Tomography vs quantum control for a three-level atom

We investigate the possibilities of controlling and reconstructing the state of a single three-level atom. We propose a physical scheme where information about the atomic state is extracted by measuring the total number of excitations after successive application of electromagnetic field pulses. We...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physics letters. A 2006-12, Vol.359 (5), p.373-380
Main Authors: Aguilar, O., Klimov, A.B., de Guise, Hubert
Format: Article
Language:English
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We investigate the possibilities of controlling and reconstructing the state of a single three-level atom. We propose a physical scheme where information about the atomic state is extracted by measuring the total number of excitations after successive application of electromagnetic field pulses. We show that, in the non-degenerate case (different transition frequencies for different atomic transitions), a three-level atom is completely controllable and its state can be completely reconstructed. In the degenerate case (when both atomic transitions are identical), we consider two dynamically inequivalent configurations, Λ and Ξ. In this case, we show that the density matrix can always be completely reconstructed whereas their respective system cannot be completely controlled. We explain why this last incompatibility between control and tomography arises.
ISSN:0375-9601
1873-2429
DOI:10.1016/j.physleta.2006.06.058