Quantum survival in hybrid pursuit dynamics - a lion chasing a lamb problem
Abstract
Measurement and classical randomness usually degrade coherence; controlling where and when a subsystem is monitored can instead make them a tunable resource. We introduce a photonic time-multiplexed quantum walk whose fast reconfigurability enables precise position measurements, allowing us to study this interplay in a hybrid quantum-classical pursuit problem: A quantum walker (lamb) evolves on a line while a classical pursuer (lion) performs a lazy random walk. Each lion trajectory drives a distinct coherent, norm-reducing evolution of the lamb, with capture implemented by measurements at the lion's positions; averaging over the recorded trajectories then synthesizes a decoherent process. Counterintuitively, increasing the lion's mobility does not monotonically suppress survival: over a broad range of hopping probabilities, the lamb survives better than against an immobile predator. Directly observing this local enhancement, we demonstrate a manifestly quantum feature aided rather than hindered by classical stochastic control.
Related
- From Reversible Quantum Dynamics to Statistical Probability: A dynamical solution to the origin of probability and Hilbert's sixth problem
- On the Energy Minimizing Problem in Plasma Dynamics
- The dynamics of early transoceanic voyages: A resource-coupled model of crew health and survival
- Infrared Problem in Quantum Electrodynamics
- Global Minima of the Thomson Problem in a Disk: A Molecular Dynamics Approach with Fixed Border Charges
BibTeX
@misc{held2026quantum,
title = {{Quantum survival in hybrid pursuit dynamics - a lion chasing a lamb problem}},
author = {P. Held and İ. Yalçınkaya and F. Pegoraro and J. Lammers and F. Schlue and K. Jiráková and S. Barkhofen and B. Brecht and M. Štefaňák and V. Potoček and A. Gábris and I. Jex and C. Silberhorn},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.25844},
eprint = {2609.25844},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.25844},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Quantum survival in hybrid pursuit dynamics - a lion chasing a lamb problem
AU - P. Held
AU - İ. Yalçınkaya
AU - F. Pegoraro
AU - J. Lammers
AU - F. Schlue
AU - K. Jiráková
AU - S. Barkhofen
AU - B. Brecht
AU - M. Štefaňák
AU - V. Potoček
AU - A. Gábris
AU - I. Jex
AU - C. Silberhorn
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/22
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.25844
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.25844
AB - Measurement and classical randomness usually degrade coherence; controlling where and when a subsystem is monitored can instead make them a tunable resource. We introduce a photonic time-multiplexed quantum walk whose fast reconfigurability enables precise position measurements, allowing us to study this interplay in a hybrid quantum-classical pursuit problem: A quantum walker (lamb) evolves on a line while a classical pursuer (lion) performs a lazy random walk. Each lion trajectory drives a distinct coherent, norm-reducing evolution of the lamb, with capture implemented by measurements at the lion's positions; averaging over the recorded trajectories then synthesizes a decoherent process. Counterintuitively, increasing the lion's mobility does not monotonically suppress survival: over a broad range of hopping probabilities, the lamb survives better than against an immobile predator. Directly observing this local enhancement, we demonstrate a manifestly quantum feature aided rather than hindered by classical stochastic control.
ER -