Distribution of Standard deviation of an observable among superposed states

The standard deviation (SD) quantifies the spread of the observed values on a measurement of an observable. In this paper, we study the distribution of SD among the different components of a superposition state. It is found that the SD of an observable on a superposition state can be well bounded by the SDs of the superposed states. We also show that the bounds also serve as good bounds on coherence of a superposition state. As a further generalization, we give an alternative definition of incompatibility of two observables subject to a given state and show how the incompatibility subject to a superposition state is distributed.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, misprints are revise

Bell-type inequality and quantum nonlocality in four-qubit systems

We present a Bell-type inequality for four-qubit systems. Using the inequality we investigate quantum nonlocality of a generic family of states $\left|G_{abcd}\right >$ [Phys. Rev. A 65, 052112 (2002)] and several canonical four-qubit entangled states. It has been demonstrated that the inequality is maximally violated by so called "four-qubit maximal entangled state $\left|G_{m}\right >$" and it is also violated by the four-qubit W state and a special family of states $\left|G_{ab00}\right >$. Moreover, a useful entanglement-nonlocality relationship for the family of states $\left|G_{ab00}\right >$ is obtained.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure

Preparation of kmkm-photon concatenated GHZ states for observing distinct quantum effects at macroscopic scale

As a class of multipartite entangled states, the multipartite concatenated GHZ (C-GHZ) states remain superior stability under the influence of decoherence. We propose two scalable experimental realization of the multiphoton C-GHZ states based on the entanglers of multiphoton GHZ state. Given a $km$-photon GHZ state as an input state, if $m$ is odd, one can create a $km$-photon C-GHZ state. Also, generally, we design a scheme to prepare $km$-photon C-GHZ states from $km$ single-photon states by using $k$ entanglers of $m$-photon GHZ state and $k$ $m$-control Toffoli gates.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Optimal sampling ratios in comparative diagnostic trials

In this paper we focus on comparative diagnostic trials which are frequently employed to compare two markers with continuous or ordinal results. We derive explicit expressions for the optimal sampling ratio based on a common variance structure shared by existing summary statistics of the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. Estimating the optimal ratio requires either pilot data or parametric model assumptions; however, pilot data are often unavailable at the planning stage of diagnostic trials. In the absence of pilot data, some distributions have to be assumed for carrying out the calculation. An optimal ratio from an incorrect distributional assumption may lead to an underpowered study. We propose a two-stage procedure to adaptively estimate the optimal ratio in comparative diagnostic trials without pilot data or assuming parametric distributions. We illustrate the properties of the proposed method through theoretical proofs and extensive simulation studies. We use an example in cancer diagnostic studies to illustrate the application of our method. We find that our method increases the power, or reduces the required overall sample size dramatically

Violation of generalized Bell inequality and its optimal measurement settings

We provide a method to describe quantum nonlocality for $n$-qubit systems. By treating the correlation function as an $n$-index tensor, we derive a generalized Bell inequality. Taking generalized Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) state for example, we calculate quantum prediction under a series of measurement settings involving various angle parameters. We reveal the exact relationship between quantum prediction and the angle parameters. We show that there exists a set of optimal measurement settings and find the corresponding maximal quantum prediction for $n$-qubit generalized GHZ states. As an example, we consider an interesting situation involving only two angle parameters. Finally, we obtain a criterion for the violation of the generalized Bell inequality.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figure

Entanglement measure and quantum violation of Bell-type inequality for a family of four-qubit entangled states

By calculating entanglement measures and quantum violation of Bell-type inequality, we reveal the relationship between entanglement measure and the amount of quantum violation for a family of four-qubit entangled states. It has been demonstrated that the Bell-type inequality is completely violated by these four-qubit entangled states. The plot of entanglement measure as a function of the expectation value of Bell operator shows that entanglement measure first decreases and then increases smoothly with increasing quantum violation.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Exploration of multiphoton entangled states by using weak nonlinearities

We propose a fruitful scheme for exploring multiphoton entangled states based on linear optics and weak nonlinearities. Compared with the previous schemes the present method is more feasible because there are only small phase shifts instead of a series of related functions of photon numbers in the process of interaction with Kerr nonlinearities. In the absence of decoherence we analyze the error probabilities induced by homodyne measurement and show that the maximal error probability can be made small enough even when the number of photons is large. This implies that the present scheme is quite tractable and it is possible to produce entangled states involving a large number of photons.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figur

On four-photon entanglement from parametric down-conversion process

We propose two schemes to generate four-photon polarization-entangled states from the second-order emission of the spontaneous parametric down-conversion process. By using linear optical elements and the coincidence-detection, the four indistinguishable photons emitted from parametric down-conversion source result in the Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) state or the superposition of two orthogonal GHZ states. For this superposition state, under particular phase settings we analyze the quantum correlation function and the local hidden variable (LHV) correlation. As a result, the Bell inequality derived from the LHV correlation is violated with the visibility larger than 0.442. It means that the present four-photon entangled state is therefore suitable for testing the LHV theory.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure

Exploration of photon-number entangled states using weak nonlinearities

A method for exploring photon-number entangled states with weak nonlinearities is described. We show that it is possible to create and detect such entanglement at various scales, ranging from microscopic to macroscopic systems. In the present architecture, we suggest that the maximal phase shift induced in the process of interaction between photons is proportional to photon numbers. Also, in the absence of decoherence we analyze maximum error probability and show its feasibility with current technology.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figur

Scalable symmetry detector and its applications by using beam splitters and weak nonlinearities

We describe a method to detect twin-beam multiphoton entanglement based on a beam splitter and weak nonlinearities. For the twin-beam four-photon entanglement, we explore a symmetry detector. It works not only for collecting two-pair entangled states directly from the spontaneous parametric down-conversion process, but also for purifying them by cascading these symmetry detectors. Surprisingly, by calculating the iterative coefficient and the success probability we show that with a few iterations the desired two-pair can be obtained from a class of four-photon entangled states. We then generalize the symmetry detector to $n$-pair emissions and show that it is capable of determining the number of the pairs emitted indistinguishably from the spontaneous parametric down-conversion source, which may contribute to explore multipair entanglement with a large number of photons.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure