Quantum walks on a circle with optomechanical systems

Abstract: We propose an implementation of a quantum walk on a circle on an optomechanical system by encoding the walker on the phase space of a radiation field and the coin on a two-level state of a mechanical resonator. The dynamics of the system is obtained by applying Suzuki-Trotter decomposition. We numerically show that the system displays typical behaviors of quantum walks, namely, the probability distribution evolves ballistically and the standard deviation of the phase distribution is linearly proportional to the number of steps. We also analyze the effects of decoherence by using the phase damping channel on the coin space, showing the possibility to implement the quantum walk with present day technology.