arXiv subjects

Zhen-Peng Xu

Publications and source records attributed to Zhen-Peng Xu.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Optimal strategies for shadow tomography with limited resources

Shadow tomography addresses the task of efficiently predicting many expectation values of an unknown quantum state from randomized measurements on comparatively few copies. Existing analyses promise large scaling advantages, but the optimal strategies realizing these guarantees are not always known, and the required measurements are potentially challenging to implement on current hardware. We address this gap for Pauli observables by computing optimal sample-complexity parameters and constructing optimal measurement strategies under realistic resource constraints. We focus on memoryless protocols, where each copy is measured only once, and on measurements with bounded interaction range. Our approach reduces the problem to the analysis of graph parameters of the frustration graph encoding the Pauli anticommutation relations. We provide efficient numerical methods for the general case and analytically prove that Clifford measurements are optimal in many situations. This includes all perfect graphs, all single-qubit, all two-qubit measurement scenarios, and more. Applied to Hamiltonian energy estimation, our framework yields constructive strategies and improved variance bounds for molecular benchmarks.

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arXiv2026

Lower-bounding entanglement with nonlocality in a general Bell's scenario

Understanding the quantitative relation between entanglement and Bell nonlocality is a long-standing open problem of fundamental and practical interest. Here, we tackle this problem in a general Bell scenario. {We observe that lying in the center of quantifying these properties are two minimal distances: one from a state to separable states (entanglement), and the other from a correlation to local correlations (nonlocality).} We find that these two distances can be related to each other -- the minimal correlation distance provides a lower bound for the minimal state distance, which allows us to derive nontrivial bounds on many entanglement measures with an arbitrary nonlocal correlation. Moreover, with the on-hand structural knowledge of entanglement and nonlocality in the $(n, 2, 2)$ Bell scenario, we refine our estimate significantly.

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arXiv2026

Simultaneous Detection of High-Dimensional Entanglement for Two Unknown Quantum States

The state overlap, quantified via $\tr[ρσ]$, is a metric widely used to assess the closeness between two quantum states $ρ$ and $σ$. Although global state overlap alone does not directly capture entanglement properties, we uncover that incorporating local state overlaps provide profound insights into the entanglement characteristics of quantum states. To be precise, the ratio of global to local state overlaps provides a lower bound on the Schmidt number, which is usually used for quantifying high-dimensional entanglement. Unlike conventional methods for detecting entanglement, the approach here can simultaneously reveal entanglement information for two unknown quantum states. Moreover, state overlap can be efficiently determined through local randomized measurement methods, which ensures the experimental feasibility of our approach. In a special case, our criterion reduces to an entanglement criterion that is more powerful than the two criteria used most in experiment--the purity criterion and the fidelity-based criterion and also outperform the $p_3$-PPT method in specific instances. Our findings highlight a promising direction for advancements in entanglement detection experiments.

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arXiv2026

Experimental Certification of Quantum Measurements with Maximally Mixed States

So far, certifying quantum devices from their input-output statistics, under minimal assumptions, required the preparation of specific pure quantum states. Recently, Xu et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 140201 (2024)] have demonstrated that certain sets of quantum observables can be certified using any state of full rank. However, their method is restricted to ideal conditions. Here, we address this problem and present an experimentally robust method that eliminates the need of preparing states with high fidelity with respect to specific pure states. We demonstrate the feasibility of the method by experimentally certifying photonic devices implementing Peres' set of 24 ququart observables [J. Phys. A 24, L175 (1991)] and Yu and Oh's set of 13 qutrit observables [Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 030402 (2012)], using maximally mixed states as input. This approach offers a crucial advantage for certifying high-dimensional quantum systems, since it works with maximally mixed and thermal states.

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arXiv2025

Efficient Identification the Inequivalence of Mutually Unbiased Bases via Finite Operators

The structural characterization of high-dimensional mutually unbiased bases (MUBs) by classifying MUBs subsets remains a major open problem. The existing methods not only fail to conclude on the exact classification, but also are severely limited by computational resources and suffer from the numerical precision problem. Here we introduce an operational approach to identify the inequivalence of MUBs subsets, which has less time complexity and entirely avoids the computational precision issues. For arbitrary MUBs subsets of $k$ elements in any prime dimension, this method yields a universal analytical upper bound for the amount of MUBs equivalence classes. By applying this method through simple iterations, we further obtain tighter classification upper bounds for any prime dimension $d\leq 37$. Crucially, the comparison of these upper bounds with existing lower bounds successfully determines the exact classification for all MUBs subsets in any dimension $d \leq 17$. We further extend this method to the case that the dimension is a power of prime number. This general and scalable framework for the classification of MUBs subsets sheds new light on related applications.

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arXiv2025

Simultaneous variances of Pauli strings, weighted independence numbers, and a new kind of perfection of graphs

A set of Pauli stings is well characterized by the graph that encodes its commutatitivity structure, i.e., by its frustration graph. This graph provides a natural interface between graph theory and quantum information, which we explore in this work. We investigate all aspects of this interface for a special class of graphs that bears tight connections between the groundstate structures of a spin systems and topological structure of a graph. We call this class $\hbar$-perfect, as it extends the class of perfect and $h$-perfect graphs. Having an $\hbar$-perfect graph opens up several applications: we find efficient schemes for entanglement detection, a connection to the complexity of shadow tomography, tight uncertainty relations and a construction for computing good lower on bounds ground state energies. Conversely this also induces quantum algorithms for computing the independence number. Albeit those algorithms do not immediately promise an advantage in runtime, we show that an approximate Hamilton encoding of the independence number can be achieved with an amount of qubits that typically scales logarithmically in the number of vertices. We also we also determine the behavior of $\hbar$-perfectness under basic graph operations and evaluate their prevalence among all graphs.

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arXiv2025

Quantifying information flow in quantum processes

We present a framework for quantifying information flow within general quantum processes. For this purpose, we introduce the signaling power of quantum channels and discuss its relevant operational properties. This function supports extensions to higher-order maps, enabling the evaluation of information flow in general quantum causal networks and also processes with indefinite causal order. Furthermore, our results offer a rigorous approach to information dynamics in open systems that applies also in the presence of initial system-environment correlations, and allows for the distinction between classical and quantum information backflow.

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arXiv2025

Quantum network-entanglement measures

Quantum networks are of high interest nowadays and a quantum internet has been long envisioned. Network-entanglement adapts the notion of entanglement to the network scenario and network-entangled states are considered to be a resource to overcome the limitations of a given network structure. In this work, we introduce measures of quantum network-entanglement that are well-defined within the general framework of quantum resource theories, which at the same time have a clear operational interpretation characterizing the extra resources necessary to prepare a targeted quantum state within a given network. In particular, we define the network communication cost and the network round complexity, which turn out to be intimately related to graph-theoretic parameters. We also provide methods to estimate these measures by introducing novel witnesses of network-entanglement.

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arXiv2025

Specifying the Intrinsic Back-action of a General Measurement

Understanding the invasive nature of quantum measurement and its implications in quantum foundations and information science demands a mathematically rigorous and physically well-grounded characterization of intrinsic back-action in general measurement processes. However, such a framework remains elusive, leaving a critical gap in quantum theory. Here, we address this issue by conceptualizing a general quantum measurement as a reduction of extended projection measurements ensured by Naimark's theorem and, derive a state-updating rule for the concerned measurement as a reduction of the projective measurements postulate. Our framework provides a detailed analysis by explicitly decomposing the disturbance effects into two distinct contributions: those arising from the measurement elements themselves and those resulting from the dilation process. Notably, this formulation naturally recovers the projection postulate in the case of projective measurements. Beyond providing insights into joint measurability, non-disturbance, our rule establishes quantitaive connections between intrinsic disturbance and other fundamental quantum features, such as randomness, uncertainty, and information gain.

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arXiv2025

Exploring the boundary of quantum network states from inside out

Quantum networks with bipartite resources and shared randomness present the simplest infrastructure for implementing a future quantum internet. Here, we shall investigate which kinds of entanglement can or cannot be generated from this kind of quantum network by examining their fidelity with different graph states. On the one hand, based on a standard form of graph states under local complementation and a fine-grained uncertainty relation between two projections, we establish upper bounds of fidelity that improve over previous results by at least $25\%$ as the dimension of local systems tends to infinity. On the other hand, in the triangle network, we propose efficient protocols to generate genuine multipartite entangled states from the network, providing significant nontrivial lower bounds of fidelity with high dimensional GHZ states.

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arXiv2025

Exploring the boundary of quantum correlations with a time-domain optical processor

Contextuality is a hallmark feature of the quantum theory that captures its incompatibility with any noncontextual hidden-variable model. The Greenberger--Horne--Zeilinger (GHZ)-type paradoxes are proofs of contextuality that reveal this incompatibility with deterministic logical arguments. However, the GHZ-type paradox whose events can be included in the fewest contexts and which brings the strongest nonclassicality remains elusive. Here, we derive a GHZ-type paradox with a context-cover number of three and show this number saturates the lower bound posed by quantum theory. We demonstrate the paradox with a time-domain fiber optical platform and recover the quantum prediction in a 37-dimensional setup based on high-speed modulation, convolution, and homodyne detection of time-multiplexed pulsed coherent light. By proposing and studying a strong form of contextuality in high-dimensional Hilbert space, our results pave the way for the exploration of exotic quantum correlations with time-multiplexed optical systems.

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arXiv2024

Hybrid of Gradient Descent And Semidefinite Programming for Certifying Multipartite Entanglement Structure

Multipartite entanglement is a crucial resource for a wide range of quantum information processing tasks, including quantum metrology, quantum computing, and quantum communication. The verification of multipartite entanglement, along with an understanding of its intrinsic structure, is of fundamental importance, both for the foundations of quantum mechanics and for the practical applications of quantum information technologies. Nonetheless, detecting entanglement structures remains a significant challenge, particularly for general states and large-scale quantum systems. To address this issue, we develop an efficient algorithm that combines semidefinite programming with a gradient descent method. This algorithm is designed to explore the entanglement structure by examining the inner polytope of the convex set that encompasses all states sharing the same entanglement properties. Through detailed examples, we demonstrate the superior performance of our approach compared to many of the best-known methods available today. Our method not only improves entanglement detection but also provides deeper insights into the complex structures of many-body quantum systems, which is essential for advancing quantum technologies

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arXiv2024

Improved criteria of detecting multipartite entanglement structure

Multipartite entanglement is one of the crucial resources in quantum information processing tasks such as quantum metrology, quantum computing and quantum communications. It is essential to verify not only the multipartite entanglement, but also the entanglement structure in both fundamental theories and the applications of quantum information technologies. However, it is proved to be challenging to detect the entanglement structures, including entanglement depth, entanglement intactness and entanglement stretchability, especially for general states and large-scale quantum systems. By using the partitions of the tensor product space we propose a systematic method to construct powerful entanglement witnesses which identify better the multipartite entanglement structures. Besides, an efficient algorithm using semi-definite programming and a gradient descent algorithm are designed to detect entanglement structure from the inner polytope of the convex set containing all the states with the same entanglement structure. We demonstrate by detailed examples that our criteria perform better than other known ones. Our results may be applied to many quantum information processing tasks.

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arXiv2024

Quantum-enhanced metrology with network states

Armed with quantum correlations, quantum sensors in a network have shown the potential to outclass their classical counterparts in distributed sensing tasks such as clock synchronization and reference frame alignment. On the other hand, this analysis was done for simple and idealized networks, whereas the correlation shared within a practical quantum network, captured by the notion of network states, is much more complex. Here, we prove a general bound that limits the performance of using quantum network states to estimate a global parameter, establishing the necessity of genuine multipartite entanglement for achieving a quantum advantage. The bound can also serve as an entanglement witness in networks and can be generalized to states generated by shallow circuits. Moreover, while our bound prohibits local network states from achieving the Heisenberg limit, we design a probabilistic protocol that, once successful, attains this ultimate limit of quantum metrology and preserves the privacy of involved parties. Our work establishes both the limitation and the possibility of quantum metrology within quantum networks.

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arXiv2024

Bounding the joint numerical range of Pauli strings by graph parameters

The interplay between the quantum state space and a specific set of measurements can be effectively captured by examining the set of jointly attainable expectation values. This set is commonly referred to as the (convex) joint numerical range. In this work, we explore geometric properties of this construct for measurements represented by tensor products of Pauli observables, also known as Pauli strings. The structure of pairwise commutation and anticommutation relations among a set of Pauli strings determines a graph $G$, sometimes also called the frustration graph. We investigate the connection between the parameters of this graph and the structure of minimal ellipsoids encompassing the joint numerical range. Such an outer approximation can be very practical since ellipsoids can be handled analytically even in high dimensions. We find counterexamples to a conjecture from [C. de Gois, K. Hansenne and O. Gühne, arXiv:2207.02197], and answer an open question in [M. B. Hastings and R. O'Donnell, Proc. STOC 2022, pp. 776-789], which implies a new graph parameter that we call $β(G)$. Besides, we develop this approach in different directions, such as comparison with graph-theoretic approaches in other fields, applications in quantum information theory, numerical methods, properties of the new graph parameter, etc. Our approach suggests many open questions that we discuss briefly at the end.

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arXiv2024

Certifying sets of quantum observables with any full-rank state

We show that some sets of quantum observables are unique up to an isometry and have a contextuality witness that attains the same value for any initial state. We prove that these two properties make it possible to certify any of these sets by looking at the statistics of experiments with sequential measurements and using any initial state of full rank, including thermal and maximally mixed states. We prove that this ``certification with any full-rank state'' (CFR) is possible for any quantum system of finite dimension $d \ge 3$ and is robust and experimentally useful in dimensions 3 and 4. In addition, we prove that complete Kochen-Specker sets can be Bell self-tested if and only if they enable CFR. This establishes a fundamental connection between these two methods of certification, shows that both methods can be combined in the same experiment, and opens new possibilities for certifying quantum devices.

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arXiv2024

Bounding the amount of entanglement from witness operators

We present an approach to estimate the operational distinguishability between an entangled state and any separable state directly from measuring an entanglement witness. We show that this estimation also implies bounds on a variety of other well-known entanglement quantifiers. This approach for entanglement estimation is then extended to to both the measurement-device-independent scenario and the fully device-independent scenario, where we obtain non-trivial but sub-optimal bounds. The procedure requires no numerical optimization and is easy to compute. It offers ways for experimenters to not only detect, but also quantify, entanglement from the standard entanglement witness procedure.

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arXiv2024

Quantum LOSR networks cannot generate graph states with high fidelity

Quantum networks lead to novel notions of locality and correlations and an important problem concerns the question of which quantum states can be experimentally prepared with a given network structure and devices and which not. We prove that all multi-qubit graph states arising from a connected graph cannot originate from any quantum network with bipartite sources, as long as feed-forward and quantum memories are not available. Moreover, the fidelity of a multi-qubit graph state and any network state cannot exceed $9/10$. Similar results can also be established for a large class of multi-qudit graph states.

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