Open quantum systems with Kadanoff-Baym equations

Abstract

We study the temporal evolution of quantum mechanical fermionic particles exhibiting one bound state within a one-dimensional attractive square-well potential in a heat bath of bosonic particles. For this open quantum system we formulate the non-equilibrium Kadanoff-Baym equations for the system particles by taking the interactions to be elastic 2-2 scatterings with the heat-bath particles. The corresponding spatially inhomogeneous integro-differential equations for the one-particle Greens's function are solved numerically. We demonstrate how the system particles equilibrate and thermalize with the heat bath and how the off-diagonal elements of the density matrix, expressed in the one-particle energy eigenbasis, decohere, so that only the diagonal entries, i.e. the occupation numbers, survive. In addition, the time evolution of the (retarded) Green's function also determines the spectral properties of the various one-particle quantum states.