We present a reliable algorithm to evaluate quantum discord for general two-qubit states, amending and extending an approach recently put forward for the subclass of $X$ states. A closed expression for the discord of arbitrary states of two qubits cannot be obtained, as the optimization problem for the conditional entropy requires the solution to a pair of transcendental equations in the state parameters. We apply our algorithm to run a numerical comparison between quantum discord and an alternative, computable measure of nonclassical correlations, namely, the geometric discord. We identify the extremally nonclassically correlated two-qubit states according to the (normalized) geometric discord, at a fixed value of the conventional quantum discord. The latter cannot exceed the square root of the former for systems of two qubits.
We present a reliable algorithm to evaluate quantum discord for general two-qubit states, amending and extending an approach recently put forward for the subclass of X states. A closed expression for the discord of arbitrary states of two qubits cannot be obtained, as the optimization problem for the conditional entropy requires the solution to a pair of transcendental equations in the state parameters. We apply our algorithm to run a numerical comparison between quantum discord and an alternative, computable measure of nonclassical correlations, namely, the geometric discord. We identify the extremally nonclassically correlated two-qubit states according to the (normalized) geometric discord, at a fixed value of the conventional quantum discord. The latter cannot exceed the square root of the former for systems of two qubits.
The geometric quantum discord of a two-qudit state has been studied in many papers; however, its exact analytical value in the explicit form is known only for a general two-qubit state, a general qubit-qudit state, and some special families of two-qudit states. Based on the general Bloch vectors formalism [E. R. Loubenets et al., J. Phys. A: Math. Theor. 54, 195301 (2021)], we find the explicit exact analytical value of the geometric quantum discord for an arbitrary two-qudit state of any dimension via the parameters of its correlation matrix and the Bloch vectors of its reduced states. This general analytical result includes all the known exact results on the geometric quantum discord only as particular cases and proves rigorously that the lower bound on the geometric discord presented in [S. Rana et al., Phys. Rev. A 85, 024102 (2012)] constitutes its exact value for each two-qudit state. Moreover, our general result allows us to find for an arbitrary two-qudit state, pure or mixed, the upper and lower bounds on its geometric quantum discord, expressed via the Hilbert space characteristics of this state.
Quantum discord provides a measure for quantifying quantum correlations beyond entanglement and is very hard to compute even for two-qubit states because of the minimization over all possible measurements. Recently a simple algorithm to evaluate the quantum discord for two-qubit X states was proposed by Ali, Rau, and Alber [Phys. Rev. A 81, 042105 (2010)] with minimization taken over only a few cases. Here we shall at first identify a class of X states, whose quantum discord can be evaluated analytically without any minimization, for which their algorithm is valid, and also identify a family of X states for which their algorithm fails. And then we demonstrate that this special family of X states provides furthermore an explicit example for the inequivalence between the minimization over positive operator-valued measures and that over von Neumann measurements.
We extend the geometric measure of quantum discord, introduced and computed for two-qubit states, to quantify non-classical correlations in composite Gaussian states of continuous variable systems. We lay the formalism for the evaluation of a Gaussian geometric discord in two-mode Gaussian states, and present explicit formulas for the class of two-mode squeezed thermal states. In such a case, under physical constraints of bounded mean energy, geometric discord is shown to admit upper and lower bounds for a fixed value of the conventional (entropic) quantum discord. We finally discuss alternative geometric approaches to quantify Gaussian quadrature correlations.
Quantum discord, a kind of quantum correlation, is defined as the difference between quantum mutual information and classical correlation in a bipartite system. It has been discussed so far for small systems with only a few independent parameters. We extend here to a much broader class of states when the second party is of arbitrary dimension d, so long as the first, measured, party is a qubit. We present two formulae to calculate quantum discord, the first relating to the original entropic definition and the second to a recently proposed geometric distance measure which leads to an analytical formulation. The tracing over the qubit in the entropic calculation is reduced to a very simple prescription. And, when the d-dimensional system is a so-called X state, the density matrix having non-zero elements only along the diagonal and anti-diagonal so as to appear visually like the letter X, the entropic calculation can be carried out analytically. Such states of the full bipartite qubit-qudit system may be named "extended X states", whose density matrix is built of four block matrices, each visually appearing as an X. The optimization involved in the entropic calculation is generally over two parameters, reducing to one for many cases, and avoided altogether for an overwhelmingly large set of density matrices as our numerical investigations demonstrate. Our results also apply to states of a N-qubit system, where "extended X states" consist of (2^(N+2) - 1) states, larger in number than the (2^(N+1) - 1) of X states of N qubits. While these are still smaller than the total number (2^(2N) - 1) of states of N qubits, the number of parameters involved is nevertheless large. In the case of N = 2, they encompass the entire 15-dimensional parameter space, that is, the extended X states for N = 2 represent the full qubit-qubit system.
Two-qubit X-state is a large class of quantum states which plays an important role in the quantification and dynamical study of quantum correlations. However, the corresponding quantification of quantum discord is still missing for bona fide discord measures, like original quantum discord, Bures distance of discord, and relative entropy of discord. In this paper, we consider the calculation of Bures distance of discord, which is a kind of correlation satisfying all criteria of a discord measure, for two-qubit X-states. Firstly, we derive an explicit expression for Bures distance of discord for a kind of five-parameters family of states. Moreover, for general two-qubit X-states, we not only calculate the Bures distance of discord for a subset of two-qubit X-states by classifying and analyzing the optimal local measurements and the optimal projection operators but also provide an analytic upper bound for the entirety.
Among various definitions of quantum correlations, quantum discord has attracted considerable attention. To find an analytical expression for quantum discord is an intractable task. Exact results are known only for very special states, namely two-qubit X-shaped states. We present in this paper a geometric viewpoint, from which two-qubit quantum discord can be described clearly. The known results on X state discord are restated in the directly perceivable geometric language. As a consequence, the dynamics of classical correlations and quantum discord for an X state in the presence of decoherence is endowed with geometric interpretation. More importantly, we extend the geometric method to the case of more general states, for which numerical as well as analytical results on quantum discord have not yet been obtained. Based on the support of numerical computations, some conjectures are proposed to help us establish the geometric picture. We find that the geometric picture for these states has an intimate relationship with that for X states. Thereby, in some cases, analytical expressions for classical correlations and quantum discord can be obtained.