Quantum Backflow States from Eigenstates of the Regularized Current Operator

TL;DR

This paper characterizes a broad class of quantum backflow states, including a simple state with significant backflow, by analyzing eigenstates of a regularized current operator and their relation to experimental measurement.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive class of backflow states based on momentum functions and links them to eigenstates of a regularized current operator, enhancing understanding of quantum flux phenomena.

Findings

Identified a simple backflow state with 41% of the theoretical flux lower bound.

Connected backflow states to eigenstates of a regularized current operator.

Clarified the spectral properties of the regularized current operator in relation to the usual current operator.

Abstract

We present an exhaustive class of states with quantum backflow -- the phenomenon in which a state consisting entirely of positive momenta may have negative current and the probability flows in the opposite direction to the momentum. They are characterized by a general function of momenta subject to very weak conditions. Such a family of states is of interest in the light of a recent experimental proposal to measure backflow. We find one particularly simple state which has surprisingly large backflow -- about 41 percent of the lower bound on flux derived by Bracken and Melloy. We study the eigenstates of a regularized current operator and we show how some of these states, in a certain limit, lead to our class of backflow states. This limit also clarifies the correspondence between the spectrum of the regularized current operator, which has just two non-zero eigenvalues in our chosen regularization, and the usual current operator.