It is one of the most remarkable features of quantum physics that measurements on spatially separated systems cannot always be described by a locally causal theory. In such a theory, the outcomes of local measurements are determined in advance solely by some unknown (or hidden) variables and the choice of local measurements. Correlations that are allowed within the framework of a locally causal theory are termed classical. Typically, the fact that quantum mechanics does not always result in classical correlations is revealed by the violation of Bell inequalities, which are constraints that have to be satisfied by any classical correlations. It has been known for a long time that entanglement is necessary to demonstrate nonclassical correlations, and hence a Bell inequality violation. However, since some entangled quantum states are known to admit explicit locally causal models, the exact role of entanglement in Bell inequality violation has remained obscure. This thesis provides both a comprehensive review on these issues as well as a report on new discoveries made to clarify the relationship between entanglement and Bell inequality violation.
It is one of the most remarkable features of quantum physics that measurements on spatially separated systems cannot always be described by a locally causal theory. In such a theory, the outcomes of local measurements are determined in advance solely by some unknown (or hidden) variables and the choice of local measurements. Correlations that are allowed within the framework of a locally causal theory are termed classical. Typically, the fact that quantum mechanics does not always result in classical correlations is revealed by the violation of Bell inequalities, which are constraints that have to be satisfied by any classical correlations. It has been known for a long time that entanglement is necessary to demonstrate nonclassical correlations, and hence a Bell inequality violation. However, since some entangled quantum states are known to admit explicit locally causal models, the exact role of entanglement in Bell inequality violation has remained obscure. This thesis provides both a comprehensive review on these issues as well as a report on new discoveries made to clarify the relationship between entanglement and Bell inequality violation.
It is one of the most remarkable features of quantum physics that measurements on spatially separated systems cannot always be described by a locally causal theory. In such a theory, the outcomes of local measurements are determined in advance solely by some unknown (or hidden) variables and the choice of local measurements. Correlations that are allowed within the framework of a locally causal theory are termed classical. Typically, the fact that quantum mechanics does not always result in classical correlations is revealed by the violation of Bell inequalities, which are constraints that have to be satisfied by any classical correlations. It has been known for a long time that entanglement is necessary to demonstrate nonclassical correlations, and hence a Bell inequality violation. However, since some entangled quantum states are known to admit explicit locally causal models, the exact role of entanglement in Bell inequality violation has remained obscure. This thesis provides both a comprehensive review on these issues as well as a report on new discoveries made to clarify the relationship between entanglement and Bell inequality violation. In particular, within the framework of a standard Bell experiment, i.e., a Bell inequality test that is directly performed on a single copy of a quantum state r, we have derived two algorithms to determine, respectively, a lower bound and an upper bound on the strength of correlations that r can offer for any given Bell inequality. Both of these algorithms make use convex optimization techniques in the form of a semidefinite program. By examples, we show that these algorithms can often be used in tandem, in conjunction with convexity arguments, to determine if a quantum state can offer nonclassical correlations and hence violates a given Bell inequality. On the other hand, since a standard Bell experiment typically involves measurements over many copies of the quantum systems, we have also investigated the possibility of enhancing the strength of nonclassical correlation by, instead, performing collective measurements on multiple copies of the quantum systems. Our findings show that even without postselection, such joint measurements may also lead to stronger nonclassical correlations, and hence a better Bell inequality violation. Meanwhile, previous studies have indicated that entangled state admitting locally causal models may still lead to observable nonclassical correlations if, prior to a standard Bell experiment, the state is subjected to some appropriate local preprocessing. This phenomenon of hidden nonlocality was discovered more than a decade ago, but to date, it is still not known if all entangled states can demonstrate nonclassical correlations through these more sophisticated Bell experiments. A key result in this thesis then consists of showing that for all bipartite entangled states, observable nonclassical correlations, in the form of a Bell-CHSH inequality violation, can indeed be derived if we allow both local preprocessing and the usage of shared ancillary state which by itself does not violate the Bell-CHSH inequality. This establishes a kind of equivalence between bipartite entanglement and states that cannot be simulated by classical correlations. In summary, for a standard Bell experiment where no local preprocessing on a quantum state r is allowed, we have provided two algorithms that can be used in tandem to determine if r can be simulated by a locally causal theory, whereas in the scenario where local preprocessing is allowed, we have demonstrated that bipartite entangled states are precisely those which cannot always be simulated classically.
A well-known manifestation of quantum entanglement is that it may lead to correlations that are inexplicable within the framework of a locally causal theory---a fact that is demonstrated by the quantum violation of Bell inequalities. The precise relationship between quantum entanglement and the violation of Bell inequalities is, however, not well understood. While it is known that entanglement is necessary for such a violation, it is not clear whether all entangled states violate a Bell inequality, even in the scenario where one allows joint operations on multiple copies of the state and local filtering operations before the Bell experiment. In this paper we show that all entangled states, or more precisely, all not-fully-separable states of arbitrary Hilbert space dimension and arbitrary number of parties, violate a Bell inequality when combined with another state which on its own cannot violate the same Bell inequality. This result shows that quantum entanglement and quantum nonlocality are in some sense equivalent, thus giving an affirmative answer to the aforementioned open question. It follows from our result that two entangled states that are apparently useless in demonstrating quantum nonlocality via a specific Bell inequality can be combined to give a Bell violation of the same inequality. Explicit examples of such activation phenomenon are provided.
The predictions of quantum mechanics cannot be resolved with a completely classical view of the world. In particular, the statistics of space-like separated measurements on entangled quantum systems violate a Bell inequality. We put forward a computational perspective on a broad class of Bell tests that study correlators, or the statistics of joint measurement outcomes. We associate particular maps, or functions to particular theories. The violation of a Bell inequality then implies the ability to perform some functions, or computations that classical, or more generally, local hidden variable (LHV) theories cannot.
Bell's theorem asserts that no local hidden variable theory can explain the predictions of quantum theory in an experiment where spacelike separated measurements are performed in distant laboratories. Loophole-free Bell tests performed in the last decade demonstrate Bell nonlocality as a property of Nature. However, the amount of nonlocality allowed in quantum theory is limited, compared to the sole restriction of no-signaling, meaning the impossibility of faster-than-light communication implied by special relativity. Information causality is a physical principle that generalizes no-signaling and is satisfied by quantum theory. It is based on the idea that shared quantum entanglement cannot enable a receiver to obtain more classical information than how much was sent by a distant sender. Remarkably, the principle was shown to imply the maximal quantum bound for the violation of the most well-known Bell inequality. The aim of this thesis is to widen our understanding of information causality and compare its predictions with other known outer approximations of the quantum set of correlations. We build upon the recent realization that most of the known consequences of information causality can be derived with a single copy of the shared systems, whereas before it was thought that many copies were necessary. We develop a novel optimization framework which bounds the possible violations of information causality by other sets of correlations, allowing us to certify when violations are not possible. We generalize the statement of information causality and reach a precise definition for the set of correlations satisfying this principle. We show that when searching for violations of information causality by physical theories, considering many copies is not necessary. Our aforementioned optimization framework approximates the information causality set from the outside. Conversely, we propose a different approach which allows us to approximate this set from the inside.
Bell's theorem is typically understood as the proof that quantum theory is incompatible with localhidden-variable models.More generally, we can see the violation of a Bell inequality as witnessing the impossibility of explaining quantum correlations with classical causal models.The violation of a Bell inequality, however, does not exclude classical models where some level of measurement dependence is allowed, that is, the choice made by observers can be correlated with the source generating the systems to be measured.Here, we show that the level of measurement dependence can be quantitatively upper bounded if we arrange the Bell test within a network.Furthermore, we also prove that these results can be adapted in order to derive nonlinear Bell inequalities for a large class of causal networks and to identify quantumly realizable correlations that violate them.
Quantum mechanics challenges our intuition on the cause-effect relations in nature. Some fundamental concepts, including Reichenbach's common cause principle or the notion of local realism, have to be reconsidered. Traditionally, this is witnessed by the violation of a Bell inequality. But are Bell inequalities the only signature of the incompatibility between quantum correlations and causality theory? Motivated by this question, we introduce a general framework able to estimate causal influences between two variables, without the need of interventions and irrespectively of the classical, quantum, or even postquantum nature of a common cause. In particular, by considering the simplest instrumental scenario-for which violation of Bell inequalities is not possible-we show that every pure bipartite entangled state violates the classical bounds on causal influence, thus, answering in negative to the posed question and opening a new venue to explore the role of causality within quantum theory.