Decoherence-Based Quantum Zeno Effect in a Cavity-QED System

TL;DR

This paper offers a decoherence-based interpretation of the quantum Zeno effect in cavity-QED systems, emphasizing dispersive couplings over traditional projection measurements, and proposes an experimental verification scheme.

Contribution

It introduces a dynamic decoherence-based perspective on the quantum Zeno effect and suggests an alternative experimental setup to test this interpretation in cavity-QED.

Findings

Decoherence time dependence distinguishes dynamic QZE from traditional projection-based QZE.

Frequent nondemolition measurements can slow photon number increase in a cavity.

Proposes an experimental scheme to verify the decoherence-based QZE in cavity-QED.

Abstract

We present a decoherence-based interpretation for the quantum Zeno effect (QZE) where measurements are dynamically treated as dispersive couplings of the measured system to the apparatus, rather than the von Neumann's projections. It is found that the explicit dependence of the survival probability on the decoherence time quantitatively distinguishes this dynamic QZE from the usual one based on projection measurements. By revisiting the cavity-QED experiment of the QZE [J. Bernu, et al., Phys. Rev. Lett, 101, 180402 (2008)], we suggest an alternative scheme to verify our theoretical consideration that frequent measurements slow down the increase of photon number inside a microcavity due to the nondemolition couplings with the atoms in large detuning.