Fidelity and Metrics of quantum states

Abstract

Fidelity plays an important role in quantum information theory. In this paper, two pairs of metrics of quantum states are introduced based on the Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity and super-fidelity. They are proved to satisfy the axioms of metrics and return to the Sine metric and Bures metric for the qubit case. The CP expansive property and convex property of the metrics are studied. These metrics have deep connections with the known important metrics such as trace metric, Sine metric, Bures metric, and spectral metric, and are useful to quantify entanglement. I. Background, problem, and result Suppose one has two quantum states ρ and σ, then the Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity [1] between ρ and σ is given by F(ρ, σ) = [Tr ρ 1 2 σρ 1 2] 2. Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity plays an important role in quantum information theory and quantum computation [1], [2]. We know that for the case of qubit, Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity has a simple form. From the Bloch sphere representation of quantum states, a qubit is described by a density matrix as([3]): ρ(u) = 1 (I + σ · u), 2 where I is the 2 × 2 unit matrix and σ = (σ1, σ2, σ3) are the Pauli matrices. Assume ρ(u) and ρ(v) are two states of one qubit, then they can represented by two vectors u and v in the Bloch sphere. The Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity for qubits has an elegant form([4] and [5]): F(ρ(u), ρ(v)) = 1 2 [1 + u · v + √ 1 − |u | 2 √ 1 − |v | 2], where u · v is the inner product of two vectors u and v, and |u | is the magnitude of u. We know that for N × N quantum states, the Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity has no simple form like the case of qubits. To use the simple form of fidelity, we note that in [6], the authors introduce a new fidelity, called super-fidelity, and proved that Uhlmann-Jozsa fidelity can be bounded above by the super-fidelity G(ρ1, ρ2): F(ρ1, ρ2) ≤ G(ρ1, ρ2)