Estimating the spectrum of a density operator

Given N quantum systems prepared according to the same density operator \rho, we propose a measurement on the N-fold system which approximately yields the spectrum of \rho. The projections of the proposed observable decompose the Hilbert space according to the irreducible representations of the permutations on N points, and are labeled by Young frames, whose relative row lengths estimate the eigenvalues of \rho in decreasing order. We show convergence of these estimates in the limit N\to\infty, and that the probability for errors decreases exponentially with a rate we compute explicitly.Comment: 4 Pages, RevTeX, one figur

Decoherence of multi-dimensional entangled coherent states

For entangled states of light both the amount of entanglement and the sensitivity to noise generally increase with the number of photons in the state. The entanglement-sensitivity tradeoff is investigated for a particular set of states, multi-dimensional entangled coherent states. Those states possess an arbitrarily large amount of entanglement $E$ provided the number of photons is at least of order $2^{2E}$. We calculate how fast that entanglement decays due to photon absorption losses and how much entanglement is left. We find that for very small losses the amount of entanglement lost is equal to $2/\log(2)\approx 2.89$ ebits per absorbed photon, irrespective of the amount of pure-state entanglement $E$ one started with. In contrast, for larger losses it tends to be the remaining amount of entanglement that is independent of $E$. This may provide a useful strategy for creating states with a fixed amount of entanglement.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure

Quantum Walks with Non-Orthogonal Position States

Quantum walks have by now been realized in a large variety of different physical settings. In some of these, particularly with trapped ions, the walk is implemented in phase space, where the corresponding position states are not orthogonal. We develop a general description of such a quantum walk and show how to map it into a standard one with orthogonal states, thereby making available all the tools developed for the latter. This enables a variety of experiments, which can be implemented with smaller step sizes and more steps. Tuning the non-orthogonality allows for an easy preparation of extended states such as momentum eigenstates, which travel at a well-defined speed with low dispersion. We introduce a method to adjust their velocity by momentum shifts, which allows to investigate intriguing effects such as the analog of Bloch oscillations.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Universal and phase covariant superbroadcasting for mixed qubit states

We describe a general framework to study covariant symmetric broadcasting maps for mixed qubit states. We explicitly derive the optimal N to M superbroadcasting maps, achieving optimal purification of the single-site output copy, in both the universal and the phase covariant cases. We also study the bipartite entanglement properties of the superbroadcast states.Comment: 19 pages, 8 figures, strictly related to quant-ph/0506251 and quant-ph/051015

Numerical simulations of mixed states quantum computation

We describe quantum-octave package of functions useful for simulations of quantum algorithms and protocols. Presented package allows to perform simulations with mixed states. We present numerical implementation of important quantum mechanical operations - partial trace and partial transpose. Those operations are used as building blocks of algorithms for analysis of entanglement and quantum error correction codes. Simulation of Shor's algorithm is presented as an example of package capabilities.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, presented at Foundations of Quantum Information, 16th-19th April 2004, Camerino, Ital

A generalization of Schur-Weyl duality with applications in quantum estimation

Schur-Weyl duality is a powerful tool in representation theory which has many applications to quantum information theory. We provide a generalization of this duality and demonstrate some of its applications. In particular, we use it to develop a general framework for the study of a family of quantum estimation problems wherein one is given n copies of an unknown quantum state according to some prior and the goal is to estimate certain parameters of the given state. In particular, we are interested to know whether collective measurements are useful and if so to find an upper bound on the amount of entanglement which is required to achieve the optimal estimation. In the case of pure states, we show that commutativity of the set of observables that define the estimation problem implies the sufficiency of unentangled measurements.Comment: The published version, Typos corrected, 40 pages, 2 figure

Multipartite Asymmetric Quantum Cloning

We investigate the optimal distribution of quantum information over multipartite systems in asymmetric settings. We introduce cloning transformations that take $N$ identical replicas of a pure state in any dimension as input, and yield a collection of clones with non-identical fidelities. As an example, if the clones are partitioned into a set of $M_A$ clones with fidelity $F^A$ and another set of $M_B$ clones with fidelity $F^B$, the trade-off between these fidelities is analyzed, and particular cases of optimal $N \to M_A+M_B$ cloning machines are exhibited. We also present an optimal $1 \to 1+1+1$ cloning machine, which is the first known example of a tripartite fully asymmetric cloner. Finally, it is shown how these cloning machines can be optically realized.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure

Measurement uncertainty relations

Measurement uncertainty relations are quantitative bounds on the errors in an approximate joint measurement of two observables. They can be seen as a generalization of the error/disturbance tradeoff first discussed heuristically by Heisenberg. Here we prove such relations for the case of two canonically conjugate observables like position and momentum, and establish a close connection with the more familiar preparation uncertainty relations constraining the sharpness of the distributions of the two observables in the same state. Both sets of relations are generalized to means of order $\alpha$ rather than the usual quadratic means, and we show that the optimal constants are the same for preparation and for measurement uncertainty. The constants are determined numerically and compared with some bounds in the literature. In both cases the near-saturation of the inequalities entails that the state (resp. observable) is uniformly close to a minimizing one.Comment: This version 2 contains minor corrections and reformulation

Direct detection of quantum entanglement

Quantum entanglement, after playing a significant role in the development of the foundations of quantum mechanics, has been recently rediscovered as a new physical resource with potential commercial applications such as, for example, quantum cryptography, better frequency standards or quantum-enhanced positioning and clock synchronization. On the mathematical side the studies of entanglement have revealed very interesting connections with the theory of positive maps. The capacity to generate entangled states is one of the basic requirements for building quantum computers. Hence, efficient experimental methods for detection, verification and estimation of quantum entanglement are of great practical importance. Here, we propose an experimentally viable, \emph{direct} detection of quantum entanglement which is efficient and does not require any \emph{a priori} knowledge about the quantum state. In a particular case of two entangled qubits it provides an estimation of the amount of entanglement. We view this method as a new form of quantum computation, namely, as a decision problem with quantum data structure.Comment: 4 pages, 1 eps figure, RevTe

On Nonzero Kronecker Coefficients and their Consequences for Spectra

A triple of spectra (r^A, r^B, r^{AB}) is said to be admissible if there is a density operator rho^{AB} with (Spec rho^A, Spec rho^B, Spec rho^{AB})=(r^A, r^B, r^{AB}). How can we characterise such triples? It turns out that the admissible spectral triples correspond to Young diagrams (mu, nu, lambda) with nonzero Kronecker coefficient [M. Christandl and G. Mitchison, to appear in Comm. Math. Phys., quant-ph/0409016; A. Klyachko, quant-ph/0409113]. This means that the irreducible representation V_lambda is contained in the tensor product of V_mu and V_nu. Here, we show that such triples form a finitely generated semigroup, thereby resolving a conjecture of Klyachko. As a consequence we are able to obtain stronger results than in [M. Ch. and G. M. op. cit.] and give a complete information-theoretic proof of the correspondence between triples of spectra and representations. Finally, we show that spectral triples form a convex polytope.Comment: 13 page