Sodium Tripolyphosphate and Polyphosphate as Dispersing Agents for Alumina Suspensions: Rheological Characterization

In the present work, the influence of addition of some dispersing agents employed for maximizing the solid loading of alumina concentrated suspensions has been investigated. Two commercially available deflocculants were used: a sodium tripolyphosphate and a sodium polyphosphate. Rheological tests were carried out at 25°C under continuous flow conditions by using the rate-controlled coaxial cylinder viscometer Rotovisko-Haake 20, system M5-osc., measuring device SV2P with serrated surfaces. The application of rheological techniques permitted the evaluation of the efficiency and the optimum dosage of the dispersing agents employed upon the alumina slips examined, that is, the critical concentration at which the maximum reduction in viscosity is detected

Experimental bound entanglement in a four-photon state

Entanglement [1, 2] enables powerful new quantum technologies [3-8], but in real-world implementations, entangled states are often subject to decoherence and preparation errors. Entanglement distillation [9, 10] can often counteract these effects by converting imperfectly entangled states into a smaller number of maximally entangled states. States that are entangled but cannot be distilled are called bound entangled [11]. Bound entanglement is central to many exciting theoretical results in quantum information processing [12-14], but has thus far not been experimentally realized. A recent claim for experimental bound entanglement is not supported by their data [15]. Here, we consider a family of four-qubit Smolin states [16], focusing on a regime where the bound entanglement is experimentally robust. We encode the state into the polarization of four photons and show that our state exhibits both entanglement and undistillability, the two defining properties of bound entanglement. We then use our state to implement entanglement unlocking, a key feature of Smolin states [16].Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures. For a simultaneously submitted related work see arXiv:1005.196

No-local-broadcasting theorem for quantum correlations

We prove that the correlations present in a multipartite quantum state have an \emph{operational} quantum character as soon as the state does not simply encode a multipartite classical probability distribution, i.e. does not describe the joint state of many classical registers. Even unentangled states may exhibit such \emph{quantumness}, that is pointed out by the new task of \emph{local broadcasting}, i.e. of locally sharing pre-established correlations: this task is feasible if and only if correlations are classical and derive a no-local-broadcasting theorem for quantum correlations. Thus, local broadcasting is able to point out the quantumness of correlations, as standard broadcasting points out the quantum character of single system states. Further, we argue that our theorem implies the standard no-broadcasting theorem for single systems, and that our operative approach leads in a natural way to the definition of measures for quantumness of correlations.Comment: 5 pages, various changes (title, shortened, references added, corrected typos,...), submitte

Entanglement-swapping boxes and their communication properties

We pose the fundamental question of communication properties of primitives irrespectively of their implementation. To illustrate the idea we introduce the concept of entanglement-swapping boxes, i.e. we consider any quantum operations which perform entanglement swapping, not necessarily via simple quantum teleportation. We ask a question about the properties of such boxes., i.e. what local operations and how much classical communication are needed to perform them. We also ask if any box which performs entanglement swapping can be used to establish classical communication. We show that each box needs at least two bits of classical communication to perform it. It is also shown that each box can be used for classical communication and, most importantly, that there exist boxes which allow to communicate at most one bit. Surprisingly we find basic irreversibility in the process of entanglement swapping with respect to its communication properties.Comment: Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. A as a Rapid Communicatio

Characterizing quantumness via entanglement creation

In [M. Piani et al., arXiv:1103.4032 (2011)] an activation protocol was introduced which maps the general non-classical (multipartite) correlations between given systems into bipartite entanglement between the systems and local ancillae by means of a potentially highly entangling interaction. Here, we study how this activation protocol can be used to entangle the starting systems themselves via entanglement swapping through a measurement on the ancillae. Furthermore, we bound the relative entropy of quantumness (a naturally arising measure of non-classicality in the scheme of Piani et al. above) for a special class of separable states, the so-called classical-quantum states. In particular, we fully characterize the classical-quantum two-qubit states that are maximally non-classical.Comment: 13 pages, 1 figure, submitted to special issue of IJQ

Class of PPT bound entangled states associated to almost any set of pure entangled states

We analyze a class of entangled states for bipartite $d \otimes d$ systems, with $d$ non-prime. The entanglement of such states is revealed by the construction of canonically associated entanglement witnesses. The structure of the states is very simple and similar to the one of isotropic states: they are a mixture of a separable and a pure entangled state whose supports are orthogonal. Despite such simple structure, in an opportune interval of the mixing parameter their entanglement is not revealed by partial transposition nor by the realignment criterion, i.e. by any permutational criterion in the bipartite setting. In the range in which the states are Positive under Partial Transposition (PPT), they are not distillable; on the other hand, the states in the considered class are provably distillable as soon as they are Nonpositive under Partial Transposition (NPT). The states are associated to any set of more than two pure states. The analysis is extended to the multipartite setting. By an opportune selection of the set of multipartite pure states, it is possible to construct mixed states which are PPT with respect to any choice of bipartite cuts and nevertheless exhibit genuine multipartite entanglement. Finally, we show that every $k$-positive but not completely positive map is associated to a family of nondecomposable maps.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures. To appear in Phys. Rev.

Universal resources for approximate and stochastic measurement-based quantum computation

We investigate which quantum states can serve as universal resources for approximate and stochastic measurement-based quantum computation, in the sense that any quantum state can be generated from a given resource by means of single-qubit (local) operations assisted by classical communication. More precisely, we consider the approximate and stochastic generation of states, resulting e.g. from a restriction to finite measurement settings or from possible imperfections in the resources or local operations. We show that entanglement-based criteria for universality obtained for the exact, deterministic case can be lifted to the much more general approximate, stochastic case, moving from the idealized situation considered in previous works, to the practically relevant context of non-perfect state preparation. We find that any entanglement measure fulfilling some basic requirements needs to reach its maximum value on some element of an approximate, stochastic universal family of resource states, as the resource size grows. This allows us to rule out various families of states as being approximate, stochastic universal. We provide examples of resources that are efficient approximate universal, but not exact deterministic universal. We also study the robustness of universal resources for measurement-based quantum computation under realistic assumptions about the (imperfect) generation and manipulation of entangled states, giving an explicit expression for the impact that errors made in the preparation of the resource have on the possibility to use it for universal approximate and stochastic state preparation. Finally, we discuss the relation between our entanglement-based criteria and recent results regarding the uselessness of states with a high degree of geometric entanglement as universal resources.Comment: 17 pages; abstract shortened with respect to the published version to respect the arXiv limit of 1,920 character

The quantumness of correlations revealed in local measurements exceeds entanglement

We analyze a family of measures of general quantum correlations for composite systems, defined in terms of the bipartite entanglement necessarily created between systems and apparatuses during local measurements. For every entanglement monotone $E$, this operational correspondence provides a different measure $Q_E$ of quantum correlations. Examples of such measures are the relative entropy of quantumness, the quantum deficit, and the negativity of quantumness. In general, we prove that any so defined quantum correlation measure is always greater than (or equal to) the corresponding entanglement between the subsystems, $Q_E \ge E$, for arbitrary states of composite quantum systems. We analyze qualitatively and quantitatively the flow of correlations in iterated measurements, showing that general quantum correlations and entanglement can never decrease along von Neumann chains, and that genuine multipartite entanglement in the initial state of the observed system always gives rise to genuine multipartite entanglement among all subsystems and all measurement apparatuses at any level in the chain. Our results provide a comprehensive framework to understand and quantify general quantum correlations in multipartite states.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures; terminology slightly revised, few remarks adde

Operational interpretations of quantum discord

Quantum discord quantifies non-classical correlations going beyond the standard classification of quantum states into entangled and unentangled ones. Although it has received considerable attention, it still lacks any precise interpretation in terms of some protocol in which quantum features are relevant. Here we give quantum discord its first operational meaning in terms of entanglement consumption in an extended quantum state merging protocol. We further relate the asymmetry of quantum discord with the performance imbalance in quantum state merging and dense coding.Comment: v4: 5 pages, 1 fig. Refs added, text improved. Main results unchanged. See arXiv:1008.4135v2 for a related work. v5: close to the published versio