Effects of a dissipative coupling to the momentum of a particle in a double well potential

TL;DR

This paper investigates how dissipative interactions, especially momentum coupling, influence quantum tunneling in a double well potential, revealing that momentum dissipation can enhance tunneling and affect phase transition thresholds.

Contribution

It introduces a semiclassical analysis of combined position and momentum dissipation effects on quantum tunneling in double well potentials, highlighting the unique role of momentum coupling.

Findings

Momentum dissipation enhances coherent tunnel splitting.

Presence of both dissipation types shifts the critical coupling for phase transition.

Momentum coupling influences the dissipative phase transition threshold.

Abstract

Double well potentials offer the possibility of coherent state preparation and therefore constitute important building blocks in the analysis of quantum information and quantum engineering devices. Here we present a study of the coherent tunneling in a parabolic double well potential in presence of different dissipative interactions. Specifically, we investigate the effects of an environmental coupling to the momentum and/or to the position of a particle in the potential. Using the semiclassical approximation to calculate instanton paths in Euclidean time, we find that momentum dissipation enhances the coherent tunnel splitting. In presence of both types of dissipation, the momentum dissipation shifts the critical coupling strength of the dissipative phase transition induced by the position dissipation.