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arXiv:1611.01740 · Physical Review A

Maximal coherence in a generic basis

Yao Yao, Guohui Dong, Li Ge, Mo Li, C. P. Sun

Published Dec 29, 2016• 51 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Since quantum coherence is an undoubted characteristic trait of quantum physics, the quantification and application of quantum coherence has been one of the long-standing central topics in quantum information science. Within the framework of a resource theory of quantum coherence proposed recently, a fiducial basis should be preselected for characterizing the quantum coherence in specific circumstances, namely, the quantum coherence is a basis-dependent quantity. Therefore, a natural question is raised: what are the maximum and minimum coherences contained in a certain quantum state with respect to a generic basis? While the minimum case is trivial, it is not so intuitive to verify in which basis the quantum coherence is maximal. Based on the coherence measure of relative entropy, we indicate the particular basis in which the quantum coherence is maximal for a given state, where the Fourier matrix (or more generally, complex Hadamard matrices) plays a critical role in determining the basis. Intriguingly, though we can prove that the basis associated with the Fourier matrix is a stationary point for optimizing the ${l}_{1}$ norm of coherence, numerical simulation shows that it is not a global optimal choice.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.94.062339

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Since quantum coherence is an undoubted characteristic trait of quantum physics, the quantification and application of quantum coherence has been one of the long-standing central topics in quantum information science. Within the framework of a resource theory of quantum coherence proposed recently, a fiducial basis should be preselected for characterizing the quantum coherence in specific circumstances, namely, the quantum coherence is a basis-dependent quantity. Therefore, a natural question is raised: what are the maximum and minimum coherences contained in a certain quantum state with respect to a generic basis? While the minimum case is trivial, it is not so intuitive to verify in which basis the quantum coherence is maximal. Based on the coherence measure of relative entropy, we indicate the particular basis in which the quantum coherence is maximal for a given state, where the Fourier matrix (or more generally, complex Hadamard matrices) plays a critical role in determining the basis. Intriguingly, though we can prove that the basis associated with the Fourier matrix is a stationary point for optimizing the l1{l}_{1}l1​ norm of coherence, numerical simulation shows that it is not a global optimal choice.
The resource theoretic measure of quantum coherence is basis dependent, and the amount of coherence contained in a state is different in different bases. We obtained analytical solutions for the maximum coherence by optimizing the reference basis and highlighted the essential role of the mutually unbiased bases (MUBs) on attaining the maximum coherence. Apart from the relative entropy of coherence, we showed that the MUBs are optimal for the robustness of coherence, the coherence weight, and the modified skew information measure of coherence for any state. Moreover, the MUBs are optimal for all the faithful coherence measures if the state is pure or is of the single qubit. We also highlighted an upper bound for the l1{l}_{1}l1​ norm of coherence and compared it with the other bounds as well as the maximum one attainable by optimizing the reference basis.
In the quantitative theory of quantum coherence, the amount of coherence for given states can be meaningfully discussed only when referring to a preferred basis. One of the objections to this quantification is that the amount of coherence is an intrinsically basis-dependent quantity. This limitation can, however, be lifted when considering a set of quantum states invariant under arbitrary unitary transformations. Thus, we analyze a basis-independent definition of quantum coherence, and the incoherent state is taken as the maximally mixed state. We describe the relationship between the basis-independent and the basis-dependent approaches and give several applications to show the advantages of the former method. The relations among basis-independent coherence, quantum entanglement, and quantum discord are discussed by using the relative entropy within a multipartite system.
Various measures have been suggested recently for quantifying the coherence of a quantum state with respect to a given basis. We first use two of these, the l1{l}_{1}l1​-norm and relative entropy measures, to investigate tradeoffs between the coherences of mutually unbiased bases. Results include relations between coherence, uncertainty, and purity; tight general bounds restricting the coherences of mutually unbiased bases; and an exact complementarity relation for qubit coherences. We further define the average coherence of a quantum state. For the l1{l}_{1}l1​-norm measure this is related to a natural ``coherence radius'' for the state and leads to a conjecture for an l2{l}_{2}l2​-norm measure of coherence. For relative entropy the average coherence is determined by the difference between the von Neumann entropy and the quantum subentropy of the state and leads to upper bounds for the latter quantity. Finally, we point out that the relative entropy of coherence is a special case of G-asymmetry, which immediately yields several operational interpretations in contexts as diverse as frame alignment, quantum communication, and metrology, and suggests generalizing the property of quantum coherence to arbitrary groups of physical transformations.
In the quantitative theory of quantum coherence, the amount of coherence is defined as the distance between the given state to the closest incoherent state. The set of incoherent states is conventionally defined as any state with a diagonal density matrix. One of the objections to this formulation is that the incoherent states are intrinsically basis-dependent, which makes the amount of coherence also a basis-dependent quantity. Basis-independent measures have recently been proposed where the incoherent state is taken as the maximally mixed state. We show that this is the only possible choice of reference incoherent state, without modifying the original definition of coherence. We find a relation between the two formulations by defining a contribution to the coherence due to the basis choice. The hierarchical relationship between quantum coherence and the various quantum correlations is explored in detail. Finally, we illustrate some operational uses of the basis-independent quantum coherence in quantum information theory tasks.
The operational characterization of quantum coherence is the cornerstone in the development of the resource theory of coherence. We introduce a new coherence quantifier based on maximum relative entropy. We prove that the maximum relative entropy of coherence is directly related to the maximum overlap with maximally coherent states under a particular class of operations, which provides an operational interpretation of the maximum relative entropy of coherence. Moreover, we show that, for any coherent state, there are examples of subchannel discrimination problems such that this coherent state allows for a higher probability of successfully discriminating subchannels than that of all incoherent states. This advantage of coherent states in subchannel discrimination can be exactly characterized by the maximum relative entropy of coherence. By introducing a suitable smooth maximum relative entropy of coherence, we prove that the smooth maximum relative entropy of coherence provides a lower bound of one-shot coherence cost, and the maximum relative entropy of coherence is equivalent to the relative entropy of coherence in the asymptotic limit. Similar to the maximum relative entropy of coherence, the minimum relative entropy of coherence has also been investigated. We show that the minimum relative entropy of coherence provides an upper bound of one-shot coherence distillation, and in the asymptotic limit the minimum relative entropy of coherence is equivalent to the relative entropy of coherence.
As one of the most essential properties of quantum mechanics, quantum coherence is also considered a key physical resource which can be used to accomplish certain tasks of quantum information processing. Significant efforts are involved in the quantification of quantum coherence using measures such as the l1{l}_{1}l1​-norm and the relative entropy of coherence. The quantum coherence as a physical resource is usually defined with respect to a given basis, which also arouses an issue of interest concerning the variation of quantum coherence for a quantum state in different reference bases. In this paper, using an all optical setup, we experimentally investigate a trade-off relation between the coherence measures quantified by relative entropy of coherence in two noncommuting reference bases. Our result shows that the sum of quantum coherence under these bases is bounded in a region defined by its lower bound and upper bound.