Everyday experience supports the existence of physical properties independent of observation in strong contrast to the predictions of quantum theory. In particular, the existence of physical properties that are independent of the measurement context is prohibited for certain quantum systems. This property is known as contextuality. This Rapid Communication studies whether the process of decay in space-time generally destroys the ability of revealing contextuality. We find that in the most general situation the decay property does not diminish this ability. However, applying certain constraints due to the space-time structure either on the time evolution of the decaying system or on the measurement procedure, the criteria revealing contextuality become inherently dependent on the decay property or an impossibility. In particular, we derive how the context-revealing setup known as Bell's nonlocality tests changes for decaying quantum systems. Our findings illustrate the interdependence between hidden and local hidden parameter theories and the role of time.
Everyday experience supports the existence of physical properties independent of observation in strong contrast to the predictions of quantum theory. In particular, the existence of physical properties that are independent of the measurement context is prohibited for certain quantum systems. This property is known as contextuality. This Rapid Communication studies whether the process of decay in space-time generally destroys the ability of revealing contextuality. We find that in the most general situation the decay property does not diminish this ability. However, applying certain constraints due to the space-time structure either on the time evolution of the decaying system or on the measurement procedure, the criteria revealing contextuality become inherently dependent on the decay property or an impossibility. In particular, we derive how the context-revealing setup known as Bell's nonlocality tests changes for decaying quantum systems. Our findings illustrate the interdependence between hidden and local hidden parameter theories and the role of time.
In the past century, experimental discoveries have witnessed phenomena in Nature which challenge our everyday classical intuition. In order to explain these facts, quantum theory was developed, which so far has been able to reproduce the observed results. However, I believe that our understanding of quantum mechanics can be significantly improved by the search for an operational meaning behind its mathematical formulation, which would help to identify the limitations and possibilities of the theory for information processing. An intriguing property of quantum theory is its intrinsic randomness. Indeed, Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen in 1935 questioned the completeness of quantum theory. They argued the possibility of the existence of a complete theory where variables to which we have not access determine the behaviour of physical systems, and the randomness observed in quantum mechanics is then due to our ignorance of these variables. These hidden variables theories, however, were proved not to be enough for explaining the predictions of quantum theory, as shown in the no-go theorems by Bell on quantum-nonlocality and by Kochen and Specker on quantum-contextuality. In the past decades, many experiments have corroborated the nonlocal and contextual character of Nature. However, no intuition behind these phenomena has been found, in particular about what limits their strength. In fact, special relativity alone would allow for phenomena which are more nonlocal than what quantum theory allows. Hence, much effort has been devoted to find the physical properties of quantum theory that restricts these phenomena. In this thesis, we study the constraints that arise on nonlocal and contextual phenomena when a certain exclusiveness structure compatible with quantum theory is imposed in the space of events. Here, an event denotes the situation where an outcome is obtained given that a measurement is performed on the physical system. Regarding nonlocality, we introduce a notion of orthogonality that states that events involving different outcomes of the same local measurement are exclusive, and construct constraints that the correlations among observers should satisfy. We denote this by Local Orthogonality principle (LO), which is the first intrinsically multipartite principle for bounding quantum correlations. We prove that LO identifies the supra-quantum character of some bipartite and multipartite correlations, and gets close to the quantum boundary. When studying contextuality, the same abstract event may correspond to outcomes of different measurements, which introduces a non-trivial structure in the space of events. For its study, we develop a general formalism for contextuality scenarios in the spirit of the recent approach by Cabello, Severini and Winter. In our framework, nonlocality arises as a particular case of contextuality, which allows us to study a generalization of LO. Both in nonlocality and contextuality, we find close connections to problems in combinatorics and hence use graph-theoretical tools for studying correlations. Finally, this thesis also studies the detection of nonlocal correlations. Most results on quantum nonlocality focus on few particles' experiments, while less is known about the detection of quantum nonlocality in many-body systems. Standard many-body observables involve correlations among few particles, while there is still no multipartite Bell inequality to test nonlocality merely from these data. In this thesis, we provide the first proposal for nonlocality detection in many-body systems using two-body correlations. We construct families of Bell inequalities from two-body correlators, which can detect nonlocality for systems with large number of constituents. In addition, we prove violations by systems which are relevant in nuclear and atomic physics, and show how to test these inequalities by measuring global spin components, hence opening the problem to experimental realizations.
Quantum mechanics provides a statistical description about nature, and thus would be incomplete if its statistical predictions could not be accounted for by some realistic models with hidden variables. There are, however, two powerful theorems against the hidden-variable theories showing that certain quantum features cannot be reproduced based on two rationale premises of locality, Bell's theorem, and noncontextuality, due to Bell, Kochen and Specker (BKS). Noncontextuality is independent of nonlocality, and the contextuality manifests itself even in a single object. Here we report an experimental verification of quantum contextuality by a single spin-1 electron system at room temperature. Such a three-level system is indivisible and then we close the compatibility loophole which exists in the experiments performed on bipartite systems. Our results confirm the quantum contextuality to be the intrinsic property of single particles.
Our everyday experiences support the hypothesis that physical systems exist independently of the act of observation. Concordant theories are characterized by the objective realism assumption whereby the act of measurement simply reveals preexisting well defined elements of reality. In stark contrast quantum mechanics portrays a world in which reality loses its objectivity and is in fact created by observation. Quantum contextuality as first discovered by Bell [Rev. Mod. Phys. 38, 447 (1966)] and Kochen-Specker [J. Math. Mech. 17, 59 (1967)] captures aspects of this philosophical clash between classical and quantum descriptions of the world. Here we briefly summarize some of the more recent advances in the field of quantum contextuality. We approach quantum contextuality through its close relation to Bell type nonlocal scenarios and highlight some of the rapidly developing tests and experimental implementations.
Nonlocality was discovered by John Bell in 1964, in the context of the debates about quantum theory, but is a phenomenon that can be studied in its own right. Its observation proves that measurements are not revealing pre-determined values, falsifying the idea of “local hidden variables” suggested by Einstein and others. One is then forced to make some radical choice: either nature is intrinsically statistical and individual events are unspeakable, or our familiar space-time cannot be the setting for the whole of physics. As phenomena, nonlocality and its consequences will have to be predicted by any future theory, and may possibly play the role of foundational principles in these developments. But nonlocality has found a role in applied physics too: it can be used for “device-independent” certification of the correct functioning of random number generators and other devices. After a self-contained introduction to the topic, this monograph on nonlocality presents the main tools and results following a logical, rather than a chronological, order.
Abstract Quantum theory has accounted for a wide range of physical effects in systems ranging from microscopic to macroscopic. However, it is associated with various paradoxes—such as the well-known EPR example. Einstein’s suggestion that the theory was incomplete has led to numerous attempts to underpin quantum theory by a hidden variable theory, including the Bell approach. This approach was originally based on certain assumptions: (i) realism (ii) locality and (iii) non-contextuality. In its developed form, the theory involved only probabilities for outcome values of system observables. For systems involving two sub-systems, the hidden variable theory predicted that correlations between measurement outcomes of observable pairs of from different sub-systems would satisfy certain—such as the CHSH Bell inequality. The inequality was inconsistent with quantum theory predictions and with experiment. Hence, the question arose: Which of the three assumptions was invalid? A widely held view is that a non-local theory is needed—another is that hidden variable theory should be contextual. In this article, derivations of the CHSH Bell inequality based on various combinations of locality/non-locality and non-contextuality/contextuality assumptions are outlined, leading to the conclusion that for a hidden variable theory to underpin quantum theory, it must be both non-local and contextual. Non-locality or contextuality alone is insufficient. However, it is also concluded that the realism assumption is questionable. At present an alternative approach of augmenting quantum theory by adding additional features—such as the deterministic trajectories of Bohmian mechanics (also a non-local theory) may be a better route for completeness.
Abstract Nonlocality was discovered by John Bell in 1964, in the context of the debates about quantum theory, but is a phenomenon that can be studied in its own right. Its observation proves that measurements are not revealing pre-determined values, falsifying the idea of “local hidden variables” suggested by Einstein and others. One is then forced to make some radical choice: either nature is intrinsically statistical and individual events are unspeakable, or our familiar space-time cannot be the setting for the whole of physics. As phenomena, nonlocality and its consequences will have to be predicted by any future theory, and may possibly play the role of foundational principles in these developments. But nonlocality has found a role in applied physics too: it can be used for “device-independent” certification of the correct functioning of random number generators and other devices. After a self-contained introduction to the topic, this monograph on nonlocality presents the main tools and results following a logical, rather than a chronological, order.