The role of coherence on two-particle quantum walks

Abstract

We investigate the dynamical properties of the two-bosons quantum walk in system with different degrees of coherence, where the effect of the coherence on the two-bosons quantum walk can be naturally introduced. A general analytical expression of the two-bosons correlation function for both pure states and mixed states is given. We propose a possible two-photon quantum-walk scheme with a mixed initial state and find that the two-photon correlation function and the average distance between two photons can be influenced by either the initial photon distribution, or the relative phase, or the degree of coherence. The propagation features of our numerical results can be explained by our analytical two-photon correlation function.