We consider the problem of optimal asymptotically faithful compression for ensembles of mixed quantum states. Although the optimal rate is unknown, we prove upper and lower bounds and describe a series of illustrative examples of compression of mixed states. We also discuss a classical analogue of the problem. 1
We consider the problem of compression of the quantum information carried by ensemble of mixed states. We prove that for arbitrary coding schemes the least number of quantum bits (qubits) per message needed to convey the signal states asymptotically faithfully is bounded from below by the Holevo function $S(\ensuremath{\varrho})\ensuremath{-}{\ensuremath{\sum}}_{i}{p}_{i}S({\ensuremath{\varrho}}_{i})$. We also show that a compression protocol can be composed with another one, provided that the latter offers perfect transmission. Such a compound protocol is applied to the case of binary source. It is conjectured to reach the obtained bound. Finally, we point out that in the case of mixed signal states there could be a difference between the maximal compression rates at the coding schemes that are ``blind'' to the signal and the ones that assume the knowledge about the identities of the signal states.
We consider the most general finite-dimensional quantum mechanical information source, which is given by a quantum systemAthat is correlated with a reference systemR. The task is to compressAin such a way as to reproduce the joint source stateρARat the decoder with asymptotically high fidelity. This includes Schumacher’s original quantum source coding problem of a pure state ensemble and that of a single pure entangled state, as well as general mixed state ensembles. Here, we determine the optimal compression rate (in qubits per source system) in terms of the Koashi-Imoto decomposition of the source into a classical, a quantum, and a redundant part. The same decomposition yields the optimal rate in the presence of unlimited entanglement between compressor and decoder, and indeed the full region of feasible qubit-ebit rate pairs.
We consider the most general (finite-dimensional) quantum mechanical information source, which is given by a quantum system A that is correlated with a reference system R. The task is to compress A in such a way as to reproduce the joint source state ρARat the decoder with asymptotically high fidelity. This includes Schumacher's original quantum source coding problem of a pure state ensemble and that of a single pure entangled state, as well as general mixed state ensembles. Here, we determine the optimal compression rate (in qubits per source system) in terms of the Koashi-Imoto decomposition of the source into a classical, a quantum, and a redundant part. The same decomposition yields the optimal rate in the presence of unlimited entanglement between compressor and decoder, and indeed the full region of feasible qubitebit rate pairs. Full version at arXiv:1912.08506 [1].
We provide a rate distortion interpretation of the problem of quantum data compression of ensembles of mixed states with commuting density operators. There are two versions of this problem. In the visible case the sequence of states is available to the encoder and in the blind or hidden case the encoder may access only a sequence of measurements. We find the exact optimal compression rates for both the visible and hidden cases. Our analysis includes the scenario in which asymptotic reconstruction is imperfect.