Lect. Notes Phys. 717 Springer, Berlin Heidelberg 2007. - 129
р.
The first edition has been out of print soon after appearance. Over the years, a strongly increasing citation rate and numerous demands for copies led to the desire for a second edition. We may say that our original idea, i.e. , making the mathematical theory related to the fundamental concept of complete positivity and derived Markovian master equations more easily accessible to a wider community, has finally boe its fruits. For the present second edition various corrections and improvements have been necessary in addition to a clean typesetting. We also found it important to give at the end a survey of further developments in this field over the past 20 years together with a list of appropriate references. We would like to express our particular acknowledgement and thanks to Prof. Jerg Hutter who has taken the labour of translating the entire text into LaTeX.
Contents
General Theory and Applications to Unstable Particles.
Quantum Dynamical Semigroups for Unstable Particles.
N-Level Systems and Applications to Spectroscopy.
Three-level Systems.
Comparison with Common Versions of Master Equations.
Open Quantum Systems with Non-constant Relaxation in Time-dependent Exteal Fields.
Determination of Relaxation Parameters from First Principles.
Entropy and Irreversibility.
Recent Developments.
The first edition has been out of print soon after appearance. Over the years, a strongly increasing citation rate and numerous demands for copies led to the desire for a second edition. We may say that our original idea, i.e. , making the mathematical theory related to the fundamental concept of complete positivity and derived Markovian master equations more easily accessible to a wider community, has finally boe its fruits. For the present second edition various corrections and improvements have been necessary in addition to a clean typesetting. We also found it important to give at the end a survey of further developments in this field over the past 20 years together with a list of appropriate references. We would like to express our particular acknowledgement and thanks to Prof. Jerg Hutter who has taken the labour of translating the entire text into LaTeX.
Contents
General Theory and Applications to Unstable Particles.
Quantum Dynamical Semigroups for Unstable Particles.
N-Level Systems and Applications to Spectroscopy.
Three-level Systems.
Comparison with Common Versions of Master Equations.
Open Quantum Systems with Non-constant Relaxation in Time-dependent Exteal Fields.
Determination of Relaxation Parameters from First Principles.
Entropy and Irreversibility.
Recent Developments.