Experimental Schmidt Decomposition and Entanglement Detection

We introduce an experimental procedure for the detection of quantum entanglement of an unknown quantum state with as few measurements as possible. The method requires neither a priori knowledge of the state nor a shared reference frame between the observers. The scheme starts with local measurements, possibly supplemented with suitable filtering, that can be regarded as calibration. Consecutive correlation measurements enable detection of the entanglement of the state. We utilize the fact that the calibration stage essentially establishes the Schmidt decomposition for pure states. Alternatively we develop a decision tree which reveals entanglement within few steps. These methods are illustrated and verified experimentally for various two-qubit entangled states.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures, journal versio

Optimized state independent entanglement detection based on geometrical threshold criterion

Experimental procedures are presented for the rapid detection of entanglement of unknown arbitrary quantum states. The methods are based on the entanglement criterion using accessible correlations and the principle of correlation complementarity. Our first scheme essentially establishes the Schmidt decomposition for pure states, with few measurements only and without the need for shared reference frames. The second scheme employs a decision tree to speed up entanglement detection. We analyze the performance of the methods using numerical simulations and verify them experimentally for various states of two, three and four qubits.Comment: 13 pages, 12 figure

Systematic errors in current quantum state tomography tools

Common tools for obtaining physical density matrices in experimental quantum state tomography are shown here to cause systematic errors. For example, using maximum likelihood or least squares optimization for state reconstruction, we observe a systematic underestimation of the fidelity and an overestimation of entanglement. A solution for this problem can be achieved by a linear evaluation of the data yielding reliable and computational simple bounds including error bars.Comment: 8 pages, 8 figure

Experimental Comparison of Efficient Tomography Schemes for a Six-Qubit State

Quantum state tomography suffers from the measurement effort increasing exponentially with the number of qubits. Here, we demonstrate permutationally invariant tomography for which, contrary to conventional tomography, all resources scale polynomially with the number of qubits both in terms of the measurement effort as well as the computational power needed to process and store the recorded data. We demonstrate the benefits of combining permutationally invariant tomography with compressed sensing by studying the influence of the pump power on the noise present in a six-qubit symmetric Dicke state, a case where full tomography is possible only for very high pump powers.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figure

Fisher information and multiparticle entanglement

The Fisher information $F$ gives a limit to the ultimate precision achievable in a phase estimation protocol. It has been shown recently that the Fisher information for a linear two-mode interferometer cannot exceed the number of particles if the input state is separable. As a direct consequence, with such input states the shot-noise limit is the ultimate limit of precision. In this work, we go a step further by deducing bounds on $F$ for several multiparticle entanglement classes. These bounds imply that genuine multiparticle entanglement is needed for reaching the highest sensitivities in quantum interferometry. We further compute similar bounds on the average Fisher information $\bar F$ for collective spin operators, where the average is performed over all possible spin directions. We show that these criteria detect different sets of states and illustrate their strengths by considering several examples, also using experimental data. In particular, the criterion based on $\bar F$ is able to detect certain bound entangled states.Comment: Published version. Notice also the following article [Phys. Rev. A 85, 022322 (2012), DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.85.022322] by Geza T\'oth on the same subjec

Useful Multiparticle Entanglement and Sub-Shot-Noise Sensitivity in Experimental Phase Estimation

We experimentally demonstrate a general criterion to identify entangled states useful for the estimation of an unknown phase shift with a sensitivity higher than the shot-noise limit. We show how to exploit this entanglement on the examples of a maximum likelihood as well as of a Bayesian phase estimation protocol. Using an entangled four-photon state we achieve a phase sensitivity clearly beyond the shot-noise limit. Our detailed comparison of methods and quantum states for entanglement enhanced metrology reveals the connection between multiparticle entanglement and sub-shot-noise uncertainty, both in a frequentist and in a Bayesian phase estimation setting.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure