2009/02/28 by Jarkko Paavola, J. Paavola, J. Piilo +5
Computer Science · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics #Brownian motion #Classical mechanics #Dissipation #Dissipative system #Markov process #Mathematics #Ohmic contact #Physics #Quantum #Quantum Information and Cryptography #Quantum dynamics #Quantum mechanics #Statistical physics #Thermalisation #Time evolution #quant-ph #stochastic dynamics and bifurcation
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physreva.79.052120
published as Phys. Rev. A 79, 052120 (2009) · 10 pages, 6 figures, v2: added new references and paragraphs
openalex publication_date 2009/05/26 · arxiv created 2010/01/28 · arxiv updated 2010/02/08 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
The dissipative dynamics of a quantum Brownian particle is studied for different types of environment. We derive analytic results for the time evolution of the mean energy of the system for Ohmic, sub-Ohmic, and super-Ohmic environments, without performing the Markovian approximation. Our results allow one to establish a direct link between the form of the environmental spectrum and the thermalization dynamics. This in turn leads to a natural explanation of the microscopic physical processes ruling the system time evolution both in the short-time non-Markovian region and in the long-time Markovian one. Our comparative study of thermalization for different environments sheds light on the physical contexts in which non-Markovian dissipation effects are dominant.