Monday, 08 January, 2007
Noise-Free Measurement of Harmonic Oscillators with Instantaneous Interactions
M. França Santos, G. Giedke and E. Solano -
Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 020401 (2007)
We present a method of measuring the quantum state of a harmonic oscillator through instantaneous probe-system selective interactions of the Jaynes-Cummings type. We prove that this scheme is robust to general decoherence mechanisms, allowing the possibility of measuring fast-decaying systems in the weak-coupling regime. This method could be applied to different setups: motional states of trapped ions, microwave fields in cavity or circuit QED, and even intracavity optical fields.