Document 
Eur. Phys. J. Special Topics 159, 135-141 (2008)
DOI: 10.1140/epjst/e2008-00702-3
Kinetic description of quantum Brownian motion
B. Vacchini1 and F. Petruccione21 Dipartimento di Fisica dell'Università di Milano and INFN, Sezione di Milano, via Celoria 16, 20133 Milan, Italy
2 School of Physics, Quantum Research Group, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville Campus, Durban 4000, South Africa
bassano.vacchini@mi.infn.it
petruccione@ukzn.ac.za
Published online: 21 May 2008
Abstract
We stress the relevance of the two features of translational invariance and atomic nature of the gas in the quantum description of the motion of a massive test particle in a gas, corresponding to the original picture of Einstein used in the characterization of Brownian motion. The master equation describing the reduced dynamics of the test particle is of Lindblad form and complies with the requirement of covariance under translations.
© EDP Sciences, Springer-Verlag 2008