Revealing the physical structure of the general quantum master equation
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Quantum Physics arXiv:2604.14382 (quant-ph) [Submitted on 15 Apr 2026] Title:Revealing the physical structure of the general quantum master equation Authors:Eugenia Pyurbeeva, Ronnie Kosloff View a PDF of the paper titled Revealing the physical structure of the general quantum master equation, by Eugenia Pyurbeeva and Ronnie Kosloff View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract:The Lindblad (GKLS) master equation, which represents the mathematical form for the general evolution of a density matrix, is a versatile and widely-used tool in open quantum systems. In contrast with the typical approach of imposing additional conditions on the system, such as weak coupling or energy conservation, we explore the structure of the equation with no assumptions. We demonstrate that general quantum dynamics can be expressed through a combination of free evolution, exchanges of some physical quantities (generalised charges), not necessarily commuting with the Hamiltonian, between the system and the bath, and pure dephasing. This result comprises a novel perspective on quantum master equations, employing physical processes as elemental parts. We use it to explore the dynamics and stationary states of a two-level system and show that strong coupling, particle exchange, and non-Abelian effects all share the same physical origin. Moreover, we demonstrate that the generalised Gibbs state for all three cases contains a non-commutation term, which has not been previously considered. Comments: Subjects: Quantum Physics (quant-ph); Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics (cond-mat.mes-hall); Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech) Cite as: arXiv:2604.14382 [quant-ph] (or arXiv:2604.14382v1 [quant-ph] for this version) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2604.14382 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration) Submission history From: Eugenia Pyurbeeva [view email] [v1] Wed, 15 Apr 2026 19:57:16 UTC (72 KB) Full-text links: Access Paper: View a PDF of the paper titled Revealing the physical structure of the general quantum master equation, by Eugenia Pyurbeeva and Ronnie KosloffView PDFHTML (experimental)TeX Source view license Current browse context: quant-ph new | recent | 2026-04 Change to browse by: cond-mat cond-mat.mes-hall cond-mat.stat-mech References & Citations INSPIRE HEP NASA ADSGoogle Scholar Semantic Scholar export BibTeX citation Loading... BibTeX formatted citation × loading... Data provided by: Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer (What is the Explorer?) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers (What is Connected Papers?) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps (What is Litmaps?) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations (What are Smart Citations?) Code, Data, Media Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv Toggle alphaXiv (What is alphaXiv?) Links to Code Toggle CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers (What is CatalyzeX?) DagsHub Toggle DagsHub (What is DagsHub?) GotitPub Toggle Gotit.pub (What is GotitPub?) Huggingface Toggle Hugging Face (What is Huggingface?) ScienceCast Toggle ScienceCast (What is ScienceCast?) Demos Demos Replicate Toggle Replicate (What is Replicate?) Spaces Toggle Hugging Face Spaces (What is Spaces?) Spaces Toggle TXYZ.AI (What is TXYZ.AI?) Related Papers Recommenders and Search Tools Link to Influence Flower Influence Flower (What are Influence Flowers?) Core recommender toggle CORE Recommender (What is CORE?) Author Venue Institution Topic About arXivLabs arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them. Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs. Which authors of this paper are endorsers? | Disable MathJax (What is MathJax?)