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Decoherence: A Closed-System Approach

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Abstract

The aim of this paper is to review a new perspective about decoherence, according to which formalisms originally devised to deal just with closed or open systems can be subsumed under a closed-system approach that generalizes the traditional account of the phenomenon. This new viewpoint dissolves certain conceptual difficulties of the orthodox open-system approach but, at the same time, shows that the openness of the quantum system is not the essential ingredient for decoherence, as commonly claimed. Moreover, when the behavior of a decoherent system is described from a closed-system perspective, the account of decoherence turns out to be more general than that supplied by the open-system approach, and the quantum-to-classical transition defines unequivocally the realm of classicality by identifying the observables with classical-like behavior.

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Acknowledgments

We are very grateful to Roland Omnès and Maximilian Schlosshauer for many comments and criticisms. This research was partially supported by grants of the University of Buenos Aires, CONICET, and FONCYT of Argentina.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CONICET, Department of Physics, FCEN (UBA), Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Sebastian Fortin

  2. CONICET and FCEN (UBA), Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Olimpia Lombardi

  3. CONICET, IAFE (CONICET-UBA), IFIR and FCEN (UBA), Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Mario Castagnino

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  1. Sebastian Fortin
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  2. Olimpia Lombardi
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  3. Mario Castagnino
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Correspondence to Sebastian Fortin.

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Fortin, S., Lombardi, O. & Castagnino, M. Decoherence: A Closed-System Approach. Braz J Phys 44, 138–153 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13538-013-0151-0

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