Time and Quantum Clocks
We study the fundamental limitations to clock making, covering foundational questions such as understanding the origin and nature of time as well as application to state-of-the-art quantum clocks.
The clock dates back millennia to ancient civilisations and is one of the oldest inventions of mankind. Throughout history, they have become more and more sophisticated and precise, enabling new technologies to flourish. Today, atomic clocks are extremely sophisticated and resolve unimaginably small shifts in energy in individual atoms. The next revolution in atomic clocks will help usher in a new technological age — one in which powerful scanners can resolve invisible small underground objects and where non-satellite GPS equivalences are commonplace.
However, we do not yet understand the fundamental limitations to clock making. This is one of the active areas in the group. On the fundamental side, given a model for a quantum clock [1], we ask questions such as what quantities limit the accuracy of clocks, including its dimensionality and entropy production [2], or how classical the device is [3]. In addition to individual clocks, we also consider, from an information-theoretic perspective, how multiple quantum clocks can be linked to each other to produce a highly accurate time signal [4] and how relativity affects quantum clocks [5]. On the more practical side, our research in clocks has generated a priori unpredicted applications in, for instance, error correction in computation [6,7], precision measurements, and thermodynamics.
References
- Mischa P. Woods, Ralph Silva and Jonathan Oppenheim. Autonomous quantum machines and finite-sized clocks. Ann. Henri Poincaré 20, 125 (2019). external pagedoi: 10.1007/s00023-018-0736-9 external pagearxiv:1607.04591
- Sandra Ranković, Yeong-Cherng Liang and Renato Renner. Quantum clocks and their synchronisation – the Alternate Ticks Game. external pagearXiv:1506.01373
- Mischa P. Woods, Ralph Silva, Gilles Pütz, Sandra Stupar and Renato Renner. Quantum clocks are more accurate than classical ones. external pagearXiv:1806.00491
- Yuxiang Yang, Lennart Baumgäertner, Ralph Silva and Renato Renner. Accuracy enhancing protocols for quantum clocks. external pagearXiv:1905.09707
- Shishir Khandelwal, Maximilian P.E. Lock and, Mischa P. Woods. Universal quantum modifications to general relativistic time dilation in delocalised clocks. Quantum 4, 309 (2020). external pagedoi: 10.22331/q-2020-08-14-309
- Mischa P. Woods and Álvaro M Alhambra. Continuous groups of transversal gates for quantum error correcting codes from finite clock reference frames. Quantum 4, 245 (2020). external pagedoi: 10.22331/q-2020-03-23-245
- Yuxiang Yang, Yin Mo, Joseph M. Renes, Giulio Chiribella and Mischa P. Woods. Covariant quantum error correcting codes via reference frames. external pagearxiv:2007.09154
Further reading
- Sandra Stupar, Christian Klumpp, Renato Renner and Nicolas Gisin. Performance of stochastic clocks in the Alternate Ticks Game. external pagearxiv:1806.08812
- Sami Boulebnane, Mischa P. Woods and Joseph M. Renes. Approximate quantum non-demolition measurements. external pagearxiv:1909.05265
- Mischa P. Woods and Michał Horodecki. The resource theoretic paradigm of quantum thermodynamics with contro. external pagearxiv:1912.05562