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arXiv:2510.15375

Fisher discord as a quantifier of quantum complexity

Huihui Li, Shunlong Luo, Yue Zhang

Published Oct 17, 2025• 0 citations
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Abstract

Two classically equivalent expressions of mutual information of probability distributions (classical bipartite states) diverge when extended to quantum systems, and this difference has been employed to define quantum discord, a quantifier of quantum correlations beyond entanglement. Similarly, equivalent expressions of classical Fisher information of parameterized probability distributions diverge when extended to quantum states, and this difference may be exploited to characterize the complex nature of quantum states. By complexity of quantum states, we mean some hybrid nature which intermingles the classical and quantum features. It is desirable to quantify complexity of quantum states from various perspectives. In this work, we pursue the idea of discord and introduce an information-theoretic quantifier of complexity for quantum states (relative to the Hamiltonian that drives the evolution of quantum systems) via the notion of Fisher discord, which is defined by the difference between two important versions of quantum Fisher information: the quantum Fisher information defined via the symmetric logarithmic derivatives and the Wigner-Yanase skew information defined via the square roots of quantum states. We reveal basic properties of the quantifier of complexity, and compare it with some other quantifiers of complexity. In particular, we show that equilibrium states (or stable states, which commute with the Hamiltonian of the quantum system) and all pure states exhibit zero complexity in this setting. As illustrations, we evaluate the complexity for various prototypical states in both discrete and continuous-variable quantum systems.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2510.15375

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Two classically equivalent expressions of mutual information of probability distributions (classical bipartite states) diverge when extended to quantum systems, and this difference has been employed to define quantum discord, a quantifier of quantum correlations beyond entanglement. Similarly, equivalent expressions of classical Fisher information of parameterized probability distributions diverge when extended to quantum states, and this difference may be exploited to characterize the complex nature of quantum states. By complexity of quantum states, we mean some hybrid nature which intermingles the classical and quantum features. It is desirable to quantify complexity of quantum states from various perspectives. In this work, we pursue the idea of discord and introduce an information-theoretic quantifier of complexity for quantum states (relative to the Hamiltonian that drives the evolution of quantum systems) via the notion of Fisher discord, which is defined by the difference between two important versions of quantum Fisher information: the quantum Fisher information defined via the symmetric logarithmic derivatives and the Wigner-Yanase skew information defined via the square roots of quantum states. We reveal basic properties of the quantifier of complexity, and compare it with some other quantifiers of complexity. In particular, we show that equilibrium states (or stable states, which commute with the Hamiltonian of the quantum system) and all pure states exhibit zero complexity in this setting. As illustrations, we evaluate the complexity for various prototypical states in both discrete and continuous-variable quantum systems.
In order to quantify the information content of quantum states in the presence of conserved quantities, Wigner and Yanase introduced the notion of skew information [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 49, 910, (1963)], which was later identified as a paradigmatic version of quantum Fisher information. The skew information is quite different from, yet deeply connected with, the ubiquitous quantum entropies and has important applications in quantum theory. In this paper, pursuing further the original idea of Wigner and Yanase, we propose a measure for correlations in terms of the skew information, investigate its fundamental properties, and elucidate its characteristics. An appealing feature of this measure for correlations is that its evaluation does not involve any optimization, in sharp contrast to the entanglement and discord measures, and can be straightforwardly calculated. In particular, the algorithm and explicit formulas for general bipartite states are prescribed, and simple analytical expressions for some special states, including arbitrary bipartite pure states, the Bell-diagonal states, and some highly symmetric states such as the Werner states and the isotropic states, are obtained.
Quantum discord, as introduced by Olliver and Zurek [Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 017901 (2001)], is a measure of the discrepancy between two natural yet different quantum analogs of the classical mutual information. This notion characterizes and quantifies quantumness of correlations in bipartite states from a measurement perspective, and is fundamentally different from the various entanglement measures in the entanglement vs separability paradigm. The phenomenon of nonzero quantum discord is a manifestation of quantum correlations due to noncommutativity rather than due to entanglement, and has interesting and significant applications in revealing the advantage of certain quantum tasks. We will evaluate analytically the quantum discord for a large family of two-qubit states, and make a comparative study of the relationships between classical and quantum correlations in terms of the quantum discord. We furthermore compare the quantum discord with the entanglement of formation, and illustrate that the latter may be larger than the former, although for separable states, the entanglement of formation always vanishes and thus is less than the quantum discord.
A parametric quantum mechanical wavefunction naturally induces parametric probability distributions by taking absolute square, and we can consider its classical Fisher information. On the other hand, it also induces parametric rank-one projections which may be viewed as density operators, and we can talk about its quantum Fisher information. Among many versions of quantum Fisher information, there are two prominent ones. The first, defined via a quantum score function, was introduced by Helstrom in 1967 and is well known. The second, defined via the square root of the density operator, has its origin in the skew information introduced by Wigner and Yanase in 1963 and remains relatively unnoticed. This study is devoted to investigating the relationships between the classical Fisher information and these two versions of quantum Fisher information for wavefunctions. It is shown that the two versions of quantum Fisher information differ by a factor 2 and that they dominate the classical Fisher information. The non-coincidence of these two versions of quantum Fisher information may be interpreted as a manifestation of quantum discord. We further calculate the difference between the Helstrom quantum Fisher information and the classical Fisher information, and show that it is precisely the instantaneous phase fluctuation of the wavefunctions.
Quantum discord, a kind of quantum correlation, is defined as the difference between quantum mutual information and classical correlation in a bipartite system. In general, this correlation is different from entanglement, and quantum discord may be nonzero even for certain separable states. Even in the simple case of bipartite quantum systems, this different kind of quantum correlation has interesting and significant applications in quantum information processing. So far, quantum discord has been calculated explicitly only for a rather limited set of two-qubit quantum states and expressions for more general quantum states are not known. In this article, we derive explicit expressions for quantum discord for a larger class of two-qubit states, namely, a seven-parameter family of so called XXX states that have been of interest in a variety of contexts in the field. We also study the relation between quantum discord, classical correlation, and entanglement for a number of two-qubit states to demonstrate that they are independent measures of correlation with no simple relative ordering between them.
Quantum discord, as defined by Olliver and Zurek (2002 Phys. Rev. Lett. 88 017901) as the difference of two natural quantum extensions of the classical mutual information, plays an interesting role in characterizing quantumness of correlations. Inspired by this idea, we will study quantumness of bipartite states arising from different quantum analogs of the classical conditional entropy. Our approach is intrinsic, in contrast to the Olliver–Zurek method that involves extrinsic local measurements. For this purpose, we introduce two alternative variants of quantum conditional entropies via conditional density operators, which in turn are intuitive quantum extensions of equivalent classical expressions for the conditional probability. The significance of these quantum conditional entropies in characterizing quantumness of bipartite states is illustrated through several examples.
By considering an arbitrary two-qubit state, it is shown that the Fisher information is intrinsically linked to the geometric discord which allows a measure for quantum correlations beyond entanglement. The complex amplitude of oscillations of the probability density function is upper bounded by the geometric discord which subsequently results in the Fisher information being bounded by the geometric discord. This gives an experimental observable which can be used to quantify quantum correlations beyond entanglement. This observable can be used to witness quantum correlations in an interferometry experiment, and provide another avenue for quantum technologies to continue to develop.