Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:1201.5333 · Electronic Communications in Probability

Random pure quantum states via unitary Brownian motion

Ion Nechita, Clément Pellegrini

Published Jan 1, 2013• 3 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We introduce a new family of probability distributions on the set of pure states of a finite dimensional quantum system. Without any a priori assumptions, the most natural measure on the set of pure state is the uniform (or Haar) measure. Our family of measures is indexed by a time parameter $t$ and interpolates between a deterministic measure ($t=0$) and the uniform measure ($t=\infty$). The measures are constructed using a Brownian motion on the unitary group $\mathcal U_N$. Remarkably, these measures have a $\mathcal U_{N-1}$ invariance, whereas the usual uniform measure has a $\mathcal U_N$ invariance. We compute several averages with respect to these measures using as a tool the Laplace transform of the coordinates.

DOI
10.1214/ecp.v18-2426

Related papers

2 RANDOM PURE QUANTUM STATES VIA UNITARY BROWNIAN MOTION

Ion Nechita, Clément Pellegrini

We introduce a new family of probability distributions on the set of pure states of a finite dimensional quantum system. Without any a priori assumptions, the most natural measure on the set of pure state is the uniform (or Haar) measure. Our family of measures is indexed by a time parameter t and interpolates between a deterministic measure (t = 0) and the uniform measure (t = ∞). The measures are constructed using a Brownian motion on the unitary group UN. Remarkably, these measures have a UN−1 invariance, whereas the usual uniform measure has a UN invariance. We compute several averages with respect to these measures using as a tool the Laplace transform of the coordinates.

•Jan 1, 2013•2 citations

Random Processes over the Unitary Group

Emilio Onorati

According to one of the fundamental axioms of quantum mechanics, unitary operators rule the evolution of any quantum system; it is thus of prominent importance to investigate the corresponding group and discover its properties. Random processes over the unitary group have indeed a wide range of applications in the context of quantum information; in particular, they are involved in the construction of peculiar distributions called unitary designs which mimic the uniform Haar measure by matching its moments and are thus deeply connected to the description of phenomena such as quantum tomography, equilibration, thermalization, encryption and scrambling. Previous approaches have shown that unitary designs are efficiently approximated by random quantum circuits with local unitary operators. Moreover, these circuits are used to characterize the precision of experimental implementations of unitary gates via randomized benchmarking protocols and to rapidly decouple a system from the environment. The main novel contribution of this work is to extend these mixing properties to a continuous-time framework, namely, Brownian motion over the unitary group induced by stochastic local Hamiltonians. In order to achieve these new results, on the one hand we move to a representation theoretic formulation and make use of its tools to establish the gap of local generators linked to the moments of the distribution induced by the diffusion process; from this we then derive an expression for the length of time it takes to ensure convergence toward the moments of the Haar measure. On the other hand we project the stochastic evolution onto a random walk on Pauli matrices and tie this description to the analogous one for random quantum circuits to achieve decoupling in a run time scaling almost linearly with respect to the system size. In addition to providing a unifying framework for random processes over the unitary group, we hence aim at presenting new mathematical results and techniques for quantum information. We furthermore discuss applications to black holes dynamics in the perspective of the information paradox. As an additional novel result not related to Brownian motion, we propose a randomized benchmarking protocol exploiting the symmetry of the gate whose accuracy has to be estimated, in order to overcome current shortcomings afflicting the known schemes. We again rely on representation theory to reduce the computational effort and the amount of employed quantum resources.

•Jan 1, 2019•0 citations

Brownian motion on Lie groups and open quantum systems

Paolo Aniello, Andrzej Kossakowski, Giuseppe Marmo +1 more

We study the twirling semigroups of (super) operators, namely certain quantum dynamical semigroups that are associated, in a natural way, with the pairs formed by a projective representation of a locally compact group and a convolution semigroup of probability measures on this group. The link connecting this class of semigroups of operators with (classical) Brownian motion is clarified. It turns out that every twirling semigroup associated with a finite-dimensional representation is a random unitary semigroup, and, conversely, every random unitary semigroup arises as a twirling semigroup. Using standard tools of the theory of convolution semigroups of measures and of convex analysis, we provide a complete characterization of the infinitesimal generator of a twirling semigroup associated with a finite-dimensional unitary representation of a Lie group.

arXiv:1002.3507•Journal of Physics A Mathematical and Theoretical•Jun 2, 2010•20 citations

Haar-random and pretty good measurements for Bayesian state estimation

Quadeer, Maria

We study Haar-random bases and pretty good measurement for Bayesian state estimation. Given $N$ Haar-random bases we derive a bound on fidelity averaged over IID sequences of such random measurements for a uniform ensemble of pure states. For ensembles of mixed qubit states, we find that measurements defined through unitary 2-designs closely approximate those defined via Haar random unitaries while the Pauli group only gives a weak lower bound. For a single-shot-update, we show using the Petz recovery map for pretty good measurement that it can give pretty good Bayesian mean estimates.

arXiv:2310.20565•Oct 31, 2023•0 citations

Coherence-generating power of quantum unitary maps and beyond

Paolo Zanardi A, Georgios Styliaris, Lorenzo Campos Venuti

Given a preferred orthonormal basis $B$ in the Hilbert space of a quantum system, we define a measure of the coherence-generating power of a unitary operation with respect to $B$. This measure is the average coherence generated by the operation acting on a uniform ensemble of incoherent states. We give its explicit analytical form in any dimension and provide an operational protocol to directly detect it. We characterize the set of unitaries with maximal coherence-generating power and study the properties of our measure when the unitary is drawn at random from the Haar distribution. For a large state-space dimension a random unitary has, with overwhelming probability, nearly maximal coherence-generating power with respect to any basis. Finally, extensions to general unital quantum operations and the relation to the concept of asymmetry are discussed.

arXiv:1610.00217•Physical Review A•May 2, 2017•65 citations

Quantum random walks on d-regular graphs with Haar-random coin operators

Alice C. Quillen

With unitary coin operator that is a random matrix drawn from a uniform distribution with respect to the Haar measure, we construct a variant of a discrete quantum random walk using a d-regular undirected connected simple graph. With each step of the walk, the coin operator random matrix is drawn independently from the distribution. The expectation value over the distribution of random unitaries for the associated quantum channel gives a depolarization channel for the coin subspace and resembles the associated classical random walk where the direction a walker steps depends upon the outcome of a fair coin or balanced d-sided dice. Remarkably, despite the fact that the averaged channel depolarizes the coin subspace, measurements in the vertex subspace can be designed that would reveal information about the initial quantum state, even after many iterations of the channel. We illustrate with examples of quantum walks on Cayley graphs of Abelian groups, such as the cycle and hypercube graphs. For Cayley graphs of Abelian groups, the averaged channel is dephasing in the Fourier basis. These quantum walks are examples of bipartite strongly interacting systems, where one subsystem is strongly perturbed, yet information about the initial state in the other subsystem is potentially measurable forever. Due to its decoherence, a quantum random walk with a Haar-random coin would not be useful in search algorithms but could aid in understanding quantum systems with strongly perturbed subsystems.

quant-pharXiv:2607.04584•Physical Review A•Jul 7, 2026•0 citations
We introduce a new family of probability distributions on the set of pure states of a finite dimensional quantum system. Without any a priori assumptions, the most natural measure on the set of pure state is the uniform (or Haar) measure. Our family of measures is indexed by a time parameter ttt and interpolates between a deterministic measure (t=0t=0t=0) and the uniform measure (t=∞t=\inftyt=∞). The measures are constructed using a Brownian motion on the unitary group UN\mathcal U_NUN​. Remarkably, these measures have a UN−1\mathcal U_{N-1}UN−1​ invariance, whereas the usual uniform measure has a UN\mathcal U_NUN​ invariance. We compute several averages with respect to these measures using as a tool the Laplace transform of the coordinates.
We introduce a new family of probability distributions on the set of pure states of a finite dimensional quantum system. Without any a priori assumptions, the most natural measure on the set of pure state is the uniform (or Haar) measure. Our family of measures is indexed by a time parameter t and interpolates between a deterministic measure (t = 0) and the uniform measure (t = ∞). The measures are constructed using a Brownian motion on the unitary group UN. Remarkably, these measures have a UN−1 invariance, whereas the usual uniform measure has a UN invariance. We compute several averages with respect to these measures using as a tool the Laplace transform of the coordinates.
According to one of the fundamental axioms of quantum mechanics, unitary operators rule the evolution of any quantum system; it is thus of prominent importance to investigate the corresponding group and discover its properties. Random processes over the unitary group have indeed a wide range of applications in the context of quantum information; in particular, they are involved in the construction of peculiar distributions called unitary designs which mimic the uniform Haar measure by matching its moments and are thus deeply connected to the description of phenomena such as quantum tomography, equilibration, thermalization, encryption and scrambling. Previous approaches have shown that unitary designs are efficiently approximated by random quantum circuits with local unitary operators. Moreover, these circuits are used to characterize the precision of experimental implementations of unitary gates via randomized benchmarking protocols and to rapidly decouple a system from the environment. The main novel contribution of this work is to extend these mixing properties to a continuous-time framework, namely, Brownian motion over the unitary group induced by stochastic local Hamiltonians. In order to achieve these new results, on the one hand we move to a representation theoretic formulation and make use of its tools to establish the gap of local generators linked to the moments of the distribution induced by the diffusion process; from this we then derive an expression for the length of time it takes to ensure convergence toward the moments of the Haar measure. On the other hand we project the stochastic evolution onto a random walk on Pauli matrices and tie this description to the analogous one for random quantum circuits to achieve decoupling in a run time scaling almost linearly with respect to the system size. In addition to providing a unifying framework for random processes over the unitary group, we hence aim at presenting new mathematical results and techniques for quantum information. We furthermore discuss applications to black holes dynamics in the perspective of the information paradox. As an additional novel result not related to Brownian motion, we propose a randomized benchmarking protocol exploiting the symmetry of the gate whose accuracy has to be estimated, in order to overcome current shortcomings afflicting the known schemes. We again rely on representation theory to reduce the computational effort and the amount of employed quantum resources.
We study the twirling semigroups of (super) operators, namely certain quantum dynamical semigroups that are associated, in a natural way, with the pairs formed by a projective representation of a locally compact group and a convolution semigroup of probability measures on this group. The link connecting this class of semigroups of operators with (classical) Brownian motion is clarified. It turns out that every twirling semigroup associated with a finite-dimensional representation is a random unitary semigroup, and, conversely, every random unitary semigroup arises as a twirling semigroup. Using standard tools of the theory of convolution semigroups of measures and of convex analysis, we provide a complete characterization of the infinitesimal generator of a twirling semigroup associated with a finite-dimensional unitary representation of a Lie group.
We study Haar-random bases and pretty good measurement for Bayesian state estimation. Given NNN Haar-random bases we derive a bound on fidelity averaged over IID sequences of such random measurements for a uniform ensemble of pure states. For ensembles of mixed qubit states, we find that measurements defined through unitary 2-designs closely approximate those defined via Haar random unitaries while the Pauli group only gives a weak lower bound. For a single-shot-update, we show using the Petz recovery map for pretty good measurement that it can give pretty good Bayesian mean estimates.
Given a preferred orthonormal basis BBB in the Hilbert space of a quantum system, we define a measure of the coherence-generating power of a unitary operation with respect to BBB. This measure is the average coherence generated by the operation acting on a uniform ensemble of incoherent states. We give its explicit analytical form in any dimension and provide an operational protocol to directly detect it. We characterize the set of unitaries with maximal coherence-generating power and study the properties of our measure when the unitary is drawn at random from the Haar distribution. For a large state-space dimension a random unitary has, with overwhelming probability, nearly maximal coherence-generating power with respect to any basis. Finally, extensions to general unital quantum operations and the relation to the concept of asymmetry are discussed.
With unitary coin operator that is a random matrix drawn from a uniform distribution with respect to the Haar measure, we construct a variant of a discrete quantum random walk using a d-regular undirected connected simple graph. With each step of the walk, the coin operator random matrix is drawn independently from the distribution. The expectation value over the distribution of random unitaries for the associated quantum channel gives a depolarization channel for the coin subspace and resembles the associated classical random walk where the direction a walker steps depends upon the outcome of a fair coin or balanced d-sided dice. Remarkably, despite the fact that the averaged channel depolarizes the coin subspace, measurements in the vertex subspace can be designed that would reveal information about the initial quantum state, even after many iterations of the channel. We illustrate with examples of quantum walks on Cayley graphs of Abelian groups, such as the cycle and hypercube graphs. For Cayley graphs of Abelian groups, the averaged channel is dephasing in the Fourier basis. These quantum walks are examples of bipartite strongly interacting systems, where one subsystem is strongly perturbed, yet information about the initial state in the other subsystem is potentially measurable forever. Due to its decoherence, a quantum random walk with a Haar-random coin would not be useful in search algorithms but could aid in understanding quantum systems with strongly perturbed subsystems.