}{\overset{N1}{}}}e^{iL_R(\tau _s\mathrm{\Delta }t)}T_+[e^{i_{j\tau _s}^{j\tau _s+\mathrm{\Delta }t}𝑑t^{}L_{P,j}(t^{})}]\}\rho (0)|0,`$
where $`T_+`$ is the time ordering symbol from right to left, and $`L_\nu (\nu =\{P,j\}or\{R\})`$ is the Liouville operator defined as

$$iL_\nu \mathrm{}\frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}[_\nu ,\mathrm{}],$$
(7)
and $`_{P,j}`$ is the Hamiltonian during the $`j`$-th pulse.

For later convenience, we introduce the hyperspace notation as $`|mn||mn`$, $`Tr[(|kl|)^{}|mn|]kl|mn`$ and $`Tr[(|kl|)^{}(O|mn|)]kl|O|mn`$ for an arbitrary hyperoperator $`O`$. Using the completeness relation,

$$\underset{m=0,1}{}\underset{n=0,1}{}|mnmn|=1,$$
(8)
Eq.(LABEL:eqn:6) is separated into the following elements as

$`kl|e^{i_{t_1}^{t_2}𝑑t^{}L_P(t^{})}|mn`$ (9)
$`=e^{i\omega \{(kl)t_2(mn)t_1\}}(\mathrm{cos}({\displaystyle \frac{\theta }{2}})\delta _{k,m}+i\mathrm{sin}({\displaystyle \frac{\theta }{2}})(1\delta _{k,m}))`$
$`\times (\mathrm{cos}({\displaystyle \frac{\theta }{2}})\delta _{n,l}i\mathrm{sin}({\displaystyle \frac{\theta }{2}})s(1\delta _{n,l}))`$
with the so-called pulse area $`\theta \frac{(t_2t_1)}{\mathrm{¯}h}\stackrel{}{\mu }\stackrel{}{H}`$, and

$$kl|e^{iL_Rt}\rho _R|mn=\delta _{k,m}\delta _{l,n}\mathrm{exp}[iL_{m,n}t]\rho _R.$$
(10)
In Eq.(10), $`\rho _R`$ is the density operator for the reservoir, and

$$L_{m,n}\rho _R=_{B,m}\rho _R\rho _R_{B,n},$$
(11)
with

$$_{B,m}=\frac{2m1}{2}(\mathrm{¯}h\omega +B)+_B.$$
(12)
Now we consider the case where we first apply a $`\frac{\pi }{2}`$ pulse to generate a superposed spin state at an initial time ($`t=0`$) and then apply $`N`$ times of $`\pi `$ pulses with constant interval $`\tau _s`$. Assuming the initial total system to be

$$\rho (0)=\rho _R(0)|00|$$
(13)
and using Eqs. (7) $``$ (12), we have for even $`N`$,

$`1|Tr_R\rho (t)|0`$
$`=Tr_R[10|e^{iL_R(tN\tau _s)}|10`$
$`\times \{01|e^{iL_R\tau _s}|0110|e^{iL_R\tau _s}|10\}^{\frac{N}{2}}\rho _R]`$
$`=Tr_R[e^{iL_{1,0}(tN\tau _s)}\{e^{iL_{0,1}\tau _s}e^{iL_{1,0}\tau _s}\}^{\frac{N}{2}}\rho _R]`$
$`=Tr_R[e^{i_{B,1}(tN\tau _s)}\{e^{i_{B,0}\tau _s}e^{i_{B,1}\tau _s}\}^{\frac{N}{2}}`$
$`\times \rho _R\{e^{i_{B,0}\tau _s}e^{i_{B,1}\tau _s}\}^{\frac{N}{2}}e^{i_{B,0}(tN\tau _s)}`$
In the last line of Eq.(LABEL:eqn:18b), the exponentials with exponent $`_{B,1}`$ and $`_{B,0}`$ alternately appear, which reflects the switching between states $`|1`$ and $`|0`$ by $`\pi `$ pulses. This is schematically drawn in Fig.1. The diagram consists of two parallel straight lines: the upper(lower) line is associated with forward (backward) time evolution of $`\rho _R`$ in Eq.(LABEL:eqn:18b). The arrow indicates the direction of time evolution. The thick (thin) line segment corresponds to the time evolution in the state $`|1`$ ($`|0`$).

We can rewrite Eq.(LABEL:eqn:18b) in the form

$`1|Tr_R\rho (t)|0`$ (15)
$`=(1)^N{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}e^{i\omega (tN\tau _s)}Tr_R[U(\tau _s,(t(N1)\tau _s))`$
$`\times U^{}(0,\tau _s)U^{}(2\tau _s,3\tau _s)\mathrm{}U^{}((N2)\tau _s,(N1)\tau _s)`$
$`\times \rho _R(0)`$
$`\times U((N3)\tau _s,(N2)\tau _s)\mathrm{}U(3\tau _s,4\tau _s)U(\tau _s,2\tau _s)`$
$`\times U^{}(0,\tau _s)],`$
where we use the relation

$$e^{\frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}(_B+B)(t_1t_2))}=e^{\frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}_0t_1}U(t_1,t_2)e^{\frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}_0t_2}$$
(16)
and

$`U(t_1,t_2)`$ $``$ $`T_+[\mathrm{exp}[{\displaystyle \frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}}{\displaystyle _{t_1}^{t_2}}𝑑t^{}B(t^{})]],`$ (17)
$`B(t)`$ $``$ $`e^{\frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}_Bt}Be^{\frac{i}{\mathrm{¯}h}_Bt}.`$ (18)
Using the diagram method in Appendix A to take up to the second order of $`B(t)`$ in cumulant expansion, we obtain the signal intensity for the coherently oscillating spin described by the off-diagonal element of the reduced density operator, $`1|Tr_R\rho (t)|0`$, as

$`I(t)`$ $``$ $`|1|Tr_R\rho (t)|0|^2`$ (19)
$`=\mathrm{exp}[2((1)^N{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{N}{}}}(1)^n(4n2)S((Nn+1)\tau _s)`$
$`+(1)^{N1}{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{N}{}}}2(1)^{n+1}S(tn\tau _s)`$
$`+(1)^NS(t))],`$
where we introduce the second cumulant as

$$S(t)_0^t𝑑t_1_0^{t_1}𝑑t_2Re[B(t_1)B(t_2)].$$
(20)
Although the formula (19) is obtained up to the second order of $`B(t)`$ in cumulant expansion, we should recall that the formula can explain the pure dephasing in many systems where spin-reservoir interaction is composed of a strong linear interaction and a relatively weak nonlinear one. This is because (1) the higher-order cumulants vanish irrespective of the coupling strength for the nondegenerate two-level system linearly interacting with the boson reservoirkotani , and (2) they are negligible for the nonlinearly interacting system if the interaction is sufficiently weak.

The quantity $`S(t)`$ can be rewritten as

$$S(t)=_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}\frac{d\omega }{2\pi }J(\omega )\frac{1\mathrm{cos}\omega t}{\omega ^2},$$
(21)
where $`J(\omega )`$ is the power spectrum defined by

$$J(\omega )_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}𝑑te^{i\omega t}B(t)B(0).$$
(22)
The obtained general formula (19) describes the spin dynamics under multipulse control in terms of the correlation function of the interaction between system and reservoir without specifying the form of interaction amplitude $`B`$, and can be applied to various systems.

At the last part of this section, we consider the asymptotic behavior of the quantity $`S(t)`$ in the long time region. Rewriting Eq.(21) into the form as

$`S(t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{d\omega }{2\pi }}J(\omega ){\displaystyle \frac{1\mathrm{cos}\omega t}{\omega ^2}}`$ (23)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{d\omega }{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1\mathrm{cos}\omega t}{\pi t\omega ^2}}J(\omega )t,`$
we have an asymptotic form as

$$S(t)\frac{J(0)}{2}t,$$
(24)
since

$$\frac{1\mathrm{cos}\omega t}{\pi t\omega ^2}\delta (\omega ),$$
(25)
in the long time region ($`t\tau _c`$). The relation (24) means that the quantity $`S(t)`$ for large $`t`$ is determined by the value $`J(0)`$, the power spectrum at $`\omega =0`$. Using the definition of $`\frac{J(0)}{2}=\frac{1}{T_2}`$, we find that the general formula (19) under the multipulse control with the long interval is reduced to

$$I(t)=|Tr_R1|\rho (t)|0|^2\mathrm{exp}[\frac{2}{T_2}t].$$
(26)
The multipulse control does not work in this situation. However, as the pulse interval becomes short, the effectiveness of pulse control increases. We will show it by evaluating concrete cases in the next section.

## III Model Calculation

Now we apply the general formula obtained in the previous section to the following two cases: (1) a phenomenological two-level model where the correlation function of the interaction decays exponentially, and (2) a spin-boson model where a spin nonlinearly interacts with a boson reservoir.

### III.1 Phenomenological Two-Level Model

In order to consider the general behavior of spin dynamics and to find model-independent results, we first apply the expression (19) to a spin system interacting with the reservoir where correlation function exponentially decays as

$$B(t_1)B(t_2)=\mathrm{\Delta }^2\mathrm{exp}[|t_1t_2|/\tau _c],$$
(27)
where $`\tau _c`$ denotes the correlation time of the reservoir and $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ is the strength of the interaction. In this case, Eq.(20) is written as

$$S(t)=\mathrm{\Delta }^2\tau _c\{t\tau _c(1e^{t/\tau _c})\}.$$
(28)
Although the correlation function (27) is simple, we can find various features depending on the ratio $`t/\tau _c`$. In the long time region ($`t\tau _c`$), the time evolution of the spin is characterized by

$$S(t)=\mathrm{\Delta }^2\tau _ct=\frac{t}{T_2},$$
(29)
where we defined the dephasing time $`T_2(\mathrm{\Delta }^2\tau _c)^1`$. (Using Eq.(22) and Eq.(27), we have $`J(0)=2\mathrm{\Delta }^2\tau _c=\frac{2}{T_2}`$.) Since the memory of the detailed information on the interaction with the reservoir is lost, the time evolution becomes fully irreversible and multipulse control is not effective. However, the multipulse control with sufficiently short pulse interval works well as shown below, because the memory effect of the reservoir plays an important role in the short time region. Equation (28) gives the dependence of $`\mathrm{ln}[I(t)]`$ at the pulse applied time $`t_N(N\tau _s)`$ for even $`N`$ in the form

$`\mathrm{ln}[I(t_N)]`$ (30)
$`={\displaystyle \frac{2}{T_2}}\{t_N+(1+e^{\frac{t_N}{\tau _c}}2N)\tau _c`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{\left(2e^{\frac{\left(\tau _st_N\right)}{\tau _c}}+2e^{\frac{t_N}{\tau _c}}+4N\right)\tau _c}{1+e^{\frac{\tau _s}{\tau _c}}}}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{4\left(e^{\frac{\tau _s}{\tau _c}}+e^{\frac{t_N}{\tau _c}}\right)\tau _c}{\left(1+e^{\frac{\tau _s}{\tau _c}}\right)^2}}\}.`$
In the case of large $`\tau _s`$ ($`\tau _c`$), we obtain the following approximate expression

$$\mathrm{ln}[I(t_N)]\frac{2}{T_2^e}t_N,$$
(31)
introducing an effective dephasing time:

$$T_2^e\frac{T_2}{(1+\left(\frac{1}{N}2\right)\frac{\tau _c}{\tau _s})}.$$
(32)
Comparing Eq.(31) and Eq.(26), we find that the effective dephasing time $`T_2^e`$ increases with decreasing $`\frac{\tau _s}{\tau _c}`$ to give suppression by the multipulse control.

Using the dimensionless time scale normalized by the dephasing time $`T_2`$ as $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_{c(s)}\tau _{c(s)}/T_2`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{t}_N\tau _{c(s)}/T_2`$, we evaluate the signal intensity $`\mathrm{ln}[I(\stackrel{~}{t}_N)]`$ as a function of a pulse application time for several values of the pulse interval $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s`$, while the correlation time $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_c`$ is fixed to 0.02 (see Fig.2 ).

When the pulse interval $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s`$ is much larger than the correlation time ($`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s=0.5`$), the decay is nearly determined by the pure dephasing time $`T_2`$. As $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s`$ decreases to $`0.1`$, we can see that the decay of the $`\mathrm{ln}[I(\stackrel{~}{t}_N)]`$ becomes slow. This means that the pulse train recovers the phase coherence. When the pulse interval becomes much shorter than the correlation time ($`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s=0.005`$), we can see that the pure dephasing is highly suppressed.

Evaluating numerically effective dephasing time $`T_2^e`$ from the decay time at sufficiently large time $`\stackrel{~}{t}=10`$, we show the pulse-interval dependence of the effective dephasing time $`T_2^e`$ in Fig.3. We find $`T_2^e`$ becomes large for sufficiently small pulse interval and monotonously decreases to an asymptotic value $`0.5`$.

Let us consider in more detail the physical origin why the dephasing is suppressed by the pulse-train control. The general formula (19) gives the time evolution of the system between the pulses as well as the values on the pulse-applied time. Figure 4 shows the time dependence of $`\mathrm{ln}[I(\stackrel{~}{t})]`$ during the multipulse control for $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s=0.05,0.1`$ and $`0.2`$ with a constant correlation time ($`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_c=0.02`$). We can see the decay recovers between the pulses. This is because the applied $`\pi `$ pulses cause the time reversal for spin dynamics. The degree of recovery reflects to what extent the memory of the interaction with the reservoir remains, which depends on the ratio $`\frac{\tau _s}{\tau _c}`$.

The memory effects of the reservoir in optically excited systems have been extensively studied during the past couple of decades as the non-Markovian optical problemaihara1 ; aihara3 ; agarwal3 ; fainberg ; vogel ; tchenio ; nibbering ; bigot ; lavoine ; saikan ; hamm . We should stress that the dephasing control by a $`\pi `$-pulse train discussed here is one of the most typical and clear phenomena arising from the finiteness of the correlation time.

### III.2 Nonlinear Spin-Boson Model

Applying the formula (19) to the case where the correlation of the interaction between system and reservoir is written in an exponential form, we have quantitatively evaluated $`\mathrm{ln}[I(\stackrel{~}{t})]`$ and discussed the physical origin of the suppression of the pure dephasing. Next we consider a microscopic case where the pure dephasing occurs by the interaction between a $`\frac{1}{2}`$ spin and a reservoir which consists of bosons. While the standard spin-boson modelCaldeira  has been often used to describe pure dephasing by linear spin-reservoir interaction, there exist many dephasing phenomena which cannot be explained without non-linear spin-reservoir interaction. A typical example of this situation is the pure dephasing phenomena of a localized electron in a solid. The dephasing phenomena, which are originated from the interaction with phonons, cannot be described by assuming the interaction to be linear where absorption and emission of one phonon occurs. As shown in sec.II, the long time behavior is described by the value of the spectrum $`J(\omega )`$ at $`\omega =0`$ (see Eq.(24)). In the case of linear interaction, the value $`J(0)`$ corresponds to the interaction with the acoustic phonon at the wave number $`k=0`$, which corresponds to the translation of the whole solid without distortion. Since such a motion does not affect the electron, the pure dephasing cannot be described with the standard spin-boson modelCaldeira . We need to consider a nonlinear interaction with the reservoir. The reason why the linear spin-boson model cannot generally describe the pure dephasing is given in Appendix B.

In this paper, assuming the reservoir to be composed of the infinite number of bosons

$$_B=\underset{l}{}\mathrm{¯}h\omega _lb_l^{}b_l,$$
(33)
in an equilibrium state with temperature $`T`$, we take into account the quadratic interaction between the spin and reservoir as

$`_{SB}=\mathrm{¯}hS_zB`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{¯}h}{2}}S_z{\displaystyle \underset{l}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{m}{}}h_{lm}\sqrt{\omega _l\omega _m}(b_l+b_l^{})(b_m+b_m^{}).`$
The interaction Hamiltonian (LABEL:eqn:41) describes simultaneous absorption and/or emission of two phonons with frequencies $`\omega _l`$ and $`\omega _m`$ where interaction strength is $`h_{lm}`$. The term $`b_l^{}b_m`$ in the above interaction Hamiltonian causes the emission of a phonon with frequency $`\omega _l`$ and the absorption of a phonon with frequency $`\omega _m`$ at the same time. The energy change of this process is $`\mathrm{¯}h(\omega _l\omega _m)`$, and therefore it contributes to $`J(\omega =0)`$ as shown below. This is the reason why the nonlinear interaction is essential when we consider the pure dephasing phenomena.

The quadratic interaction gives the correlation function in Eq.(22) of the form

$`B(t)B(0)`$ (35)
$`={\displaystyle \underset{l}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{m}{}}h_{lm}^2\omega _l\omega _m\{(n(\omega _l)+1)(n(\omega _m)+1)e^{i(\omega _l+\omega _m)t}`$
$`+2n(\omega _l)(n(\omega _m)+1)e^{i(\omega _l\omega _m)t}`$
$`+n(\omega _l)n(\omega _m)e^{i(\omega _l+\omega _m)t}\},`$
where $`n(\omega )`$ is the boson distribution function:

$$n(\omega )=\frac{1}{e^{\mathrm{¯}h\omega /k_BT}1}.$$
(36)
We rewrite the summation over the label of the boson in Eq.(35) into an integral form to give the power spectrum $`J(\omega )`$ in Eq.(22) by using the following relation,

$`{\displaystyle \underset{l}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{m}{}}h_{lm}^2f(\omega _l,\omega _m)`$ (37)
$`={\displaystyle \underset{l}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{m}{}}h_{lm}^2\delta (e\omega _l)\delta (e^{}\omega _m)f(e,e^{})`$
$`={\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑e{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑e^{}h(e)h(e^{})f(e,e^{})`$
where $`h(\omega )`$ is a spectral density of the coupling function for the spin-reservoir interaction and $`f(\omega ,\omega ^{})`$ is an arbitrary function of $`\omega `$ and $`\omega ^{}`$.

When the spectral density of the coupling function is assumed to be a Gaussian distribution with mean frequency $`\omega _p`$ and variance $`\gamma _p`$;

$$h(e)\frac{s}{\sqrt{\pi }\gamma _p}\mathrm{exp}(\frac{(e\omega _p)^2}{\gamma _p^2}),$$
(38)
we have

$`J(\omega )`$ (39)
$`=2\pi {\displaystyle }deh(e)\{e(\omega e)(n(e)+1)(n(\omega e)+1)h(\omega e)`$
$`2e(\omega e)n((\omega e))(n(e)+1)h((\omega e))`$
$`e(\omega +e)n(e)n((\omega +e))h((\omega +e))\}.`$
Figure 5 shows $`J(\stackrel{~}{\omega })`$ for $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_p=0.4`$, $`S_Qs^2=1/40`$, and $`\mathrm{¯}h\omega _p/k_BT=1`$ where we have defined as $`\stackrel{~}{\omega }\omega /\omega _p`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_p\gamma _p/\omega _p`$. We can see three peaks: The right (left) peak at $`\stackrel{~}{\omega }=2(=2)`$ in Fig.5 corresponds to the emission (absorption) of two bosons by the spin. The center peak at $`\stackrel{~}{\omega }=0`$ represents the simultaneous boson absorption and emission, which causes the pure dephasing. This is because the quantity $`S(t)`$ is described as $`S(t)\frac{J(0)}{2}t`$ in the long tine region, and the quantity $`\frac{J(0)}{2}`$ gives the dephasing rate for the dynamics(see Eq.(24) and Eq.(26)).

Now we discuss the effectiveness of the multipulse control in suppression of the pure dephasing. In Fig.6, we show $`\mathrm{ln}[I(\stackrel{~}{t})]`$ for the same conditions as in the Fig.5, using a definition as $`\stackrel{~}{t}\omega _pt`$. The decay is well suppressed for small pulse interval $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s(\omega _p\tau _s)=0.1`$, which is consistent to the results in the previous subsection. However, a surprising result is obtained in increasing the pulse interval: As the interval increases to $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s=1.5`$, the degree of the suppression becomes worse, but a significant recovery is seen for $`\stackrel{~}{\tau }_s=2`$ and $`2.5`$.

Next we evaluate the pulse-interval dependence of the effective dephasing time $`T_2^e`$ which is obtained by the decay time at $`\stackrel{~}{t}=45`$. Figure 7 shows that the characteristic feature inherent to the dynamical behavior of boson system. When the pulse interval is near to $`\frac{\pi }{\omega _p}`$, the more effective suppression of pure dephasing is caused by resonance enhancement between the oscillatory behavior of boson system and the pulse train. This should be contrasted with the phenomenological case where $`T_2^e`$ monotonously decreases with increasing the pulse interval $`\tau _s`$ (see Fig.3).

## IV Concluding Remarks

We have obtained a general formula (19) which describes the time evolution of spin system under pulse-train control. The formula is expressed with the correlation function for arbitrary interaction amplitude $`B`$ which causes dephasing. This enables us to clarify how the suppression of pure dephasing depends on the pulse interval and the characteristic time of the interaction. We have applied the general formula to two examples: (1) a phenomenological two-level model where the correlation function of the interaction decays exponentially, and (2) a spin-boson model where a spin nonlinearly interacts with a boson reservoir. In the case (1), the analytic form for the intensity is evaluated from the off-diagonal element of the reduced density operator at pulse applied times. We define effective pure dephasing time $`T_2^e`$ from this form and we find that $`T_2^e`$ effectively increases by decreasing the ratio of the pulse interval to the correlation time. Moreover, the analytic expression of the time evolution of the intensity between pulses enables us to generally discuss the mechanism of the suppression of dephasing by multipulse control. In the case (2), we also found the suppression of the pure dephasing. However, special attention should be paid to the fact that the extent of the suppression does not monotonously decrease as the pulse interval increases, which is contrasted with the phenomenological case (1). When the pulse interval is near to the half of the average period of boson system, pure dephasing is effectively suppressed by resonance between the oscillatory behavior of boson system and the pulse train. This coherence recovery shows us that the microscopic mechanism can be used for effective suppression.

###### Acknowledgements.

This study is supported by the Grant in Aid for Scientific Research from the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture of Japan. The authors are deeply grateful to Dr. L. Viola for her thoughtful comments and suggestions.

## Appendix A Diagram Method

In order to obtain Eq.(19), we expand the time-ordered exponential in Eq.(15) and take up to the second order of $`B(t)`$. In the case of two-pulse excitation , for the most simple case where $`\pi `$ pulse is applied once at $`t=\tau _s`$ after a $`\frac{\pi }{2}`$ pulse at $`t=0`$, the intensity $`I(t)`$ is obtained asaihara1 ; aihara2

$$I(t)=\mathrm{exp}[2(2S(\tau _s)+2S(t\tau _s)S(t))].$$
(40)
Using the fact that the exponent in Eq.(40) is composed of the function $`S`$ with three kinds of time difference, $`\tau _s,t\tau _s`$, and $`t`$, we can write a diagram as in Fig.8.

In this diagram, the dots are placed at the pulse applied times and the observation time t. The broken lines are connected between the time points that are the ends of the broad lines. The coefficient of the function $`S`$ can be determined by the number of the broken line $`N_b`$ and the number of the time points $`N_t`$ included between the broken line as $`(1)^{N_t}N_b`$.

For application of $`\pi `$ pulses in two times, we obtain the intensity as

$`I(t)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{exp}[2(6S(\tau _s)2S(t\tau _s)+S(t)`$ (41)
$`2S(2\tau _s)+2S(t2\tau _s))].`$
The diagram is written in Fig.9.

These diagram rules enable us to obtain a general formula Eq.(19) for an arbitrary number of pulses. It is also noted that the diagram method is a powerful tool to evaluate more general cases with irregular pulse interval and pulse area.

## Appendix B Note on the conventional linear spin-boson model

The pure dephasing has been explained with the spin-boson modelCaldeira  where a $`\frac{1}{2}`$ spin linearly interacts with a reservoir which consists of bosons as,

$$_{SB}=\mathrm{¯}hS_zB=\mathrm{¯}hS_z\underset{k}{}(g_k^{}b_k+g_kb_k^{}).$$
(42)
In Eq.(42), $`g_k`$ is the coupling strength between the spin and the $`k`$-th boson of the reservoir. For this model, the correlation function in Eq.(22) is obtained as

$$B(t)B(0)=\underset{k}{}|g_k|^2\{(n(\omega _k)+1)e^{i\omega _kt}+n(\omega _k)e^{i\omega _kt}\},$$
(43)
which gives the power spectrum of the form,

$`J(\omega )`$ $`=`$ $`2\pi \{I(\omega )(n(\omega )+1)\theta (\omega )+I(\omega )n(\omega )\theta (\omega )\}.`$
Here we have introduced the spectral density of the coupling function $`I(\omega )`$ as

$$\underset{k}{}|g_k|^2\delta (\omega \omega _k)\mathrm{}_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\omega I(\omega )\mathrm{}.$$
(45)
Using Eq.(21), we obtain the second cumulant $`S(t)`$ in the form

$$S(t)=_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\omega I(\omega )(2n(\omega )+1)\frac{1\mathrm{cos}\omega t}{\omega ^2}.$$
(46)
This corresponds to $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_0(t)`$ of Eq.(17) inllyod1 , which describes the decay of the off-diagonal element of the density operator by the interaction with the reservoir. In the long time region, the quantity $`S(t)`$ goes to

$$S(t)\frac{J(0)}{2}t=\frac{\pi [I(0)(2n(0)+1)]}{2}t\frac{t}{T_2},$$
(47)
which shows us that the value $`J(0)`$ deteremines the long time behavior.

Now we consider the spectral density $`I(\omega )`$ of the reservoir to be the one defined by Caldeira and LeggettCaldeira  as in previous studiesllyod1 ; ban ,

$$I(\omega )=\alpha \omega ^ne^{\omega /\omega _c},$$
(48)
where $`\alpha `$ determines the coupling strength with the reservoir and an integer $`n`$ depends on details of the system- reservoir interactionCaldeira . Evaluating $`T_2`$ with Eqs.(47) and (48), we have

$`T_2=\{\begin{array}{cccccccccccccccccccc}\frac{2\mathrm{¯}h}{\pi k_BT}(n=1)& & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & \\ \mathrm{}(n1)& & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & \end{array}`$ (51)
which shows that the pure dephasing is absent except for the ohmic dissipation case $`(n=1)`$. It is remarked that the model can describe the pure dephasing only for the ohmic dissipation case.


text:
# 1 The diagrams that give rise to FI–terms via brane scalar (a), bulk scalar (b) and bulk fermion (c) loops.

## Acknowledgments

Work supported in part by the European Community’s Human Potential Programme under contracts HPRN–CT–2000–00131 Quantum Spacetime, HPRN–CT–2000–00148 Physics Across the Present Energy Frontier and HPRN–CT–2000–00152 Supersymmetry and the Early Universe. SGN was supported by priority grant 1096 of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft. MO was partially supported by the Polish KBN grant 2 P03B 052 16.