Using the thermal Green's function approach we propose a general method to investigate entanglement of the vacuum state or thermal ground states in an arbitrary dimensional space-time. As an application we show quantum separability of the massive thermal scalar field vacuum in the 1+1 dimensional cylindrical space-time. Separability is demonstrated using the positive partial transpose criterion for effective two-mode Gaussian states of collective operators. In this case, for all mass and temperature values entanglement is absent between the collective operators.
Using the thermal Green's function approach we propose a general method to investigate entanglement of the vacuum state or thermal ground states in an arbitrary dimensional space-time. As an application we show quantum separability of the massive thermal scalar field vacuum in the 1+1 dimensional cylindrical space-time. Separability is demonstrated using the positive partial transpose criterion for effective two-mode Gaussian states of collective operators. In this case, for all mass and temperature values entanglement is absent between the collective operators.
Quantum fields exhibit a rich entanglement structure which is still not fully understood. In this work, we study the entanglement structure of the vacuum state of a massless scalar field in (1+1)-dimensions -- a paradigmatic case for both high energy and condensed matter physics. We fully characterize the entanglement negativity between two arbitrary compact spacelike-separated regions of the field by calculating the logarithmic negativity along with the modes carrying it, called negativity cores. We achieve this using a framework based on the Kähler structure of Gaussian states, wherein we calculate the diagonalization of the operator associated with the partially-transposed restricted linear complex structure. In doing so, we extend the methods of this framework by proposing a basis-independent definition of the transpose operation. The explicit diagonalization we perform is enabled by a reformulation of the eigenvalue problem as a boundary value problem in the complex plane. Our results also suggest extensions to higher dimensions and fermionic fields.
We overcome the long-standing noninvasive measurability (NIM) challenge in Leggett-Garg tests by exploiting the causal structure of quantum field theory (QFT). Our protocol uses three independent ensembles of the vacuum state, each measured by a different pair of observers at spacelike-separated events, yielding the three two-time correlators. By placing these events at positions
(0,0),
(τ,L), and
(2τ,2L) with
L>τ+2τ0, we rigorously ensure that no measurement can influence another. We investigate the vacuum state of a free massive scalar field in 1+1 dimensions, employing the dichotomic observable
Q(f)=sign(φ(f)) where
φ(f) is the smeared field. In the Heisenberg picture, the time evolution is absorbed into a translation of the time-window function, allowing us to derive the two-time correlation function
C(τ,L) and the Leggett-Garg parameter
K3=2C(τ,L)−C(2τ,2L). For non-overlapping time windows, we find that the correlation function decays exponentially with
τ for a massive field. For overlapping windows, our numerical computation for a rectangular time window yields
K3<1 across the entire mass range, firmly establishing that the vacuum does not violate the LGI. Thus, under strict noninvasive conditions, the vacuum shows no violation of macrorealism, in stark contrast to its well-known violation of spatial Bell inequalities. Our spacelike-separated protocol provides the first LGI test in QFT with rigorously satisfied NIM, setting a methodological benchmark for future studies and highlighting the fundamental distinction between spacelike entanglement and temporal macrorealism in relativistic quantum fields.
Quantum field theory is the application of quantum physics to fields. It provides a theoretical framework widely used in particle physics and condensed matter physics. One of the most distinct features of quantum physics with respect to classical physics is entanglement or the existence of strong correlations between subsystems that can even be spacelike separated. In quantum fields, observables restricted to a region of space define a subsystem. While there are proofs on the existence of local observables that would allow a violation of Bell's inequalities in the vacuum states of quantum fields as well as some explicit but technically demanding schemes requiring an extreme fine-tuning of the interaction between the fields and detectors, an experimentally accessible entanglement witness for quantum fields is still missing. Here we introduce smeared field operators which allow reducing the vacuum to a system of two effective bosonic modes. The introduction of such collective observables is motivated by the fact that no physical probe has access to fields in single spatial (mathematical) points but rather smeared over finite volumes. We first give explicit collective observables whose correlations reveal vacuum entanglement in the Klein-Gordon field. We then show that the critical distance between the two regions of space above which two effective bosonic modes become separable is of the order of the Compton wavelength of the particle corresponding to the massive Klein-Gordon field.