Influence of two-level fluctuators on adiabatic passage techniques

TL;DR

This paper investigates how two-level fluctuators in solid-state environments impact the efficiency of adiabatic passage techniques like STIRAP and CTAP, revealing resonance effects and the limitations of existing noise models.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of TLF effects on STIRAP and CTAP, including resonance phenomena and the need for higher-dimensional models for structured environments.

Findings

Resonance with TLF level spacing sharply reduces protocol quality.

Weakly structured environments can be modeled with Bloch-Redfield theory.

Strongly structured environments require higher-dimensional modeling.

Abstract

We study the process of Stimulated Raman Adiabatic Passage (STIRAP) under the influence of a non-trivial solid-state environment, particularly the effect of two-level fluctuators (TLFs) as they are frequently present in solid-state devices. When the amplitudes of the driving-pulses used in STIRAP are in resonance with the level spacing of the fluctuators the quality of the protocol, i.e., the transferred population decreases sharply. In general the effect can not be reduced by speeding up the STIRAP process. We also discuss the effect of a structured noise environment on the process of Coherent Tunneling by Adiabatic Passage (CTAP). The effect of a weakly structured environment or TLFs with short coherence times on STIRAP and CTAP can be described by the Bloch-Redfield theory. For a strongly structured environment a higher-dimensional approach must be used, where the TLFs are treated as part of the system.