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Moment Operators of Observables in Quantum Mechanics, with Applications to Quantization and Homodyne Detection

Jukka Kiukas

Published Jan 19, 2008• 1 citation
OpenAlex

Abstract

The questions studied in this thesis are centered around the moment operators of a quantum observable, the latter being represented by a normalized positive operator measure. The moment operators of an observable are physically relevant, in the sense that these operators give, as averages, the moments of the outcome statistics for the measurement of the observable. The main questions under consideration in this work arise from the fact that, unlike a projection valued observable of the von Neumann formulation, a general positive operator measure cannot be characterized by its first moment operator. The possibility of characterizing certain observables by also involving higher moment operators is investigated and utilized in three different cases: a characterization of projection valued measures among all the observables is given, a quantization scheme for unbounded classical variables using translation covariant phase space operator measures is presented, and, finally, a mathematically rigorous description is obtained for the measurements of rotated quadratures and phase space observables via the high amplitude limit in the balanced homodyne and eight-port homodyne detectors, respectively. In addition, the structure of the covariant phase space operator measures, which is essential for the above quantization, is analyzed in detail in the context of a (not necessarily unimodular) locally compact group as the phase space.

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The questions studied in this thesis are centered around the moment operators of a quantum observable, the latter being represented by a normalized positive operator measure. The moment operators of an observable are physically relevant, in the sense that these operators give, as averages, the moments of the outcome statistics for the measurement of the observable. The main questions under consideration in this work arise from the fact that, unlike a projection valued observable of the von Neumann formulation, a general positive operator measure cannot be characterized by its first moment operator. The possibility of characterizing certain observables by also involving higher moment operators is investigated and utilized in three different cases: a characterization of projection valued measures among all the observables is given, a quantization scheme for unbounded classical variables using translation covariant phase space operator measures is presented, and, finally, a mathematically rigorous description is obtained for the measurements of rotated quadratures and phase space observables via the high amplitude limit in the balanced homodyne and eight-port homodyne detectors, respectively. In addition, the structure of the covariant phase space operator measures, which is essential for the above quantization, is analyzed in detail in the context of a (not necessarily unimodular) locally compact group as the phase space.
We consider questions related to a quantization scheme in which a classical variable f:Ω→R on a phase space Ω is associated with a (preferably unique) semispectral measure Ef, such that the moment operators of Ef are required to be of the form Γ(fk), with Γ a suitable mapping from the set of classical variables to the set of (not necessarily bounded) operators in the Hilbert space of the quantum system. In particular, we investigate the situation where the map Γ is implemented by the operator integral with respect to some fixed positive operator measure. The phase space Ω is first taken to be an abstract measurable space, then a locally compact unimodular group, and finally R2, where we determine explicitly the relevant operators Γ(fk) for certain variables f, in the case where the quantization map Γ is implemented by a translation covariant positive operator measure. In addition, we consider the question under what conditions a positive operator measure is projection valued.
We consider questions related to a quantization scheme in which a classical variable f:Ω\to R on a phase space Ωis associated with a semispectral measure E^f, such that the moment operators of E^f are required to be of the form Γ(f^k), with Γa suitable mapping from the set of classical variables to the set of (not necessarily bounded) operators in some Hilbert space. In particular, we investigate the situation where the map Γis implemented by the operator integral with respect to some fixed positive operator measure. The phase space Ωis first taken to be an abstract measurable space, then a locally compact unimodular group, and finally R^2, where we determine explicitly the relevant operators Γ(f^k) for certain variables f, in the case where the quantization map Γis implemented by a translation covariant positive operator measure. In addition, we consider the question under what conditions a positive operator measure is projection valued.
We consider questions related to the following quantization scheme: a classical variable f: Ω → ℝ on a phase space Ω is associated with a unique semispectral measure E f , such that the kth moment operator of E f is required to coincide with the operator integral L(f k , E) of f k with respect to a certain fixed phase space semispectral measure E. Mainly, we take the phase space Ω to be a locally compact unimodular group. In the concrete case where Ω = ℝ2 and E is a translation covariant semispectral measure, we determine explicitly the relevant operators L(f k , E) for certain variables f. In addition, we consider the question under what conditions a positive operator measure is projection valued.
We consider the moment operators of the observable (i.e. a semispectral measure or POM) associated with the balanced homodyne detection statistics, whilst paying attention to the correct domains of these unbounded operators. We show that the high amplitude limit, when performed on the moment operators, actually determines uniquely the entire statistics of a rotated quadrature amplitude of the signal field, thereby verifying the usual assumption that the homodyne detection achieves a measurement of that observable. We also consider, in a general setting, the possibility of constructing a measurement of a single quantum observable from a sequence of observables by taking the limit on the level of moment operators of these observables. In this context, we show that under some natural conditions (each of which is satisfied by the homodyne detector example), the existence of the moment limits ensures that the underlying probability measures converge weakly to the probability measures of the limiting observable. The moment approach naturally requires that the observables be determined by their moment operator sequences (which does not automatically happen), and it turns out, in particular, that this is the case for the balanced homodyne detector.
In accordance with the fact that quantum measurements are described in terms of positive operator measures (POMs), we consider certain aspects of a quantization scheme in which a classical variable f:R2→Rf:\R^2\to \Rf:R2→R is associated with a unique positive operator measure (POM) EfE^fEf, which is not necessarily projection valued. The motivation for such a scheme comes from the well-known fact that due to the noise in a quantum measurement, the resulting outcome distribution is given by a POM and cannot, in general, be described in terms of a traditional observable, a selfadjoint operator. Accordingly, we notice that the noiseless measurements are the ones which are determined by a selfadjoint operator. The POM EfE^fEf in our quantization is defined through its moment operators, which are required to be of the form Γ(fk)Γ(f^k)Γ(fk), k∈Nk\in \Nk∈N, with ΓΓΓ a fixed map from classical variables to Hilbert space operators. In particular, we consider the quantization of classical \emph{questions}, that is, functions f:R2→Rf:\R^2\to\Rf:R2→R taking only values 0 and 1. We compare two concrete realizations of the map ΓΓΓ in view of their ability to produce noiseless measurements: one being the Weyl map, and the other defined by using phase space probability distributions.
This thesis addresses the use of covariant phase space observables in quantum tomography. Necessary and sufficient conditions for the informational completeness of covariant phase space observables are proved, and some state reconstruction formulae are derived. Different measurement schemes for measuring phase space observables are considered. Special emphasis is given to the quantum optical eight-port homodyne detection scheme and, in particular, on the effect of non-unit detector efficiencies on the measured observable. It is shown that the informational completeness of the observable does not depend on the efficiencies. As a related problem, the possibility of reconstructing the position and momentum distributions from the marginal statistics of a phase space observable is considered. It is shown that informational completeness for the phase space observable is neither necessary nor sufficient for this procedure. Two methods for determining the distributions from the marginal statistics are presented. Finally, two alternative methods for determining the state are considered. Some of their shortcomings when compared to the phase space method are discussed.