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Updated: Mar 22, 2026

Generation and Coherent Control of Pulsed Quantum Frequency Combs
Published on: June 8, 2018
Enhancing coherent transport in a photonic network using controllable decoherence
Devon N Biggerstaff1, René Heilmann2, Aidan A Zecevik1
1Centre for Engineered Quantum Systems and Centre for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, School of Mathematics and Physics, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia.
Abstract:
Transport phenomena on a quantum scale appear in a variety of systems, ranging from photosynthetic complexes to engineered quantum devices. It has been predicted that the efficiency of coherent transport can be enhanced through dynamic interaction between the system and a noisy environment. We report an experimental simulation of environment-assisted coherent transport, using an engineered network of laser-written waveguides, with relative energies and inter-waveguide couplings tailored to yield the desired Hamiltonian. Controllable-strength decoherence is simulated by broadening the bandwidth of the input illumination, yielding a significant increase in transport efficiency relative to the narrowband case. We show integrated optics to be suitable for simulating specific target Hamiltonians as well as open quantum systems with controllable loss and decoherence.
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