“Open Quantum Systems” everything you need to start learning this interesting but a little abstruse field!

In this post, I try to collect most of the available resources that we have for the Open Quantum Systems which includes Lecture Videos, Schools (Online & in Person), Lecture Notes, Books & Software Packages, Jupyter Notebooks, etc.

Source: https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5115323

Motivation for collecting this list:

When it comes to Quantum Information and Quantum Computing and even Quantum Optics, many courses and MOOCs are available and there are lots of workshops have been held in recent years for these fields and you can easily find a large number of them with a simple search on the Internet and enjoy learning, but there is no specific online course for “Open Quantum Systems” at the time of writing this story(Feb 2021), but there are still some good resources out there although they are sparse they can be a very good starting point for newbies.

Why should we learn Open Quantum Systems?

The theory of open quantum systems is at the basis of many recent quantum technological applications. An open quantum system is a quantum system interacting with its Environment which is sometimes called a Bath or Reservoir, In reality, every system is open and an isolated quantum system is an idealization and consequently our famous Schrodinger equation is also an idealization for only closed quantum systems. In the context of OQS, we usually see more generalized equations like Master Equation or GKSL (stands for Gorini–Kossakowski–Sudarshan–Lindblad).

A Quantum system is usually coupled to an environment so Open quantum systems have become an active area of research, owing to its potential applications in many different fields such as quantum optics, quantum information processing, quantum computing, quantum biology, Quantum Chemistry, relativistic quantum mechanics, Quantum cryptography, Quantum Thermodynamics and the foundations of quantum mechanics.

This list will be updated regularly, if you have a good source and any suggestions or corrections let me know to add to this list. Stay tuned!

Video Lectures of Schools & Workshops

1. Foundations of Theoretical and Computational Open Quantum Systems by Dr Ilya Sinayskiy, UKZN, South Africa-2021 (5 Lectures + Jupyter Notebooks): Youtube link. + Github
2. Mini-School on Introduction to Open Quantum Systems by Dr Graeme Pleasance, -2020 (5 Lectures): Youtube link.
3. Open Quantum System Dynamics by Sabrina Maniscalco, VII Paraty Quantum Information School and Workshop -2019 (3 Lectures),: Youtube link.
4. Open quantum systems: Opportunities & challenges KITP Blackboard Talk by Sabrina Maniscalco — 2019 (1 Lecture): Youtube link.
5. Open Quantum Systems by Ines de Vega — Winter College on Optics: Quantum Photonics and Information 2020 (3 Lectures): Youtube link.
6. Dissipative quantum systems by Sushanta Dattagupta-2014 (5 Lectures): Youtubelink.
7. Unraveling Open System Quantum Dynamics (1 Lecture, indeed it is a part of this MOOC “ MIT 8.422 Atomic and Optical Physics II, Spring 2013”): Youtube link.
8. Introduction to Quantum Optics by Peter Zoller -2018 (4 Lectures), In the second part of the course he considers open quantum optical systems. Youtube link.
9. School on Quantum Thermodynamics and Open Quantum Systems IPM-Iran- 2018. 3 lectures given by Dr. Farzad Qassemi is about the basics of Open Quantum Systems. Lecture Notes & Voices are available in Farsi (Persian Language): Link.

Books

1. Quantum computing explained by David McMahon (2007) By reading this book you will get familiar with basic concepts about closed quantum systems through many solved examples (Particularly the first seven chapters).
2. The Theory of Open Quantum Systems by Heinz-Peter Breuer and Francesco Petruccione (2002): My PhD supervisor's famous book!
3. Open Quantum Systems Dynamics of Nonclassical Evolution by Banerjee, Subhashish(2018).
4. Open Quantum Systems An Introduction Authors by Rivas, Ángel, Huelga, Susana F (2012).
5. An Introduction to Quantum Optics: An Open Systems Approach by Dr. Perry Rice (2020)
6. Stochastic Processes in Physics and Chemistry (North-Holland Personal Library) 3rd Edition by N.G. Van Kampen (2017)
7. Stochastic Methods A Handbook for the Natural and Social Sciences by Gardiner, Crispin (2009)
8. Quantum Noise, A Handbook of Markovian and Non-Markovian Quantum Stochastic Methods with Applications to Quantum Optics by Crispin Gardiner, Peter Zoller (2004)
9. Open Quantum Systems Far from Equilibrium by Gernot Schaller (2014)
10. Statistical Methods in Quantum Optics 1 : Master Equations and Fokker-Planck Equations By Carmichael, Howard J (1999).
11. Statistical Methods in Quantum Optics 2 : Non-Classical Fields By Carmichael, Howard J (2008).
12. Quantum Optics Including Noise Reduction, Trapped Ions, Quantum Trajectories, and Decoherence by Miguel Orszag (2016).
13. An Open Systems Approach to Quantum Optics by Howard Carmichael (1993).
14. An Introduction to Macroscopic Quantum Phenomena and Quantum Dissipation by Amir Caldeira (2004).
15. Quantum Effects in Biology by M. MOHSENI, Y. OMAR, G. ENGEL AND M. B. PLENIO -(2014).

Lecture Notes

1. Lecture Notes on the Theory of Open Quantum Systems by Daniel A. Lidar(2019). Arxiv link.
2. Open Quantum Systems. An Introduction by Ángel Rivas, Susana F. Huelga (2012). Arxiv link.
3. Open Quantum Sensing and Measurement Notes — Delft University of Technology: It has good Python + QuTiP codes (Link) + (Gitlab).
4. A Tutorial on Quantum Master Equations: Tips and tricks for quantum optics, quantum computing, and beyond, Arxiv Link, Examples in Mathematica, MATLAB and QuTiP.

Software & Packages & Toolboxes

1. QuTiP (Quantum Toolbox in Python): QuTiP is open-source software for simulating the dynamics of open quantum systems with a very comprehensive documentation with many examples Website.
2. QuantumOptics.jl : is a numerical framework written in Julia that makes it easy to simulate various kinds of quantum systems. It is inspired by the Quantum Optics Toolbox for MATLAB and the Python framework QuTiP.
3. OpenQuantumSystems.jl : is a numerical framework written in Julia that makes it easy to simulate various kinds of open quantum systems with main focus on quantum biology in finite basis.
4. Qiskit: set of Jupyter notebooks contains the material for a comprehensive 54-hour course on open quantum systems (OQS) Link .

Review Articles (Pedagogical Approach or Review article, not research-based)

1. A short introduction to the Lindblad master equation by Daniel Manzano-2020: https://aip.scitation.org/doi/pdf/10.1063/1.5115323.
2. A simple derivation of the Lindblad equation by Carlos Alexandre Brasil et al. -2012: https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.2122.
3. An Invitation to Quantum Channels by Vinayak Jagadish, Francesco Petruccione-2019 (This article is for beginners in the area of open quantum systems who find the different representations and their transformations confusing): https://arxiv.org/abs/1902.00909.
4. IBM Q Experience as a versatile experimental testbed for simulating open quantum systems: https://arxiv.org/abs/1906.07099 + GitHub

I really hope you enjoyed this article, If you have any suggestions for improving this post or just want to chat about these topics feel free to contact me: Omid.Hassasfar@gmail.com, and you can also find me easily on LinkedIn.

In the end, I should thank my friend Abdul Moiz Mehmood for leading our Open Quantum System study group as a part of QWORLD and also other active members of group for useful discussions during our sessions.