arXiv subjects

Andrea Mari

Publications and source records attributed to Andrea Mari.

52 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2017

Optimal quantum state discrimination via nested binary measurements

A method to compute the optimal success probability of discrimination of N arbitrary quantum states is presented, based on the decomposition of any N-outcome measurement into sequences of nested two-outcome ones. In this way the optimization of the measurement operators can be carried out in successive steps, optimizing first the binary measurements at the deepest nesting level and then moving on to those at higher levels. We obtain an analytical expression for the maximum success probability after the first optimization step and examine its form for the specific case of N=3,4 states of a qubit. In this case, at variance with previous proposals, we are able to provide a compact expression for the success probability of any set of states, whose numerical optimization is straightforward; the results thus obtained highlight some lesser-known features of the discrimination problem.

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arXiv2016

Multi-Phase Hadamard receivers for classical communication on lossy bosonic channels

A scheme for transferring classical information over a lossy bosonic channel is proposed by generalizing the proposal presented in Phys. Rev. Lett. 106, 240502 (2011) by Guha. It employs codewords formed by products of coherent states of fixed mean photon number with multiple phases which, through a passive unitary transformation, reduce to a Pulse-Position Modulation code with multiple pulse phases. The maximum information rate achievable with optimal, yet difficult to implement, detection schemes is computed and shown to saturate the classical capacity of the channel in the low energy regime. An easy to implement receiver based on a conditional Dolinar detection scheme is also proposed finding that, while suboptimal, it allows for improvements in an intermediate photon-number regime with respect to previous proposals.

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arXiv2016

Passive states as optimal inputs for single-jump lossy quantum channels

The passive states of a quantum system minimize the average energy among all the states with a given spectrum. We prove that passive states are the optimal inputs of single-jump lossy quantum channels. These channels arise from a weak interaction of the quantum system of interest with a large Markovian bath in its ground state, such that the interaction Hamiltonian couples only consecutive energy eigenstates of the system. We prove that the output generated by any input state $ρ$ majorizes the output generated by the passive input state $ρ_0$ with the same spectrum of $ρ$. Then, the output generated by $ρ$ can be obtained applying a random unitary operation to the output generated by $ρ_0$. This is an extension of De Palma et al., IEEE Trans. Inf. Theory 62, 2895 (2016), where the same result is proved for one-mode bosonic Gaussian channels. We also prove that for finite temperature this optimality property can fail already in a two-level system, where the best input is a coherent superposition of the two energy eigenstates.

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arXiv2016

Coherent-state discrimination via non-heralded probabilistic amplification

A scheme for the detection of low-intensity optical coherent signals was studied which uses a probabilistic amplifier operated in the non-heralded version, as the underlying non-linear operation to improve the detection efficiency. This approach allows us to improve the statistics by keeping track of all possible outcomes of the amplification stage (including failures). When compared with an optimized Kennedy receiver, the resulting discrimination success probability we obtain presents a gain up to ~1.85% and it approaches the Helstrom bound appreciably faster than the Dolinar receiver, when employed in an adaptive strategy. We also notice that the advantages obtained can be ultimately associated with the fact that, in the high gain limit, the non-heralded version of the probabilistic amplifier induces a partial dephasing which preserves quantum coherence among low energy eigenvectors while removing it elsewhere. A proposal to realize such transformation based on an optical cavity implementation is presented.

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arXiv2016

Optimal processes for probabilistic work extraction beyond the second law

According to the second law of thermodynamics, for every transformation performed on a system which is in contact with an environment of fixed temperature, the extracted work is bounded by the decrease of the free energy of the system. However, in a single realization of a generic process, the extracted work is subject to statistical fluctuations which may allow for probabilistic violations of the previous bound. We are interested in enhancing this effect, i.e. we look for thermodynamic processes that maximize the probability of extracting work above a given arbitrary threshold. For any process obeying the Jarzynski identity, we determine an upper bound for the work extraction probability that depends also on the minimum amount of work that we are willing to extract in case of failure, or on the average work we wish to extract from the system. Then we show that this bound can be saturated within the thermodynamic formalism of quantum discrete processes composed by sequences of unitary quenches and complete thermalizations. We explicitly determine the optimal protocol which is given by two quasi-static isothermal transformations separated by a finite unitary quench.

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arXiv2015

Experiments testing macroscopic quantum superpositions must be slow

We consider a thought experiment where the preparation of a macroscopically massive or charged particle in a quantum superposition and the associated dynamics of a distant test particle apparently allow for superluminal communication. We give a solution to the paradox which is based on the following fundamental principle: any local experiment, discriminating a coherent superposition from an incoherent statistical mixture, necessarily requires a minimum time proportional to the mass (or charge) of the system. For a charged particle, we consider two examples of such experiments, and show that they are both consistent with the previous limitation. In the first, the measurement requires to accelerate the charge, that can entangle with the emitted photons. In the second, the limitation can be ascribed to the quantum vacuum fluctuations of the electromagnetic field. On the other hand, when applied to massive particles our result provides an indirect evidence for the existence of gravitational vacuum fluctuations and for the possibility of entangling a particle with quantum gravitational radiation.

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arXiv2015

Quantum optomechanical piston engines powered by heat

We study two different models of optomechanical systems where a temperature gradient between two radiation baths is exploited for inducing self-sustained coherent oscillations of a mechanical resonator. Viewed from a thermodynamic perspective, such systems represent quantum instances of self-contained thermal machines converting heat into a periodic mechanical motion and thus they can be interpreted as nano-scale analogues of macroscopic piston engines. Our models are potentially suitable for testing fundamental aspects of quantum thermodynamics in the laboratory and for applications in energy efficient nanotechnology.

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arXiv2015

Normal form decomposition for Gaussian-to-Gaussian superoperators

In this paper we explore the set of linear maps sending the set of quantum Gaussian states into itself. These maps are in general not positive, a feature which can be exploited as a test to check whether a given quantum state belongs to the convex hull of Gaussian states (if one of the considered maps sends it into a non positive operator, the above state is certified not to belong to the set). Generalizing a result known to be valid under the assumption of complete positivity, we provide a characterization of these Gaussian-to-Gaussian (not necessarily positive) superoperators in terms of their action on the characteristic function of the inputs. For the special case of one-mode mappings we also show that any Gaussian-to-Gaussian superoperator can be expressed as a concatenation of a phase-space dilatation, followed by the action of a completely positive Gaussian channel, possibly composed with a transposition. While a similar decomposition is shown to fail in the multi-mode scenario, we prove that it still holds at least under the further hypothesis of homogeneous action on the covariance matrix.

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arXiv2015

Quantum state majorization at the output of bosonic Gaussian channels

Quantum communication theory explores the implications of quantum mechanics to the tasks of information transmission. Many physical channels can be formally described as quantum Gaussian operations acting on bosonic quantum states. Depending on the input state and on the quality of the channel, the output suffers certain amount of noise. For a long time it has been conjectured, but never proved, that output states of Gaussian channels corresponding to coherent input signals are the less noisy ones (in the sense of a majorization criterion). In this work we prove this conjecture. Specifically we show that every output state of a phase insensitive Gaussian channel is majorized by the output state corresponding to a coherent input. The proof is based on the optimality of coherent states for the minimization of strictly concave output functionals. Moreover we show that coherent states are the unique optimizers.

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arXiv2015

A generalization of the Entropy Power Inequality to Bosonic Quantum Systems

In most communication schemes information is transmitted via travelling modes of electromagnetic radiation. These modes are unavoidably subject to environmental noise along any physical transmission medium and the quality of the communication channel strongly depends on the minimum noise achievable at the output. For classical signals such noise can be rigorously quantified in terms of the associated Shannon entropy and it is subject to a fundamental lower bound called entropy power inequality. Electromagnetic fields are however quantum mechanical systems and then, especially in low intensity signals, the quantum nature of the information carrier cannot be neglected and many important results derived within classical information theory require non-trivial extensions to the quantum regime. Here we prove one possible generalization of the Entropy Power Inequality to quantum bosonic systems. The impact of this inequality in quantum information theory is potentially large and some relevant implications are considered in this work.

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arXiv2015

The multi-mode quantum Entropy Power Inequality

The quantum version of a fundamental entropic data-processing inequality is presented. It establishes a lower bound for the entropy that can be generated in the output channels of a scattering process, which involves a collection of independent input bosonic modes (e.g., the modes of the electromagnetic field). The impact of this inequality in quantum information theory is potentially large and some relevant implications are considered in this work.

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arXiv2014

Classical capacity of Gaussian thermal memory channels

The classical capacity of phase-invariant Gaussian channels has been recently determined under the assumption that such channels are memoryless. In this work we generalize this result by deriving the classical capacity of a model of quantum memory channel, in which the output states depend on the previous input states. In particular we extend the analysis of [C. Lupo, et al., PRL and PRA (2010)] from quantum limited channels to thermal attenuators and thermal amplifiers. Our result applies in many situations in which the physical communication channel is affected by nonzero memory and by thermal noise.

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arXiv2014

On the time optimal thermalization of single mode Gaussian states

We consider the problem of time optimal control of a continuous bosonic quantum system subject to the action of a Markovian dissipation. In particular, we consider the case of a one mode Gaussian quantum system prepared in an arbitrary initial state and which relaxes to the steady state due to the action of the dissipative channel. We assume that the unitary part of the dynamics is represented by Gaussian operations which preserve the Gaussian nature of the quantum state, i.e. arbitrary phase rotations, bounded squeezing and unlimited displacements. In the ideal ansatz of unconstrained quantum control (i.e. when the unitary phase rotations, squeezing and displacement of the mode can be performed instantaneously), we study how control can be optimized for speeding up the relaxation towards the fixed point of the dynamics and we analytically derive the optimal relaxation time. Our model has potential and interesting applications to the control of modes of electromagnetic radiation and of trapped levitated nanospheres.

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arXiv2013

An experimental proposal for a Gaussian amendable quantum channel

We propose a quantum optics experiment where a single two-mode Gaussian entangled state is used for realizing the paradigm of an amendable Gaussian channel recently presented in Phys. Rev. A, \textbf{87}, 062307 (2013). Depending on the choice of the experimental parameters the entanglement of the probe state is preserved or not and the relative map belongs or not to the class of entanglement breaking channels. The scheme has been optimized to be as simple as possible: it requires only a single active non-linear operation followed by four passive beam-splitters. The effects of losses, detection inefficiencies and statistical errors are also taken into account, proving the feasibility of the experiment with current realistic resources.

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arXiv2013

Speeding up and slowing down the relaxation of a qubit by optimal control

We consider a two-level quantum system prepared in an arbitrary initial state and relaxing to a steady state due to the action of a Markovian dissipative channel. We study how optimal control can be used for speeding up or slowing down the relaxation towards the fixed point of the dynamics. We analytically derive the optimal relaxation times for different quantum channels in the ideal ansatz of unconstrained quantum control (a magnetic field of infinite strength). We also analyze the situation in which the control Hamiltonian is bounded by a finite threshold. As byproducts of our analysis we find that: (i) if the qubit is initially in a thermal state hotter than the environmental bath, quantum control cannot speed up its natural cooling rate; (ii) if the qubit is initially in a thermal state colder than the bath, it can reach the fixed point of the dynamics in finite time if a strong control field is applied; (iii) in the presence of unconstrained quantum control it is possible to keep the evolved state indefinitely and arbitrarily close to special initial states which are far away from the fixed points of the dynamics.

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arXiv2009

Optimal fidelity of teleportation of coherent states and entanglement

We study the Braunstein-Kimble protocol for the continuous variable teleportation of a coherent state. We determine lower and upper bounds for the optimal fidelity of teleportation, maximized over all local Gaussian operations for a given entanglement of the two-mode Gaussian state shared by the sender (Alice) and the receiver (Bob). We also determine the optimal local transformations at Alice and Bob sites and the corresponding maximum fidelity when one restricts to local trace-preserving Gaussian completely positive maps.

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