We construct the optimal one to two cloning transformation for the family of displaced thermal equilibrium states of a harmonic oscillator, with a fixed and known temperature. The transformation is Gaussian and it is optimal with respect to the figure of merit based on the joint output state and norm distance. The proof of the result is based on the equivalence between the optimal cloning problem and that of optimal amplification of Gaussian states which is then reduced to an optimization problem for diagonal states of a quantum oscillator. A key concept in finding the optimum is that of stochastic ordering which plays a similar role in the purely classical problem of Gaussian cloning. The result is then extended to the case of $n$ to $m$ cloning of mixed Gaussian states.
We construct the optimal one to two cloning transformation for the family of displaced thermal equilibrium states of a harmonic oscillator, with a fixed and known temperature. The transformation is Gaussian and it is optimal with respect to the figure of merit based on the joint output state and norm distance. The proof of the result is based on the equivalence between the optimal cloning problem and that of optimal amplification of Gaussian states which is then reduced to an optimization problem for diagonal states of a quantum oscillator. A key concept in finding the optimum is that of stochastic ordering which plays a similar role in the purely classical problem of Gaussian cloning. The result is then extended to the case of n to m cloning of mixed Gaussian states.
Given an ensemble of mixed qubit states, it is possible to increase the purity of the constituent states using a procedure known as state purification. The reverse operation, which we refer to as dilution, produces a larger ensemble, while reducing the purity level of the systems. In this paper we find asymptotically optimal procedures for purification and dilution of an ensemble of independently and identically distributed mixed qubit states, for some given input and output purities and an asymptotic output rate. Our solution involves using the statistical tool of local asymptotic normality, which recasts the qubit problem in terms of attenuation and amplification of a single-mode displaced Gaussian state. Therefore, to obtain the qubit solutions, we must first solve the analogous problems in the Gaussian setup. We provide full solutions to all of the above for the (global) trace-norm figure of merit.
We determine asymptotic global fidelities of cloning generic mixed states with simple (non-degenerate) full-rank spectra. In fixed dimension d, let n inputs and mn outputs satisfy mn/n→γ>1. For a known simple full-rank spectrum p1>⋯>pd>0, we prove that the optimal root fidelity between the entire output and the product target state is $$
F_\rm{orb}(γ,p)
=\prod_{i<j}
\frac{\sqrtγ+\sqrt{q_{ij}(γ-1+q_{ij})}}
{γ+q_{ij}},
\qquad q_{ij}=\frac{p_j}{p_i}. $$ When the spectrum is unknown, one spectrum-independent cloner attains $$
F_\rm{univ}(γ,p)
=\left(\frac{2\sqrtγ}{1+γ}\right)^{(d-1)/2}
F_\rm{orb}(γ,p), $$ uniformly on compact subsets of the simple full-rank chamber and is minimax optimal. The two factors quantify spectral and eigenbasis uncertainty. Our channels combine classical processing of Schur--Weyl labels with a covariant Cartan-sector channel. Local asymptotic normality and a Gaussian fidelity bound against arbitrary channels yield the converses. For flat projector states ρ=P/r, with P a rank-r orthogonal projector, we separately prove the optimum γ−r(d−r)/2. Furthermore, we estimate the exact asymptotic fidelity of purify--clone--trace (PCT), and show that our cloners strictly outperform PCT at every fixed gain for simple full-rank spectra and rank-r projector states with 1<r<d.
Quantum state cloning is the task of approximately producing additional copies of an unknown quantum state from a finite number of input copies. The optimal cloning fidelity is known exactly for pure states, but no comparable characterization is known for general mixed states. We determine the optimal asymptotic copy complexity for d-dimensional states of rank at most r: producing M additional copies with worst-case fidelity at least 1−ε requires and is achievable with N=Θ(Mrd/ε) input copies. Remarkably, the lower bound already holds for a family of states with a fixed flat spectrum, while the matching upper bound is achieved by random purification followed by optimal pure-state cloning. For M=1, we further show that high-fidelity tomography can be coherently converted into cloning with comparable error, revealing an operational origin of the matching cloning and tomography complexities.
The cloning of conjugate continuous quantum variables is analyzed based on the concept of Gaussian cloning machines, i.e., transformations that yield copies that are Gaussian mixtures centered on the state to be copied. The optimality of Gaussian cloning machines that transform N identical input states into M output states is investigated, and bounds on the fidelity of the process are derived via a connection with quantum estimation theory. In particular, the optimal N-to-M cloning fidelity for coherent states is found to be equal to $MN/(MN+M\ensuremath{-}N).$
We analyze in details a scheme for cloning of Gaussian states based on linear optical components and homodyne detection recently demonstrated by Andersen et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 240503 (2005)]. The input-output fidelity is evaluated for a generic (pure or mixed) Gaussian state taking into account the effect of nonunit quantum efficiency and unbalanced mode mixing. In addition, since in most quantum information protocols the covariance matrix of the set of input states is not perfectly known, we evaluate the average cloning fidelity for classes of Gaussian states with the degree of squeezing and the number of thermal photons being only partially known.
Following the work of Niu and Griffiths, in \emph{Phys.Rev.A 58, 4377(1998)}, we shall investigate the problem, how to design the optimal quantum cloning machines (QCMs) for qubit system, with the help of Bloch-sphere representation. In stead of the quality factor there, the Fiuráusek's optimal condition, where the optimal cloning machine should maximize a convex mixture of the average fidelity, is used as the optimality criterion in present protocol. Almost all of the known optimal QCMs in previous works, the cloning for states with fixed polar angle, the phase-covariant cloning, the universal QCMs, the cloning for two arbitrary pure states, and the mirror phase-covariant cloning, should be discussed in a systematic way. The known results, the optimal fidelities for various input ensembles according to different optimality criteria, are recovered here. Our present scheme also offers a general way of constructing the unitary transformation to realize the optimal cloning.