A First-Principles Thermodynamic Uncertainty Relation for Shortcuts to Adiabaticity

TL;DR

This paper establishes a thermodynamic uncertainty relation for shortcuts to adiabaticity in quantum harmonic oscillators controlled by a quantum clock, revealing fundamental limits on precision and purity loss.

Contribution

It introduces a first-principles thermodynamic uncertainty relation for quantum STA protocols with quantum clocks, highlighting the tradeoff between precision and purity loss.

Findings

Derived a tradeoff linking fidelity, purity, and clock precision.

Quantified energetic deviations and fluctuations in a noise-dominated regime.

Analyzed effects for vacuum and coherent initial states.

Abstract

We study the fundamental limitations of implementing time-dependent Hamiltonian protocols when ''time'' is provided by a quantum clock rather than an external classical parameter. For a parametric harmonic oscillator controlled through a shortcut-to-adiabaticity (STA) schedule and coupled to a minimal clock degree of freedom, tracing out the clock yields an effective reduced dynamics that is a mixture of unitary Gaussian trajectories. Within a noise-dominated regime, we compute the energetic deviation from the target STA outcome and its fluctuations, together with the fidelity to the target evolution and the purity loss of the reduced state, for vacuum and coherent initial states. Combining these observables produces a thermodynamic-uncertainty-type tradeoff that links achievable precision to an irreducible loss of purity set by the clock precision and the protocol sensitivity.