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arXiv:quant-ph/0306194 · Physical Review Letters

Characterizing Entanglement via Uncertainty Relations

Otfried Gühne

Published Mar 18, 2004• 295 citations
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Abstract

We derive a family of necessary separability criteria for finite-dimensional systems based on inequalities for variances of observables. We show that every pure bipartite entangled state violates some of these inequalities. Furthermore, a family of bound entangled states and true multipartite entangled states can be detected. The inequalities also allow us to distinguish between different classes of true tripartite entanglement for qubits. We formulate an equivalent criterion in terms of covariance matrices. This allows us to apply criteria known from the regime of continuous variables to finite-dimensional systems.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.92.117903

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We derive a family of necessary separability criteria for finite-dimensional systems based on inequalities for variances of observables. We show that every pure bipartite entangled state violates some of these inequalities. Furthermore, a family of bound entangled states and true multipartite entangled states can be detected. The inequalities also allow us to distinguish between different classes of true tripartite entanglement for qubits. We formulate an equivalent criterion in terms of covariance matrices. This allows us to apply criteria known from the regime of continuous variables to finite-dimensional systems.
We formulate an entanglement criterion using Peres-Horodecki positive partial transpose operations combined with the Schr\"odinger-Robertson uncertainty relation. We show that any pure entangled bipartite and tripartite state can be detected by experimentally measuring mean values and variances of specific observables. Those observables must satisfy a specific condition in order to be used, and we show their general form in the $2\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}2$ (two qubits) dimension case. The criterion is applied on a variety of physical systems including bipartite and multipartite mixed states and reveals itself to be stronger than the Bell inequalities and other criteria. The criterion also work on continuous variable cat states and angular momentum states of the radiation field.
Covariance matrices are a useful tool for investigating correlations and entanglement in quantum systems. They are widely used in continuous-variable systems, but recently also for finite-dimensional systems powerful entanglement criteria in terms of covariance matrices have been derived. We show how these results can be used for the quantification of entanglement in bipartite systems. To that aim we introduce an entanglement parameter that quantifies the violation of the covariance matrix criterion and can be used to give lower bounds on the concurrence. These lower bounds are easily computable and give entanglement estimates for many weakly entangled states.
We propose a sufficient criterion for the entanglement of tripartite systems based on local sum uncertainty relations for arbitrarily chosen observables of subsystems. This criterion generalizes the tighter criterion for bipartite systems introduced by Zhang et al. [C.-J. Zhang, H. Nha, Y.-S. Zhang, and G.-C. Guo, Phys. Rev. A 81, 012324 (2010)] and can be used for both discrete- and continuous-variable systems. It enables us to detect the entanglement of quantum states without having a complete knowledge of them. Its utility is illustrated by some examples of three-qubit, qutrit-qutrit-qubit, and three-mode Gaussian states. It is found that, in comparison with other criteria, this criterion is able to detect some three-qubit bound entangled states more efficiently.
A general procedure to construct criteria for identifying genuine multipartite continuous-variable entanglement is presented. It relies on the definition of adequate global operators describing the multipartite system, the positive partial transpose criterion of separability, and quantum-mechanical uncertainty relations. As a consequence, each criterion encountered consists of a single inequality that is nicely computable and experimentally feasible. Violation of the inequality is a sufficient condition for genuine multipartite entanglement. Additionally, we show that the previous work of van Loock and Furusawa [P. van Loock and A. Furusawa, Phys. Rev. A 67, 052315 (2003)] is a special case of our result.
We show that multi-invariants provide necessary and sufficient criteria for full separability in finite-dimensional multipartite systems. For tripartite three-qubit states, the third-order negativity gives an exact criterion for full separability for both pure and mixed states. We then extend the framework to four-qubit pure states, whose full characterization requires eighteen independent real parameters. We identify eighteen independent entanglement measures, consisting of six bipartite, eight tripartite, and four quadripartite measures, with the third-order negativity serving as a key separability criterion. Finally, we generalize the construction to multipartite qudit systems and discuss an application to conformal field theory.
We propose a unifying approach to the separability problem using covariance matrices of locally measurable observables. From a practical point of view, our approach leads to strong entanglement criteria that allow us to detect the entanglement of many bound entangled states in higher dimensions and which are at the same time necessary and sufficient for two qubits. From a fundamental perspective, our approach leads to insights into the relations between several known entanglement criteria--such as the computable cross-norm and local uncertainty criteria--as well as their limitations.