What is Amplitude damping channel?

In the theory of quantum communication, an amplitude damping channel is a quantum channel that models physical processes such as spontaneous emission. A natural process by which this channel can occur is a spin chain through which a number of spin states, coupled by a time independent Hamiltonian, can be used to send a quantum state from one location to another. The resulting quantum channel ends up being identical to an amplitude damping channel, for which the quantum capacity, the classical capacity and the entanglement assisted classical capacity of the quantum channel can be evaluated.