nLab quantum operation

Contents

Context

Quantum systems

quantum logic


quantum physics


quantum probability theoryobservables and states


quantum information


quantum computation

qbit

quantum algorithms:


quantum sensing


quantum communication

Contents

Idea

Any physical process is supposed to take physical states into physical states (Schrödinger picture). If density matrices are used to describe quantum states in quantum mechanics, then it must be some operation that sends density matrices to density matrices. So for finite-dimensional state spaces a process should be a linear map of vector spaces of matrices

U:Mat(n×n,)Mat(k×k,) U \;\colon\; Mat(n \times n, \mathbb{C}) \to Mat(k \times k, \mathbb{C})

(so far this is a general “superoperator”) that preserves the subset of density matrices, in that

Such a map is then called a quantum operation. The notion of a quantum operation is built from the Stinespring factorization theorem.

Definition

We first give the traditional definition in terms of linear algebra and matrices in

Then we consider the general abstract formulation

In terms of matrices

Let k,nk,n \in \mathbb{N}.

A matrix AMat(n×n,)A \in Mat(n \times n, \mathbb{C}) is called positive if it is hermitian – if A =AA^\dagger = A – and if all its eigenvalues (which then are necessarily real) are non-negative.

A linear map (morphism of vector spaces of matrices)

Φ:Mat(n×n,)Mat(k×k,) \Phi \;\colon\; Mat(n \times n, \mathbb{C}) \to Mat(k \times k, \mathbb{C})

is called positive if it takes positive matrices to positive matrices.

The map Φ\Phi is called completely positive if for all pp \in \mathbb{N} the tensor product

ΦId Mat(p×p),:Mat(n×n,)Mat(p×p,)Mat(k×k,)Mat(p×p,) \Phi \otimes Id_{Mat(p\times p),\mathbb{C}} \;\colon\; Mat(n \times n , \mathbb{C}) \otimes Mat(p \times p , \mathbb{C}) \longrightarrow Mat(k \times k , \mathbb{C}) \otimes Mat(p \times p , \mathbb{C})

is positive.

A quantum operation (or quantum channel) is a map that is both completely positive and trace preserving (often abbreviated to CPTP).

In terms of compact closed categories

… due to (Selinger 05) … see for instance (Coecke-Heunen 11, section 2) for a quick summary …

Properties

Characterization of complete positivity

Theorem

A map Φ\Phi as above is completely positive precisely if there exists a set II and an II-family {E iMat(k×n,|iI)}\{E_i \in Mat(k \times n, \mathbb{C}| i \in I)\} of matrices, such that for all AMat(n×n,)A \in Mat(n \times n, \mathbb{C}) we have

Φ(A)= iIE iAE i . \Phi(A) = \sum_{i \in I} E_i A E_i^\dagger \,.

Moreover, such Φ\Phi preserves the trace of matrices precisely if

iIE i E i=Id Mat(n×n,). \sum_{i \in I} E_i^\dagger E_i = Id_{Mat(n \times n, \mathbb{C})} \,.

This is originally due to (Stinespring 55). The decomposition in the theorem is called Kraus decomposition after (Kraus 71). See also (Choi 76, theorem 1). A brief review is for instance in (Kuperberg 05, theorem 1.5.1). A general abstract proof in terms of †-categories is given in (Selinger 05). A characterization of completely positive maps entirely in terms of \dagger-categories is given in (Coecke 07).

The matrices {E i}\{E_i\} that are associated to a completely positive and trace-preserving map by the above theorem are called Kraus operators.

In the physics literature the above theorem is then phrased as: Every quantum channel can be represented using Kraus operators .

Notice that the identity map is clearly completely positive and trace preserving, and that the composite of two maps that preserve positivity and trace clearly still preserves positivity and trace. Therefore we obtain a category QChanVectQChan \subset Vect – a subcategory of Vect {}_{\mathbb{C}} – whose

  • objects are the vector spaces Mat(n×n,)Mat(n \times n, \mathbb{C}) for all nn \in \mathbb{N};

  • morphism are completely positive and trace-preserving linear maps Φ:Mat(n×n,)Mat(m×m,)\Phi : Mat(n\times n , \mathbb{C}) \to Mat(m \times m, \mathbb{C});

  • composition of morphisms is, of course, the composition in Vect, i.e. the ordinary composition of linear maps.

See also extremal quantum channels and graphical quantum channels.

Universal property

The category whose objects are indexed by natural numbers n,m,n,m, \cdots and whose morphisms are quantum operations from n×nn \times n to m×mm \times m matrices is a semicartesian monoidal category with the monoidal structure given by multiplication of numbers. Being semicartesian, the monoidal tensor unit (the number 11) has a unique morphism to it from any object: this morphism is the trace.

In fact, this category has the universal property of the semicartesian reflection of the monoidal category of isometries. This is the category whose objects are natural numbers, considered as Hilbert spaces, and whose morphisms are isometries between them, where an isometry mnm\to n is an m×nm\times n complex matrix VV such that VV*=IVV*=I.

In detail, the universal property says that for any strict semicartesian monoidal category 𝒟\mathcal{D} and any monoidal functor Isometries𝒟\mathbf{Isometries}\to \mathcal{D}, there is a unique symmetric monoidal functor making the following diagram commute:

Isometries QuantumChannels 𝒟 \array{ \mathbf{Isometries} &\rightarrow& \mathbf{Quantum Channels} \\ &\searrow&\downarrow\\ && \mathcal{D} }

This fits a physical intuition as follows. Suppose that the isometries are a model of reality, as in the the many worlds interpretation and the Church of the larger Hilbert space. But in practice the observer cannot access the entirety of reality, and so some bits are hidden. The canonical way to model this hiding is to do it freely, which is to form the semicartesian reflection.

Examples

Quantum measurement and POVMs

A quantum measurement is formally represented by a quantum operation that is induced by a positive-operator valued probability measure (POVM).

Decoherence and partial traces

For the moment see the references at quantum decoherence.

Noice channels

Examples of quantum noise channels:

quantum probability theoryobservables and states

References

The Kraus-decomposition characterization of completely positive maps is due to

Review and survey:

See also

  • Caleb J. O’Loan (2009), Topics in Estimation of Quantum Channels , PhD thesis, University of St. Andrews, (arXiv)

  • Christian B. Mendl, Michael M. Wolf, Unital Quantum Channels - Convex Structure and Revivals of Birkhoff’s Theorem , Commun. Math. Phys. 289, 1057-1096 (2009) (arXiv:0806.2820)

  • John A. Smolin, Frank Verstraete, Andreas Winter, Entanglement of assistance and multipartite state distillation, Phys. Rev. A 72 (2005) 052317 (arXiv:quant-ph/0505038)

  • John Watrous, Mixing doubly stochastic quantum channels with the completely depolarizing channel (2008) (arXiv)

  • Wikipedia, Quantum Operation

The description of completely positive maps in terms of dagger-categories (see at quantum information theory via dagger-compact categories) goes back to

  • Peter Selinger, Dagger-compact closed categories and completely positive maps, Electronic Notes in Theoretical Computer Science (special issue: Proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on Quantum Programming Languages). 2005 (pdf, ps)

  • Bob Coecke, Complete positivity without compactness, 2007 (pdf)

This is further explored in

For the universal property, see

  • Mathieu Huot, Sam Staton, Universal properties in quantum theory (QPL 2018) (pdf).

On quantum channel capacity:

  • Alexander S. Holevo, Quantum Systems, Channels, Information – A Mathematical Introduction, Studies in Mathematical Physics 16, De Gruyter (2013) [doi:10.1515/9783110273403]

  • Alexander S. Holevo, Quantum channel capacities, Quantum Electron. 50 440 (2020) [doi:10.1070/QEL17285/meta]

Last revised on March 29, 2023 at 20:56:37. See the history of this page for a list of all contributions to it.