Our basic structure is a finite-dimensional complex Hilbert space
H. We point out that the set of effects on
H form a convex effect algebra. Although the set of operators on
H also form a convex effect algebra, they have a more detailed structure. W introduce sequential products of effect and operations. Although these have already been studied, we introduce the new concept of sequential products of effects with operations and operations with effects. We then consider various special types of operations. After developing properties of these concepts, the results are generalized to include observables and instruments. In particular, sequential products of observables with instruments and instruments with observables are developed. Finally, we consider conditioning and coexistence of observables and instruments.
Our basic concept is the set
E(H) of effects on a finite dimensional complex Hilbert space
H. If
a,b∈E(H), we define the sequential product
a[I]b of
a then
b. The sequential product depends on the operation
I used to measure
a. We begin by studying the properties of this sequential product. It is observed that
b↦a[I]b is an additive, convex morphism and we show by examples that
a↦a[I]b enjoys very few conditions. This is because a measurement of
a can interfere with a later measurement of
b. We study sequential products relative to Kraus, Lüders and Holevo operations and find properties that characterize these operations. We consider repeatable effects and conditions on
a[I]b that imply commutativity. We introduce the concept of an effect
b given an effect
a and study its properties. We next extend the sequential product to observables and instruments and develop statistical properties of real-valued observables. This is accomplished by employing corresponding stochastic operators. Finally, we introduce an uncertainty principle for conditioned observables.
A quantum effect is an operator
A on a complex Hilbert space
H that satisfies
0≤A≤I,
E(H) is the set of all quantum effects on
H. In 2001, Professor Gudder and Nagy studied the sequential product
A∘B=A1/2BA1/2 of
A,B∈E(H). In 2005, Professor Gudder asked: Is
A∘B=A1/2BA1/2 the only sequential product on
E(H)? Recently, Liu and Wu presented an example to show that the answer is negative. In this paper, firstly, we characterize some algebraic properties of the abstract sequential product on
E(H); secondly, we present a general method for constructing sequential products on
E(H); finally, we study some properties of the sequential products constructed by the method
Unsharp quantum measurements can be modelled by means of the class E ( H ) \mathcal {E}(\mathcal {H}) of positive contractions on a Hilbert space H \mathcal {H} , in brief, quantum effects. For A , B ∈ E ( H ) A,B\in \mathcal {E}(\mathcal {H}) the operation of sequential product A ∘ B = A 1 / 2 B A 1 / 2 A\circ B=A^{1/2}BA^{1/2} was proposed as a model for sequential quantum measurements. We continue these investigations on sequential product and answer positively the following question: the assumption A ∘ B ≥ B A\circ B\geq B implies A B = B A = B AB=BA=B . Then we propose a geometric approach of quantum effects and their sequential product by means of contractively contained Hilbert spaces and operator ranges. This framework leads us naturally to consider lattice properties of quantum effects, sums and intersections, and to prove that the sequential product is left distributive with respect to the intersection.
It has already been established that the properties required of an abstract sequential product as introduced by Gudder and Greechie are not enough to characterise the standard sequential product a◦b=aba on an operator algebra. We give three additional properties, each of which characterises the standard sequential product on either a von Neumann algebra or a Euclidean Jordan algebra. These properties are (1) invariance under the application of unital order isomorphisms, (2) symmetry of the sequential product with respect to a certain inner product, and (3) preservation of invertibility of the effects. To give these characterisations, we first have to study convex σ-sequential effect algebras. We show that these objects correspond to unit intervals of spectral order unit spaces with a homogeneous positive cone.
The quantum effects for a physical system can be described by the set E(H) of positive operators on a complex Hilbert space H that are bounded above by the identity operator I. For A, B∊E(H), the operation of sequential product A∘B=A1∕2BA1∕2 was proposed as a model for sequential quantum measurements. A nice investigation of properties of the sequential product has been carried over [Gudder, S. and Nagy, G., “Sequential quantum measurements,” J. Math. Phys. 42, 5212 (2001)]. In this note, we extend some results of this reference. In particular, a gap in the proof of Theorem 3.2 in this reference is overcome. In addition, some properties of generalized infimum A⨅B are studied.