2019/06/30 by Christian Kraglund Andersen, Archana Kamal, Nicholas A. Masluk +3 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevapplied.13.044017
published as Phys. Rev. Applied 13, 044017 (2020) · 16 pages, 9 figures
arxiv created 2020/04/10 · arxiv updated 2020/04/13
We report a first-principles study of the driven dissipative dynamics for Kerr oscillators in the mesoscopic regime. This regime is characterized by large Kerr nonlinearity, realized here using the nonlinear kinetic inductance of a large array of Josephson junctions. The experimentally measured nonlinear resonance lineshapes of the junction array modes show significant deviations from steady-state numerical predictions, and necessitate time-dependent numerical simulations indicative of strong measurement-induced dephasing in the system arising from the large cross-Kerr effect between array modes. Analytical and numerical calculations of switching rate corroborate this by showing the emergence of a slow time scale, which is much longer than the linear decay rate and is set by fluctuation-induced switching times in the bistable regime. Furthermore, our analysis shows that the usual quantum-activated escape treatment is inadequate for prediction of the switching rates at large frequency shifts caused by strong nonlinearities, necessitating a quantum treatment that utilizes the full system Liouvillian. Based on our analysis, we identify a universal crossover parameter that delineates the regimes of validity of semiclassical and quantum descriptions, respectively. Our work shows how dynamical switching effects in strongly nonlinear systems provide a platform to study quantum-to-classical transitions.