Pairwise entanglement of a three-qubit Heisenberg XY chain in a nonuniform magnetic field with intrinsic decoherence

Taking into account the intrinsic decoherence, the concurrence of the nearest and the next-to-nearest neighbor qubits in a three-qubit Heisenberg XY chain are investigated when a nonuniform magnetic field is included. We show that the effects of the external magnetic field, including the uniform and inhomogeneous magnetic fields, on the time evolution of entanglement between the nearest and the next-to-nearest neighbor qubits rely deeply on the initial states. We can moderate the destructive effect of intrinsic decoherence by controlling the Uniform and inhomogeneous magnetic fields, so that a proper value of Uniform and inhomogeneous magnetic fields can, to a great extent enhance the stationary entanglement. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.