Quantum Probability and Quantum Information Theory
This is an introductory course on quantum probability and quantum information, based on matrix algebras.
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arXiv subjects
Hans Maassen
Publications and source records attributed to Hans Maassen.
A Galton-Watson estimate for Dyson series
We consider the question of convergence of particular series of integrals, which are labeled by rooted trees. Necessary and sufficient criteria for convergence are obtained, together with an explicit expression for the sum. The technique used is strongly reminiscent of the generating function approach of Galton and Watson to branching processes. The interest in these series derives from the Dyson series expansion for the perturbation of a free quantum dynamics by a local potential: the convergence of the series imlies that the perturbed dynamics exists and is unitarily equivalent with the free one.
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Copying Quantum States
The no-broadcasting theorem in quantum information says that a set of states on a quantum system admits a common broadcasting (copying) operation if and only if their density matrices belong to a commuting family. We discuss and prove this theorem, as well as the closely related no-cloning theorem in the context of quantum probability theory, i.e. in the category of (finite dimensional) C-star-algebras with unital completely positive maps.
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Continuous Observation of Quantum Systems
In a series of papers in the 1980's Alexander Holevo proved a classification theorem for continuous quantum measurement processes, or, as they would today be called, stationary quantum trajectories in continuous time. His main tools were functional analytic in character: starting from a Bochner-type inequality he employed dilation techniques for positive definite kernels. Here we give an alternative, more probabilistic proof: we use weak convergence of measures and employ Levy's Continuity Theorem. We clarify the boundedness conditions in Holevo's theorem, and supply a simple example from quantum optics.
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Matrix forms of immanant inequalities
We translate inequalities and conjectures for immanants and generalized matrix functions into inequalities in the Löwner order. These have the form of trace polynomials and generalize the inequalities from [FH, J. Math. Phys. 62 (2021), 2, 022203].
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Quasirandom quantum channels
Mixing (or quasirandom) properties of the natural transition matrix associated to a graph can be quantified by its distance to the complete graph. Different mixing properties correspond to different norms to measure this distance. For dense graphs, two such properties known as spectral expansion and uniformity were shown to be equivalent in seminal 1989 work of Chung, Graham and Wilson. Recently, Conlon and Zhao extended this equivalence to the case of sparse vertex transitive graphs using the famous Grothendieck inequality. Here we generalize these results to the non-commutative, or `quantum', case, where a transition matrix becomes a quantum channel. In particular, we show that for irreducibly covariant quantum channels, expansion is equivalent to a natural analog of uniformity for graphs, generalizing the result of Conlon and Zhao. Moreover, we show that in these results, the non-commutative and commutative (resp.) Grothendieck inequalities yield the best-possible constants.
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Optimality of entropic uncertainty relations
The entropic uncertainty relation proven by Maassen and Uffink for arbitrary pairs of two observables is known to be non-optimal. Here, we call an uncertainty relation optimal, if the lower bound can be attained for any value of either of the corresponding uncertainties. In this work we establish optimal uncertainty relations by characterising the optimal lower bound in scenarios similar to the Maassen-Uffink type. We disprove a conjecture by Englert et al. and generalise various previous results. However, we are still far from a complete understanding and, based on numerical investigation and analytical results in small dimension, we present a number of conjectures.
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Protected Subspaces in Quantum Information
In certain situations the state of a quantum system, after transmission through a quantum channel, can be perfectly restored. This can be done by 'coding' the state space of the system before transmission into a 'protected' part of a larger state space, and by applying a proper 'decoding' map afterwards. We investigate two kinds of protected subspaces: the error correction subspaces and the dark subspaces. In neither case information leaks out of the system, but in the second it is more difficult to restore the state. Recent results on higher rank numerical ranges of operators are used to construct examples. In particular, dark spaces are constructed for any map of rank 2, for a biased permutations channel and for certain separable maps acting on multipartite systems. Furthermore, error correction subspaces are provided for a class of three unitary noise models.
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Information Transfer Implies State Collapse
We attempt to clarify certain puzzles concerning state collapse and decoherence. In open quantum systems decoherence is shown to be a necessary consequence of the transfer of information to the outside; we prove an upper bound for the amount of coherence which can survive such a transfer. We claim that in large closed systems decoherence has never been observed, but we will show that it is usually harmless to assume its occurrence. An independent postulate of state collapse over and above Schroedinger's equation and the probability interpretation of quantum states, is shown to be redundant.
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Purification of quantum trajectories
We prove that the quantum trajectory of repeated perfect measurement on a finite quantum system either asymptotically purifies, or hits upon a family of `dark' subspaces, where the time evolution is unitary.
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Quantum probability applied to the damped harmonic oscillator
In this introductory course we sketch the framework of quantum probability in order to discuss open quantum systems, in particular the damped harmonic oscillator.
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A Pathwise Ergodic Theorem for Quantum Trajectories
If the time evolution of an open quantum system approaches equilibrium in the time mean, then on any single trajectory of any of its unravelings the time averaged state approaches the same equilibrium state with probability 1. In the case of multiple equilibrium states the quantum trajectory converges in the mean to a random choice from these states.
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Stochastic Schrodinger equations
A derivation of stochastic Schrodinger equations is given using quantum filtering theory. We study an open system in contact with its environment, the electromagnetic field. Continuous observation of the field yields information on the system: it is possible to keep track in real time of the best estimate of the system's quantum state given the observations made. This estimate satisfies a stochastic Schrodinger equation, which can be derived from the quantum stochastic differential equation for the interaction picture evolution of system and field together. Throughout the paper we focus on the basic example of resonance fluorescence.
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Constructing the Davies process of Resonance Fluorescence with Quantum Stochastic Calculus
Starting point is a given semigroup of completely positive maps on the 2 times 2 matrices. This semigroup describes the irreversible evolution of a decaying 2-level atom. Using the integral-sum kernel approach to quantum stochastic calculus we couple the 2-level atom to an environment, which in our case will be interpreted as the electromagnetic field. The irreversible time evolution of the 2-level atom then stems from the reversible time evolution of atom and field together. Mathematically speaking, we have constructed a Markov dilation of the semigroup. The next step is to drive the atom by a laser and to count the photons emitted into the field by the decaying 2-level atom. For every possible sequence of photon counts we construct a map that gives the time evolution of the 2-level atom inferred by that sequence. The family of maps that we obtain in this way forms a so-called Davies process. In his book Davies describes the structure of these processes, which brings us into the field of quantum trajectories. Within our model we calculate the jump operators and we briefly describe the resulting counting process.
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Generalised Brownian Motion and Second Quantisation
A new approach to the generalised Brownian motion introduced by M. Bozejko and R. Speicher is described, based on symmetry rather than deformation. The symmetrisation principle is provided by Joyal's notions of tensorial and combinatorial species. Any such species V gives rise to an endofunctor F_V of the category of Hilbert spaces with contractions. A generalised Brownian motion is an algebra of creation and annihilation operators acting on F_V(H) for arbitrary Hilbert spaces H and having a prescription for the calculation of vacuum expectations in terms of a function t on pair partitions. The positivity is encoded by a *-semigroup of "broken pair partitions" whose representation space with respect to t is V. The existence of the second quantisation as functor Gamma_t from Hilbert spaces to noncommutative probability spaces is proved to be equivalent to the multiplicative property of the function t. For a certain one parameter interpolation between the fermionic and the free Brownian motion it is shown that the ``field algebras'' Gamma(K) are type II_1 factors when K is infinite dimensional.
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An Ergodic Theorem for Quantum Counting Processes
For a quantum-mechanical counting process we show ergodicity, under the condition that the underlying open quantum system approaches equilibrium in the time mean. This implies equality of time average and ensemble average for correlation functions of the detection current to all orders and with probability 1.
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Symmetric Hilbert spaces arising from species of structures
Symmetric Hilbert spaces such as the bosonic and the fermionic Fock spaces over some `one particle space' $\K$ are formed by certain symmetrization procedures performed on the full Fock space. We investigate alternative ways of symmetrization by building on Joyal's notion of a combinatorial species. Any such species $F$ gives rise to an endofunctor $\G_F$ of the category of Hilbert spaces with contractions mapping a Hilbert space $\K$ to a symmetric Hilbert space $\G_F(\K)$ with the same symmetry as the species $F$. A general framework for annihilation and creation operators on these spaces is developed, and compared to the generalised Brownian motions of R. Speicher and M. Bożejko. As a corollary we find that the commutation relation $a_ia_j^*-a_j^*a_i=f(N)δ_{ij}$ with $Na_i^*-a_i^*N=a_i^*$ admits a realization on a symmetric Hilbert space whenever $f$ has a power series with infinite radius of convergence and positive coefficients.
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An obstruction for q-deformation of the convolution product
We consider two independent q-Gaussian random variables X and Y and a function f chosen in such a way that f(X) and X have the same distribution. For 0 < q < 1 we find that at least the fourth moments of X + Y and f(X) + Y are different. We conclude that no q-deformed convolution product can exist for functions of independent q-Gaussian random variables.
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