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arXiv:2601.08712

Fragility of Optimal Measurements due to Noise in Probe States for Quantum Sensing

Andrew Kolmer Forbes, Marco A. Rodríguez-García, Ivan H. Deutsch

quant-phSubmitted Jan 13, 2026• Announced Jan 14, 2026• 0 citations
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Abstract

For a given quantum state used in sensing, the quantum Cramér-Rao bound (QCRB) sets a fundamental limit on the precision achievable by an unbiased estimator of an unknown parameter, determined by the inverse of the quantum Fisher information (QFI). The QFI serves as an upper bound on the classical Fisher information (CFI), representing the maximum extractable information about the unknown parameter from measurements on a physical system. Thus, a central goal in quantum parameter estimation is to find a measurement, described by a POVM, that saturates the QFI (achieves maximum CFI), and thereby achieves the QCRB. In the idealization that one uses pure states and unitary encodings for sensing, discontinuities can appear in the CFI but not the QFI. In this article, we demonstrate that these discontinuities are important features, quantifying how much Fisher information is lost in the presence of noise. We refer to this as the Fisher information "fragility". We present a simple framework for understanding how discontinuities increase fragility through Jensen's inequality, and demonstrate how one can use this framework to design more robust POVMs for quantum advantage in metrology.

Comments
17 pages, 9 figures

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For a given quantum state used in sensing, the quantum Cramér-Rao bound (QCRB) sets a fundamental limit on the precision achievable by an unbiased estimator of an unknown parameter, determined by the inverse of the quantum Fisher information (QFI). The QFI serves as an upper bound on the classical Fisher information (CFI), representing the maximum extractable information about the unknown parameter from measurements on a physical system. Thus, a central goal in quantum parameter estimation is to find a measurement, described by a POVM, that saturates the QFI (achieves maximum CFI), and thereby achieves the QCRB. In the idealization that one uses pure states and unitary encodings for sensing, discontinuities can appear in the CFI but not the QFI. In this article, we demonstrate that these discontinuities are important features, quantifying how much Fisher information is lost in the presence of noise. We refer to this as the Fisher information "fragility". We present a simple framework for understanding how discontinuities increase fragility through Jensen's inequality, and demonstrate how one can use this framework to design more robust POVMs for quantum advantage in metrology.
Quantum Fisher information and the associated quantum Cramér-Rao bound (QCRB) are fundamental tools in frequentist quantum metrology, offering both analytical simplicity and practical precision limits for parameter estimation. The QCRB sets a lower bound on the mean square error (MSE) in the idealized limit of infinite measurement trials ( ν → ∞ ). Here we perform a systematic expansion in powers of 1 / ν to refine MSE estimates in realistic, finite-resource scenarios. These corrections reveal differences between measurements that appear equally optimal under the QCRB. They also help to distinguish among multiple optimal state families for estimating an unknown unitary transformation. Additionally, we explore the Bhattacharyya bound and its quantum counterpart, which constrain these corrections. Our results are relevant for preasymptotic metrology, enabling optimized protocols with limited resources without reliance on numerical simulations.
Abstract We address the discontinuities of the quantum Fisher information (QFI) that may arise when the parameter of interest takes values that change the rank of the quantum statistical model. We revisit the classical and the quantum Cramér–Rao theorems, show that they do not hold in these limiting cases, and discuss how this impacts on the relationship between the QFI and the Bures metric. In order to illustrate the metrological implications of our findings, we present two paradigmatic examples, where we discuss in detail the role of the discontinuities. We show that the usual equivalence between the variance of the maximum likelihood estimator and the inverse of the QFI breaks down.
Abstract The quantum Cramér–Rao bound sets a fundamental limit on the accuracy of unbiased parameter estimation in quantum systems, relating the uncertainty in determining a parameter to the inverse of the quantum Fisher information. We experimentally demonstrate near saturation of the quantum Cramér–Rao bound in the phase estimation of a solid-state spin system, provided by a nitrogen-vacancy center in diamond. This is achieved by comparing the experimental uncertainty in phase estimation with an independent measurement of the related quantum Fisher information. The latter is independently extracted from coherent dynamical responses of the system under weak parametric modulations, without performing any quantum-state tomography. While optimal parameter estimation has already been observed for quantum devices involving a limited number of degrees of freedom, our method offers a versatile and powerful experimental tool to explore the Cramér–Rao bound and the quantum Fisher information in systems of higher complexity, as relevant for quantum technologies.
We develop a quantum metrological framework for resonant nanophotonic sensors based on subwavelength Fabry-Perot (FP) slit cavities. Building directly on classical Fisher-information analyses of resonant transmission sensors, we model parameter encoding as a phase-and-loss quantum channel embedded in one arm of a Mach-Zehnder interferometer. We derive the quantum Fisher information (QFI) for coherent and Gaussian probe states under linear loss and show that, even at the quantum limit, optimal estimation precision is governed by the generator of parameter-dependent phase shifts-dominated by interface contributions-rather than by the cavity quality factor. Consequently, the operating point that maximizes QFI does not generally coincide with the maximum-Q resonance. Quantum resources enhance sensitivity but do not redefine the optimal geometry. Our results provide physically transparent design principles for quantum-enhanced nanophotonic sensing and clarify the central role of boundaries and loss in quantum-limited precision.
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