THE ROLE OF THE RESERVOIR CORRELATIONS IN THE RELAXATION RATES FOR DIFFERENT COUPLING MODELS

A quantal system is assumed to interact with a thermal environment. Th e fully coupled (FC) and the rotating wave approximation (RWA) models are considered to derive a generalized master equation for the reduced density operator in terms of the spectral density of the correlation function of the thermal environment. The parameters of the irreversibl e motion are compared for different reservoir models. In particular, w e examine the case of normal and odd heat baths and work out specific examples for both coupling mechanisms.