The effect of thermal photons on exceptional points in coupled resonators

Abstract

We analyse two quantum systems with hidden parity-time (PT) symmetry: one is an optical device, whereas another is a superconducting microwave-frequency device. To investigate their symmetry, we introduce an equilibrium frame, in which loss and gain terms for a given Hamiltonian are balanced. We show that the non-Hermitian Hamiltonians of both systems can be tuned to reach an exceptional point (EP), i.e., the point in parameter space at which a transition from broken to unbroken hidden PT symmetry takes place. We calculate a degeneracy of a Liouvillian superoperator, which is called the Liouvillian exceptional point (LEP), and show that, in the optical domain, LEP is equivalent to EP obtained from the non-Hermitian Hamiltonian (HEP). We also report breaking the equivalence between LEP and HEP by a non-zero number of thermal photons for the microwave-frequency system.

This preprint has not undergone peer review or any post-submission improvements or corrections. The Version of Record of this article is published in Scientific Reports, and is available online at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-32864-2

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Cited by in corpus (3)

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• Quantumness and its hierarchies in PT-symmetric down-conversion models
• Quantum jumps in open cavity optomechanics and Liouvillian versus Hamiltonian exceptional points