arXiv subjects

Alexander Streltsov

Publications and source records attributed to Alexander Streltsov.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2021

Experimental progress on quantum coherence: detection, quantification, and manipulation

Quantum coherence is a fundamental property of quantum systems, separating quantum from classical physics. Recently, there has been significant interest in the characterization of quantum coherence as a resource, investigating how coherence can be extracted and used for quantum technological applications. In this work we review the progress of this research, focusing in particular on recent experimental efforts. After a brief review of the underlying theory we discuss the main platforms for realizing the experiments: linear optics, nuclear magnetic resonance, and superconducting systems. We then consider experimental detection and quantification of coherence, experimental state conversion and coherence distillation, and experiments investigating the dynamics of quantum coherence. We also review experiments exploring the connections between coherence and uncertainty relations, path information, and coherence of operations and measurements. Experimental efforts on multipartite and multilevel coherence are also discussed.

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arXiv2021

Preserving quantum correlations and coherence with non-Markovianity

Open quantum systems exhibit a rich phenomenology, in comparison to closed quantum systems that evolve unitarily according to the Schrödinger equation. The dynamics of an open quantum system are typically classified into Markovian and non-Markovian, depending on whether the dynamics can be decomposed into valid quantum operations at any time scale. Since Markovian evolutions are easier to simulate, compared to non-Markovian dynamics, it is reasonable to assume that non-Markovianity can be employed for useful quantum-technological applications. Here, we demonstrate the usefulness of non-Markovianity for preserving correlations and coherence in quantum systems. For this, we consider a broad class of qubit evolutions, having a decoherence matrix separated from zero for large times. While any such Markovian evolution leads to an exponential loss of correlations, non-Markovianity can help to preserve correlations even in the limit $t \rightarrow \infty$. For covariant qubit evolutions, we also show that non-Markovianity can be used to preserve quantum coherence at all times, which is an important resource for quantum metrology. We explicitly demonstrate this effect experimentally with linear optics, by implementing the required evolution that is non-Markovian at all times.

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arXiv2021

Resource theory of imaginarity: Quantification and state conversion

Complex numbers are widely used in both classical and quantum physics, and are indispensable components for describing quantum systems and their dynamical behavior. Recently, the resource theory of imaginarity has been introduced, allowing for a systematic study of complex numbers in quantum mechanics and quantum information theory. In this work we develop theoretical methods for the resource theory of imaginarity, motivated by recent progress within theories of entanglement and coherence. We investigate imaginarity quantification, focusing on the geometric imaginarity and the robustness of imaginarity, and apply these tools to the state conversion problem in imaginarity theory. Moreover, we analyze the complexity of real and general operations in optical experiments, focusing on the number of unfixed wave plates for their implementation. We also discuss the role of imaginarity for local state discrimination, proving that any pair of real orthogonal pure states can be discriminated via local real operations and classical communication. Our study reveals the significance of complex numbers in quantum physics, and proves that imaginarity is a resource in optical experiments.

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arXiv2021

Operational Resource Theory of Imaginarity

Wave-particle duality is one of the basic features of quantum mechanics, giving rise to the use of complex numbers in describing states of quantum systems, their dynamics, and interaction. Since the inception of quantum theory, it has been debated whether complex numbers are actually essential, or whether an alternative consistent formulation is possible using real numbers only. Here, we attack this long-standing problem both theoretically and experimentally, using the powerful tools of quantum resource theories. We show that - under reasonable assumptions - quantum states are easier to create and manipulate if they only have real elements. This gives an operational meaning to the resource theory of imaginarity. We identify and answer several important questions which include the state-conversion problem for all qubit states and all pure states of any dimension, and the approximate imaginarity distillation for all quantum states. As an application, we show that imaginarity plays a crucial role for state discrimination: there exist real quantum states which can be perfectly distinguished via local operations and classical communication, but which cannot be distinguished with any nonzero probability if one of the parties has no access to imaginarity. We confirm this phenomenon experimentally with linear optics, performing discrimination of different two-photon quantum states by local projective measurements. These results prove that complex numbers are an indispensable part of quantum mechanics.

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arXiv2020

Quantum state merging with bound entanglement

Quantum state merging is one of the most important protocols in quantum information theory. In this task two parties aim to merge their parts of a pure tripartite state by making use of additional singlets while preserving correlations with a third party. We study a variation of this scenario where the shared state is not necessarily pure, and the merging parties have free access to local operations, classical communication, and PPT entangled states. We provide general conditions for a state to admit perfect merging, and present a family of fully separable states which cannot be perfectly merged if the merging parties have no access to additional singlets. We also show that free PPT entangled states do not give any advantage for merging of pure states, and the conditional entropy plays the same role as in standard quantum state merging quantifying the rate of additional singlets needed to perfectly merge the state.

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arXiv2020

Direct estimation of quantum coherence by collective measurements

The recently established resource theory of quantum coherence allows for a quantitative understanding of the superposition principle, with applications reaching from quantum computing to quantum biology. While different quantifiers of coherence have been proposed in the literature, their efficient estimation in today's experiments remains a challenge. Here, we introduce a collective measurement scheme for estimating the amount of coherence in quantum states, which requires entangled measurements on two copies of the state. As we show by numerical simulations, our scheme outperforms other estimation methods based on tomography or adaptive measurements, leading to a higher precision in a large parameter range for estimating established coherence quantifiers of qubit and qutrit states. We show that our method is accessible with today's technology by implementing it experimentally with photons, finding a good agreement between experiment and theory.

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arXiv2019

Entanglement negativity as a universal non-Markovianity witness

In order to engineer an open quantum system and its evolution, it is essential to identify and control the memory effects. These are formally attributed to the non-Markovianity of dynamics that manifests itself by the evolution being indivisible in time, a property which can be witnessed by a non-monotonic behavior of contractive functions or correlation measures. We show that by monitoring directly the entanglement behavior of a system in a tripartite setting it is possible to witness all invertible non-Markovian dynamics, as well as all (also non-invertible) qubit evolutions. This is achieved by using negativity, a computable measure of entanglement, which in the usual bipartite setting is not a universal non-Markovianity witness. We emphasize further the importance of multipartite states by showing that non-Markovianity cannot be faithfully witnessed by any contractive function of single qubits. We support our statements by an explicit example of eternally non-Markovian qubit dynamics, for which negativity can witness non-Markovianity at arbitrary time scales.

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arXiv2019

Stochastic Coherence Theory for Qubits

The resource theory of coherence studies the operational value of superpositions in quantum technologies. A key question in this theory concerns the efficiency of manipulation and interconversion of this resource. Here we solve this question completely for mixed states of qubits by determining the optimal probabilities for mixed state conversions via stochastic incoherent operations. This implies new lower bounds on the asymptotic state conversion rate between mixed single-qubit states which in some cases is proven to be tight. Furthermore, we obtain the minimal distillable coherence for given coherence cost among all single-qubit states, which sheds new light on the irreversibility of coherence theory.

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arXiv2019

Quantum coherence and state conversion: theory and experiment

The resource theory of coherence studies the operational value of superpositions in quantum technologies. A key question in this theory concerns the efficiency of manipulation and inter-conversion of the resource. Here we solve this question completely for qubit states by determining the optimal probabilities for mixed state conversions via stochastic incoherent operations. Extending the discussion to distributed scenarios, we introduce and address the task of assisted incoherent state conversion where the process is enhanced by making use of correlations with a second party. Building on these results, we demonstrate experimentally that the optimal state conversion probabilities can be achieved in a linear optics set-up. This paves the way towards real world applications of coherence transformations in current quantum technologies.

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arXiv2018

Non-asymptotic assisted distillation of quantum coherence

We characterize the operational task of environment-assisted distillation of quantum coherence under different sets of free operations when only a finite supply of copies of a given state is available. We first evaluate the one-shot assisted distillable coherence exactly, and introduce a semidefinite programming bound on it in terms of a smooth entropic quantity. We prove the bound to be tight for all systems in dimensions 2 and 3, which allows us to obtain computable expressions for the one-shot rate of distillation, establish an analytical expression for the best achievable fidelity of assisted distillation for any finite number of copies, and fully solve the problem of asymptotic zero-error assisted distillation for qubit and qutrit systems. Our characterization shows that all relevant sets of free operations in the resource theory of coherence have exactly the same power in the task of one-shot assisted coherence distillation, and furthermore resolves a conjecture regarding the additivity of coherence of assistance in dimension 3.

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arXiv2018

Maximal Coherence and the Resource Theory of Purity

The resource theory of quantum coherence studies the off-diagonal elements of a density matrix in a distinguished basis, whereas the resource theory of purity studies all deviations from the maximally mixed state. We establish a direct connection between the two resource theories, by identifying purity as the maximal coherence which is achievable by unitary operations. The states that saturate this maximum identify a universal family of maximally coherent mixed states. These states are optimal resources under maximally incoherent operations, and thus independent of the way coherence is quantified. For all distance-based coherence quantifiers the maximal coherence can be evaluated exactly, and is shown to coincide with the corresponding distance-based purity quantifier. We further show that purity bounds the maximal amount of entanglement and discord that can be generated by unitary operations, thus demonstrating that purity is the most elementary resource for quantum information processing.

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arXiv2018

Converting multilevel nonclassicality into genuine multipartite entanglement

Characterizing genuine quantum resources and determining operational rules for their manipulation are crucial steps to appraise possibilities and limitations of quantum technologies. Two such key resources are nonclassicality, manifested as quantum superposition between reference states of a single system, and entanglement, capturing quantum correlations among two or more subsystems. Here we present a general formalism for the conversion of nonclassicality into multipartite entanglement, showing that a faithful reversible transformation between the two resources is always possible within a precise resource-theoretic framework. Specializing to quantum coherence between the levels of a quantum system as an instance of nonclassicality, we introduce explicit protocols for such a mapping. We further show that the conversion relates multilevel coherence and multipartite entanglement not only qualitatively, but also quantitatively, restricting the amount of entanglement achievable in the process and in particular yielding an equality between the two resources when quantified by fidelity-based geometric measures.

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arXiv2018

Quantum state redistribution with local coherence

Quantum entanglement and coherence are two fundamental resources for quantum information processing. Recent results clearly demonstrate their relevance in quantum technological tasks, including quantum communication and quantum algorithms. In this Letter we study the role of quantum coherence for quantum state redistribution, a fundamental task where two parties aim to relocate a quantum particle by using a limited amount of quantum communication and shared entanglement. We provide general bounds for the resource rates required for this process, and show that these bounds are tight under additional reasonable constraints, including the situation where the receiving party cannot use local coherence. While entanglement cannot be directly converted into local coherence in our setting, we show that entanglement is still useful for local coherence creation if an additional quantum channel is provided, and the optimal protocol for local coherence creation for any given amount of quantum communication and shared entanglement is presented. We also discuss possible extensions of our methods to other scenarios where the receiving party is limited by local constraints, including theories of thermodynamics and asymmetry.

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arXiv2017

Activation of entanglement from quantum coherence and superposition

Quantum entanglement and coherence are two fundamental features of nature, arising from the superposition principle of quantum mechanics. While considered as puzzling phenomena in the early days of quantum theory, it is only very recently that entanglement and coherence have been recognized as resources for the emerging quantum technologies, including quantum metrology, quantum communication, and quantum computing. In this work we study the limitations for the interconversion between coherence and entanglement. We prove a fundamental no-go theorem, stating that a general resource theory of superposition does not allow for entanglement activation. By constructing a CNOT gate as a free operation, we experimentally show that such activation is possible within the more constrained framework of quantum coherence. Our results provide new insights into the interplay between coherence and entanglement, representing a substantial step forward for solving longstanding open questions in quantum information science.

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arXiv2017

Structure of the resource theory of quantum coherence

Quantum coherence is an essential feature of quantum mechanics which is responsible for the departure between classical and quantum world. The recently established resource theory of quantum coherence studies possible quantum technological applications of quantum coherence, and limitations which arise if one is lacking the ability to establish superpositions. An important open problem in this context is a simple characterization for incoherent operations, constituted by all possible transformations allowed within the resource theory of coherence. In this work, we contribute to such a characterization by proving several upper bounds on the maximum number of incoherent Kraus operators in a general incoherent operation. For a single qubit, we show that the number of incoherent Kraus operators is not more than 5, and it remains an open question if this number can be reduced to 4. The presented results are also relevant for quantum thermodynamics, as we demonstrate by introducing the class of Gibbs-preserving strictly incoherent operations, and solving the corresponding mixed-state conversion problem for a single qubit.

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arXiv2017

Quantum Coherence as a Resource

The coherent superposition of states, in combination with the quantization of observables, represents one of the most fundamental features that mark the departure of quantum mechanics from the classical realm. Quantum coherence in many-body systems embodies the essence of entanglement and is an essential ingredient for a plethora of physical phenomena in quantum optics, quantum information, solid state physics, and nanoscale thermodynamics. In recent years, research on the presence and functional role of quantum coherence in biological systems has also attracted a considerable interest. Despite the fundamental importance of quantum coherence, the development of a rigorous theory of quantum coherence as a physical resource has only been initiated recently. In this Colloquium we discuss and review the development of this rapidly growing research field that encompasses the characterization, quantification, manipulation, dynamical evolution, and operational application of quantum coherence.

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arXiv2017

Towards resource theory of coherence in distributed scenarios

The search for a simple description of fundamental physical processes is an important part of quantum theory. One example for such an abstraction can be found in the distance lab paradigm: if two separated parties are connected via a classical channel, it is notoriously difficult to characterize all possible operations these parties can perform. This class of operations is widely known as local operations and classical communication (LOCC). Surprisingly, the situation becomes comparably simple if the more general class of separable operations is considered, a finding which has been extensively used in quantum information theory for many years. Here, we propose a related approach for the resource theory of quantum coherence, where two distant parties can only perform measurements which do not create coherence and can communicate their outcomes via a classical channel. We call this class local incoherent operations and classical communication (LICC). While the characterization of this class is also difficult in general, we show that the larger class of separable incoherent operations (SI) has a simple mathematical form, yet still preserving the main features of LICC. We demonstrate the relevance of our approach by applying it to three different tasks: assisted coherence distillation, quantum teleportation, and single-shot quantum state merging. We expect that the results obtained in this work also transfer to other concepts of coherence which are discussed in recent literature. The approach presented here opens new ways to study the resource theory of coherence in distributed scenarios.

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arXiv2017

Genuine quantum coherence

Any quantum resource theory is based on free states and free operations, i.e., states and operations which can be created and performed at no cost. In the resource theory of coherence free states are diagonal in some fixed basis, and free operations are those which cannot create coherence for some particular experimental realization. Recently, some problems of this approach have been discussed, and new sets of operations have been proposed to resolve these problems. We propose here the framework of genuine quantum coherence. This approach is based on a simple principle: we demand that a genuinely incoherent operation preserves all incoherent states. This framework captures coherence under additional constrains such as energy preservation and all genuinely incoherent operations are incoherent regardless of their particular experimental realization. We also introduce the full class of operations with this property, which we call fully incoherent. We analyze in detail the mathematical structure of these classes and also study possible state transformations. We show that deterministic manipulation is severely limited, even in the asymptotic settings. In particular, this framework does not have a unique golden unit, i.e., there is no single state from which all other states can be created deterministically with the free operations. This suggests that any reasonably powerful resource theory of coherence must contain free operations which can potentially create coherence in some experimental realization.

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