Stabilizing simulations of complex stochastic representations for quantum dynamical systems

Path integral representations of quantum dynamics can often be formulated as stochastic differential equations (SDEs). In a series of papers, Corney and Drummond (2004 Phys. Rev. Lett. 93 260401), Deuar and Drummond (2001 Comput. Phys. Commun. 142 442-5), Drummond and Gardnier (1980 J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 13 2353-68), Gardiner and Zoller (2004 Quantum Noise: A Handbook of Markovian and Non-Markovian Quantum Stochastic Methods with Applications to Quantum Optics (Springer Series in Synergetics) 3rd edn (Berlin: Springer)) and Gilchrist et al (1997 Phys. Rev. A 55 3014-32) and their collaborators have derived SDEs from coherent states representations for density matrices. Computationally, these SDEs are attractive because they seem simple to simulate. They can be quite unstable, however. In this paper, we consider some of the instabilities and propose a few remedies. Particularly, because the variances of the simulated paths typically grow exponentially, the processes become de-localized in relatively short times. Hence, the issues of boundary conditions and stable integration methods become important. We use the Bose-Einstein Hamiltonian as an example. Our results reveal that it is possible to significantly extend integration times and show the periodic structure of certain functionals.