Publications

Increasing the probability of quantum tunneling between two states, while keeping constant the resources of the underlying physical system, is a task of key importance in several physical contexts and platforms, including ultracold atoms confined by double-well potentials and superconducting qubits. We propose a novel ancillary assisted protocol showing that when a quantum system—such as a qubit—is coupled to an ancilla, one can learn the optimal ancillary component and its coupling, to increase the tunneling probability. As a case study, we consider a quantum system that, due to the presence of an energy detuning between two modes, cannot transfer by tunneling the particles from one mode to the other. However, it does it through a learned coupling with an ancillary system characterized by a detuning not smaller than the one of the primary system. We provide several illustrative examples for the paradigmatic case of a two-mode system and a two-mode ancilla in the presence of interacting particles. This reduces to a qubit coupled to an ancillary qubit in the case of one particle in the system and one in the ancilla. Our proposal provides an effective method to increase the tunneling probability in all those physical situations where no direct improvement of the system parameters, such as tunneling coefficient or energy detuning, is either possible or resource efficient. Finally, we also argue that the proposed strategy is not hampered by weak coupling to noisy environments.

Measurement-induced phases exhibit unconventional dynamics as emergent collective phenomena, yet their behavior in tailored interacting systems – crucial for quantum technologies – remains less understood. We develop a systematic toolbox to analyze monitored dynamics in long-range interacting systems, relevant to platforms like trapped ions and Rydberg atoms. Our method extends spin-wave theory to general dynamical generators at the quantum trajectory level, enabling access to a broader class of states than approaches based on density matrices. This allows efficient simulation of large-scale interacting spins and captures nonlinear dynamical features such as entanglement and trajectory correlations. We showcase the versatility of our framework by exploring entanglement phase transitions in a monitored spin system with power-law interactions in one and two dimensions, where the entanglement scaling changes from logarithm to volume law as the interaction range shortens, and by dwelling on how our method mitigates experimental post-selection challenges in detecting monitored quantum phases.

Foundation models are highly versatile neural-network architectures capable of processing different data types, such as text and images, and generalizing across various tasks like classification and generation. Inspired by this success, we propose Foundation Neural-Network Quantum States (FNQS) as an integrated paradigm for studying quantum many-body systems. FNQS leverage key principles of foundation models to define variational wave functions based on a single, versatile architecture that processes multimodal inputs, including spin configurations and Hamiltonian physical couplings. Unlike specialized architectures tailored for individual Hamiltonians, FNQS can generalize to physical Hamiltonians beyond those encountered during training, offering a unified framework adaptable to various quantum systems and tasks. FNQS enable the efficient estimation of quantities that are traditionally challenging or computationally intensive to calculate using conventional methods, particularly disorder-averaged observables. Furthermore, the fidelity susceptibility can be easily obtained to uncover quantum phase transitions without prior knowledge of order parameters. These pretrained models can be efficiently fine-tuned for specific quantum systems. The architectures trained in this paper are publicly available at https://huggingface.co/nqs-models, along with examples for implementing these neural networks in NetKet.

Measuring fluctuations in matter’s low-energy excitations is the key to unveiling the nature of the non-equilibrium response of materials. A promising outlook in this respect is offered by spectroscopic methods that address matter fluctuations by exploiting the statistical nature of light-matter interactions with weak few-photon probes. Here we report the first implementation of ultrafast phase randomized tomography, combining pump-probe experiments with quantum optical state tomography, to measure the ultrafast non-equilibrium dynamics in complex materials. Our approach utilizes a time-resolved multimode heterodyne detection scheme with phase-randomized coherent ultrashort laser pulses, overcoming the limitations of phase-stable configurations and enabling a robust reconstruction of the statistical distribution of phase-averaged optical observables. This methodology is validated by measuring the coherent phonon response in α-quartz. By tracking the dynamics of the shot-noise limited photon number distribution of few-photon probes with ultrafast resolution, our results set an upper limit to the non-classical features of phononic state in α-quartz and provide a pathway to access non-equilibrium quantum fluctuations in more complex quantum materials.

This summary of the second Terrestrial Very-Long-Baseline Atom Interferometry (TVLBAI) Workshop provides a comprehensive overview of our meeting held in London in April 2024 (Second Terrestrial Very-Long-Baseline Atom Interferometry Workshop, Imperial College, April 2024), building on the initial discussions during the inaugural workshop held at CERN in March 2023 (First Terrestrial Very-Long-Baseline Atom Interferometry Workshop, CERN, March 2023). Like the summary of the first workshop (Abend et al. in AVS Quantum Sci. 6:024701, 2024), this document records a critical milestone for the international atom interferometry community. It documents our concerted efforts to evaluate progress, address emerging challenges, and refine strategic directions for future large-scale atom interferometry projects. Our commitment to collaboration is manifested by the integration of diverse expertise and the coordination of international resources, all aimed at advancing the frontiers of atom interferometry physics and technology, as set out in a Memorandum of Understanding signed by over 50 institutions (Memorandum of Understanding for the Terrestrial Very Long Baseline Atom Interferometer Study).

Exponentially small spectral gaps are known to be the crucial bottleneck for traditional Quantum Annealing (QA) based on interpolating between two Hamiltonians, a simple driving term and the complex problem to be solved, with a linear schedule in time. One of the simplest models exhibiting exponentially small spectral gaps is a ferromagnetic Ising ring with a single antiferromagnetic bond introducing frustration. Previous studies of this model have explored continuous-time diabatic QA, where optimized non-adiabatic annealing schedules provided good solutions, avoiding exponentially large annealing times. In our work, we move to a digital framework of Variational Quantum Algorithms, and present two main results: (1) we show that the model is digitally controllable with a scaling of resources that grows quadratically with the system size, achieving the exact solution using the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm; (2) We combine a technique of quantum control—the Chopped RAndom Basis method—and digitized quantum annealing to construct smooth digital schedules yielding optimal solutions with very high accuracy.

We study the quantum transport generated by the bipartite entanglement in two-dimensional conformal field theory at finite density with the U(1) × U(1) symmetry associated to the conservation of the electric charge and of the helicity. The bipartition given by an interval is considered, either on the line or on the circle. The continuity equations and the corresponding conserved quantities for the modular flows of the currents and of the energy-momentum tensor are derived. We investigate the mean values of the associated currents and their quantum fluctuations in the finite density representation, which describe the properties of the modular quantum transport. The modular analogues of the Johnson- Nyquist law and of the fluctuation-dissipation relation are found, which encode the thermal nature of the modular evolution.

The Mpemba effect, in which a hotter system can equilibrate faster than a cooler one, has long been a subject of fascination in classical physics. In the past few years, notable theoretical and experimental progress has been made in understanding its occurrence in both classical and quantum systems. In this Perspective, we provide a concise overview of recent work and open questions on the Mpemba effect in quantum systems, with a focus on both open and isolated dynamics, which give rise to distinct manifestations of this anomalous non-equilibrium phenomenon. We discuss key theoretical frameworks, highlight experimental observations and explore the fundamental mechanisms that give rise to anomalous relaxation behaviours. Particular attention is given to the role of quantum fluctuations, integrability and symmetry in shaping equilibration pathways.

Quantum secure direct communication (QSDC) is an evolving quantum communication framework based on transmitting secure information directly through a quantum channel, without relying on key-based encryption such as in quantum key distribution (QKD). Optical QSDC protocols, utilizing discrete and continuous variable encodings, show great promise for future technological applications. We present the first table-top continuous-variable QSDC proof of principle, analyzing its implementation and comparing the use of coherent against squeezed light sources. A simple beam-splitter attack is analyzed by using Wyner wiretap channel theory. Our study illustrates the advantage of squeezed states over coherent ones for enhanced security and reliable communication in lossy and noisy channels. Our practical implementation, utilizing mature telecom components, could foster secure quantum metropolitan networks compatible with advanced multiplexing systems.

We show that topological metals lacking time-reversal symmetry have an intrinsic non-quantised component of the anomalous Hall conductivity which is contributed not only by the Berry phase of quasiparticles on the Fermi surface, but also by Fermi-liquid corrections due to the residual interactions among quasiparticles, the Landau f-parameters. These corrections pair up with those that modify the optical mass with respect to the quasiparticle effective one, or the charge compressibility with respect to the quasiparticle density of states. Our result supports recent claims that the correct expressions for topological observables include vertex corrections besides the topological invariants built just upon the Green’s functions. Furthermore, it demonstrates that such corrections are naturally accounted for by Landau’s Fermi liquid theory, here extended to the case in which coherence effects between bands crossing the chemical potential and those that are instead away from it may play a crucial role, as in the anomalous Hall conductivity, and have important implications when those metals are on the verge of a doping-driven Mott transition, as we discuss.

We present a classical kinetically constrained model of interacting particles on a triangular ladder, which displays diffusion and jamming and can be treated by means of a classical-quantum mapping. Interpreted as a theory of interacting fermions, the diffusion coefficient is the inverse of the effective mass of the quasiparticles which can be computed using mean-field theory. At a critical density ρ = 2 / 3 , the model undergoes a dynamical phase transition in which exponentially many configurations become jammed while others remain diffusive. The model can be generalized to two dimensions.

We study the entanglement Hamiltonian of two disjoint blocks in the harmonic chain on the line and in its ground state. In the regime of large mass, the only non-vanishing terms are the on-site and nearest-neighbour ones. Analytic expressions are obtained for their profiles, which are written in terms of piecewise linear functions that can be discontinuous and display sharp transitions as the separation between the blocks changes. In the regime of vanishing mass, where the matrices characterizing the entanglement Hamiltonian contain couplings at all distances, we explore the location of the subdominant terms and some combinations of matrix elements that are useful for the continuum limit, comparing the results with the corresponding ones for a free chiral current. The single-particle entanglement spectrum is also investigated.

We investigate a phenomenon known as Superactivation of Backflow of Information (SBFI); namely, the fact that the tensor product of a non-Markovian dynamics with itself exhibits Backflow of Information (BFI) from environment to system even if the single dynamics does not. Such an effect is witnessed by the non-monotonic behaviour of the Helstrom norm and emerges in the open dynamics of two independent, but statistically coupled, parties. We physically interpret SBFI by means of the discrete-time non-Markovian dynamics of two open qubits collisionally coupled to an environment described by a classical Markov chain. In such a scenario, SBFI can be ascribed to the decrease of the qubit-qubit-environment correlations in favour of those of the two qubits, only. We further prove that the same mechanism at the roots of SBFI also holds in a suitable continuous-time limit. We also show that SBFI does not require entanglement to be witnessed, but only the quantumness of the Helstrom ensemble.

In two-dimensional conformal field theories (CFT) in Minkowski spacetime, we study the spacetime distance between two events along two distinct modular trajectories. When the spatial line is bipartite by a single interval, we consider both the ground state and the state at finite different temperatures for the left and right moving excitations. For the free massless Dirac field in the ground state, the bipartition of the line given by the union of two disjoint intervals is also investigated. The modular flows corresponding to connected subsystems preserve relativistic causality. Locality along the modular flows of some fields is explored by evaluating their (anti-)commutators. In particular, the bilocal nature of the modular Hamiltonian of two disjoint intervals for the massless Dirac field provide multiple trajectories leading to Dirac delta contributions in the (anti-)commutators even when the initial points belong to different intervals, thus being spacelike separated.

We examine the behavior of the entanglement asymmetry in the ground state of a (1+1)-dimensional conformal field theory with a boundary condition that explicitly breaks a bulk symmetry. Our focus is on the asymmetry of a subsystem A originating from the symmetry-breaking boundary and extending into a semi-infinite bulk. By employing the twist field formalism, we derive a universal expression for the asymmetry, showing that the asymptotic behavior for large subsystems is approached algebraically, with an exponent which is twice the conformal dimension of a boundary condition-changing operator. As a secondary result, we also establish a similar asymptotic behavior for the string order parameter. Our exact analytical findings are validated through numerical simulations in the critical Ising and 3-state Potts models.

The entanglement asymmetry measures the extent to which a symmetry is broken within a subsystem of an extended quantum system. Here, we analyse this quantity in Haar random states for arbitrary compact, semi-simple Lie groups, building on and generalising recent results obtained for the U(1) symmetric case. We find that, for any group, the average entanglement asymmetry vanishes in the thermodynamic limit when the subsystem is smaller than its complement. When the subsystem and its complement are of equal size, the entanglement asymmetry jumps to a finite value, indicating a sudden transition of the subsystem from a fully symmetric state to one devoid of any symmetry. For larger subsystem sizes, the entanglement asymmetry displays a logarithmic scaling with a coefficient fixed by the dimension of the group. We also investigate the fluctuations of the entanglement asymmetry, which tend to zero in the thermodynamic limit. We check our findings against exact numerical calculations for the SU(2) and SU(3) groups. We further discuss their implications for the thermalisation of isolated quantum systems and black hole evaporation.

We study the dynamics of hard-core bosons on ladders, in the presence of strong kinetic constrains akin to those of the Bariev model. We use a combination of analytical methods and numerical simulations to establish the phase diagram of the model. The model displays a paired Tomonaga-Luttinger liquid phase featuring an emergent dipole symmetry, which encodes the local pairing constraint into a global, nonlocal quantity. We scrutinize the effect of such emergent low-energy symmetry during quench dynamics including single-particle defects. We observe that, despite being approximate, the dipole symmetry still leads to very slow relaxation dynamics, which we model via an effective field theory. The model we discuss is amenable to realization in both cold atoms in optical lattices and Rydberg atom arrays with dynamics taking place solely in the Rydberg manifold. To observe the unusual dynamics of excitations in such experimental platforms, we propose a two-step protocol, which starts with the quasi-adiabatic preparation of low-energy states, followed by the local creation of defects and their study under quench dynamics.

Symmetry-resolved entanglement, capturing the refined structure of quantum entanglement in systems with global symmetries, has attracted a lot of attention recently. In this manuscript, introducing the notion of symmetry-resolved generalized entropies, we aim to develop a computational framework suitable for the study of excited state symmetry-resolved entanglement as well as the dynamical evolution of symmetry-resolved entanglement in symmetry-preserving out-of-equilibrium settings. We illustrate our framework using the example of (1+1)-d free massless compact boson theory, and benchmark our results using lattice computation in the XX chain. As a byproduct, our computational framework also provides access to the probability distribution of the symmetry charge contained within a subsystem and the corresponding full counting statistics.

Locality is a transversal principle that governs quantum dynamics of many-body systems. However, for cavity-embedded systems, such a fundamental notion is hindered by the presence of nonlocal cavity modes, leaving space for new possible dynamical behavior. Here, we investigate the real-time dynamics of low-energy excitations in one-dimensional Rydberg atom arrays coupled to a global cavity mode. We derive an effective description in terms of a Tavis-Cummings-Ising model, whose phase diagram features ordered and disordered phases. The nonlocal nature of the cavity mode drastically affects the emergent meson and string dynamics. Mesons hybridize coherently with the cavity photons, leading to composite meson-polariton excitations. Strings, differently from local interacting theories, acquire a finite kinetic energy thanks to nonlocal cavity-mediated interactions between the underlying domain walls. We then conclude by presenting a new concrete experimental blueprint for a cavity QED Rydberg atom array simulator where the physics outlined in this Letter can be realized.

We study the directed transport of bosons along a one dimensional lattice in a dissipative setting, where the hopping is only facilitated by coupling to a Markovian reservoir. By combining numerical simulations with a field-theoretic analysis, we investigate the current fluctuations for this process and determine its asymptotic behavior. These findings demonstrate that dissipative bosonic transport belongs to the Kardar-Parisi-Zhang universality class and therefore, in spite of the drastic difference in the underlying particle statistics, it features the same coarse-grained behavior as the corresponding asymmetric simple exclusion process for fermions. However, crucial differences between the two processes emerge when focusing on the full counting statistics of current fluctuations. By mapping both models to the physics of fluctuating interfaces, we find that dissipative transport of bosons and fermions can be understood as surface growth and erosion processes, respectively. Within this unified description, both the similarities and discrepancies between the full counting statistics of the transport are reconciled. Beyond purely theoretical interest, these findings are relevant for experiments with cold atoms or long-lived quasiparticles in nanophotonic lattices, where such transport scenarios can be realized.