Origin of meter fluctuations in weak measurement interactions

TL;DR

This paper analyzes how weak measurement interactions influence meter readout fluctuations, revealing the effects of non-linearities, post-selection, and measurement back-action on the observed quantum statistics.

Contribution

It introduces a Heisenberg picture approach to understand meter fluctuation changes, including non-linear effects and dynamic pseudovariance, in weak quantum measurements.

Findings

Meter fluctuations are affected by non-linearities in the measurement response.

Post-selection modifies meter fluctuations based on target observable statistics.

Dynamic effects can mimic genuine fluctuations, complicating interpretation.

Abstract

Measurements map the value of a target observable onto a meter shift, resulting in a meter readout that combines the initial statistics of the meter state with the quantum statistics of the target observable. Even in the limit of weak measurement interactions, some information about the fluctuations of the target observable can be extracted from the change in the readout fluctuations caused by the measurement interaction. Here, we apply the Heisenberg picture to analyze the changes in the meter readout statistics caused by sufficiently weak measurement interactions, including the effects of non-linearities in the meter response. When additional information is obtained in a subsequent measurement of the system, the meter fluctuations are modified based on the post-selected statistics of the target observable. In addition, our analysis reveals a direct modification of the meter fluctuations due to the dependence of the post-selection probability on the dynamics induced by the meter in the measurement interaction. We point out that the quantum formalism makes it difficult to distinguish this dynamic term from the physical fluctuations of the target observable and stress the importance of distinguishing between genuine conditional fluctuations of the target observable and the dynamic pseudovariance associated with the measurement back-action.