Catalytic coherence transformations allow the otherwise impossible state transformations using only incoherent operations with the aid of an auxiliary system with finite coherence which is not being consumed in anyway. Here we find the necessary and sufficient conditions for the deterministic and stochastic catalytic coherence transformations between pair of pure quantum states. In particular, we show that the simultaneous decrease of a family of Rényi entropies of the diagonal parts of the states under consideration are necessary and sufficient conditions for the deterministic catalytic coherence transformations. Similarly, for stochastic catalytic coherence transformations we find the necessary and sufficient conditions for achieving higher optimal probability of conversion. We, thus, completely characterize the coherence transformations amongst pure quantum states under incoherent operations. We give numerous examples to elaborate our results. We also explore the possibility of the same system acting as a catalyst for itself and find that indeed {\it self catalysis} is possible. Further, for the cases where no catalytic coherence transformation is possible we provide entanglement assisted coherence transformations and find the necessary and sufficient conditions for such transformations.
Quantum coherence, the ability to control the phases in superposition states is a resource, and it is of crucial importance, therefore, to understand how it is consumed in use. It has been suggested that catalytic coherence is possible, that is repeated use of the coherence without degradation or reduction in performance. The claim has particular relevance for quantum thermodynamics because, were it true, it would allow free energy that is locked in coherence to be extracted $\textit{indefinitely}$. We address this issue directly with a careful analysis of the proposal by $Å$berg. We find that…
Aberg has claimed in a recent Letter," Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 150402 (2014)", that the coherence of a reservoir can be used repeatedly to perform coherent operations without ever diminishing in power to do so. The claim has particular relevance for quantum thermodynamics because, as shown in "Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 150402 (2014)", latent energy that is locked by coherence may be extractable without incurring any additional cost. We show here, however, that repeated use of the reservoir gives an overall coherent operation of diminished accuracy and is necessarily accompanied by an increased therm…
Due to conservation of energy we cannot directly turn a quantum system with a definite energy into a superposition of different energies. However, if we have access to an additional resource in terms of a system with a high degree of coherence, as for standard models of laser light, we can overcome this limitation. The question is to what extent coherence gets degraded when utilized. Here it is shown that coherence can be turned into a catalyst, meaning that we can use it repeatedly without ever diminishing its power to enable coherent operations. This finding stands in contrast to the degrada…
Quantum catalytic transformations play important roles in the transformation of quantum entangled states under local operations and classical communications (LOCC). The key problems in catalytic transformations are the existence and the bounds on the catalytic states. We present the necessary conditions of catalytic states based on a set of points given by the Schmidt coefficients of the entangled source and target states. The lower bounds on the dimensions of the catalytic states are also investigated. Moreover, we give a detailed protocol of quantum mixed state transformation under entanglem…
Determining whether a given state can be transformed into a target state using free operations is one of the fundamental questions in the study of resources theories. Free operations in resource theories can be enhanced by allowing for a catalyst system that assists the transformation and is returned unchanged, but potentially correlated, with the target state. While this has been an active area of recent research, very little is known about the necessary properties of such catalysts. Here, we prove fundamental limits applicable to a large class of correlated catalytic transformations by showi…
The laws of thermodynamics are usually formulated under the assumption of infinitely large environments. While this idealization facilitates theoretical treatments, real physical systems are always finite and their interaction range is limited. These constraints have consequences for important tasks such as cooling, not directly captured by the second law of thermodynamics. Here, we study catalytic transformations that cannot be achieved when a system exclusively interacts with a finite environment. Our core result consists of constructive conditions for these transformations, which include th…
Quantum entanglement of pure states is usually quantified via the entanglement entropy, the von Neumann entropy of the reduced state. Entanglement entropy is closely related to entanglement distillation, a process for converting quantum states into singlets, which can then be used for various quantum technological tasks. The relation between entanglement entropy and entanglement distillation has been known only for the asymptotic setting, and the meaning of entanglement entropy in the single-copy regime has so far remained open. Here we close this gap by considering entanglement catalysis. We …
There are various physical scenarios in which one can only implement operations with a certain symmetry. Under such restriction, a system in a symmetry-breaking state can be used as a catalyst, e.g. to prepare another system in a desired symmetry-breaking state. This sort of (approximate) catalytic state transformations are relevant in the context of (i) state preparation using a bounded-size quantum clock or reference frame, where the clock or reference frame acts as a catalyst, (ii) quantum thermodynamics, where again a clock can be used as a catalyst to prepare states which contain coherenc…
We examine the problem of state transformations in the framework of Gaussian thermal resource theory in the presence of catalysts. To this end, we introduce an expedient parametrisation of covariance matrices in terms of principal mode temperatures and asymmetries, and consider both weak and strong catalytic scenarios. We show that strong catalysts (where final correlations with the system are forbidden) are useless for the single mode case, in that they do not expand the set of states reachable from a given initial state through Gaussian thermal operations. We then go on to prove that weak ca…
The resource theory of quantum coherence is an important topic in quantum information science. Standard coherence distillation and dilution problems have been thoroughly studied. In this paper, we introduce and study the problem of one-shot coherence distillation with catalysts. In order to distill more coherence from a state of interest, a catalytic system can be involved and a jointly free operation is applied to both systems. The joint output state should be a maximally coherent state in tensor product with the unchanged catalysts, with some allowable fidelity error. We consider several dif…
Catalysts are substances that assist transformation of other resourceful objects without being consumed in the process. However, the fact that their `catalytic power' is limited and can be depleted is often overlooked, especially in the recently developing theories on catalysis of quantum randomness utilizing building correlation with catalyst. In this work, we establish a resource theory of one-shot catalytic randomness in which uncorrelatedness is consumed in catalysis of randomness. We do so by completely characterizing bipartite unitary operators that can be used to implement catalysis of …
An important problem in quantum information theory is the mathematical characterization of the phenomenon of quantum catalysis: when can the surrounding entanglement be used to perform transformations of a jointly held quantum state under LOCC (local operations and classical communication) ? Mathematically, the question amounts to describe, for a fixed vector $y$, the set $T(y)$ of vectors $x$ such that we have $x \otimes z \prec y \otimes z$ for some $z$, where $\prec$ denotes the standard majorization relation. Our main result is that the closure of $T(y)$ in the $\ell_1$ norm can be fully d…
University of Geneva（日内瓦大学）；Center for Theoretical Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences（波兰科学院理论物理中心）；Institute of Theoretical Physics, Jagiellonian University（雅盖隆大学理论物理研究所）；Sorbonne Université, CNRS, LIP6（索邦大学、法国国家科学研究中心、LIP6实验室）
We investigate the single qubit transformations under several typical coherence-free operations, such as, incoherent operation (IO), strictly incoherent operation (SIO), physically incoherent operation (PIO), and coherence preserving operation (CPO). Quantitative connection has been built between IO and SIO in single qubit systems. Moreover, these coherence-free operations have a clear hierarchical relationship in single qubit systems: CPO $\subset$ PIO $\subset$ SIO=IO. A new and explicit proof for the necessary and sufficient condition of single qubit transformation via IO or SIO has been pr…
Given two pairs of quantum states, a fundamental question in the resource theory of asymmetric distinguishability is to determine whether there exists a quantum channel converting one pair to the other. In this work, we reframe this question in such a way that a catalyst can be used to help perform the transformation, with the only constraint on the catalyst being that its reduced state is returned unchanged, so that it can be used again to assist a future transformation. What we find here, for the special case in which the states in a given pair are commuting, and thus quasi-classical, is tha…
One of the main problems in any quantum resource theory is the characterization of the conversions between resources by means of the free operations of the theory. In this work, we advance on this characterization within the quantum coherence resource theory by introducing the generalized coherence vector of an arbitrary quantum state. The generalized coherence vector is a probability vector that can be interpreted as a concave roof extension of the pure states coherence vector. We show that it completely characterizes the notions of being incoherent, as well as being maximally coherent. Moreo…
We build the counterpart of the celebrated Nielsen's theorem for coherence manipulation in this paper. This offers an affirmative answer to the open question: whether, given two states $ρ$ and $σ$, either $ρ$ can be transformed into $σ$ or vice versa under incoherent operations [Phys. Rev. Lett. \textbf{113}, 140401(2014)]. As a consequence, we find that there exist essentially different types of coherence. Moreover, incoherent operations can be enhanced in the presence of certain coherent states. These extra states are coherent catalysts: they allow uncertain incoherent operations to be reali…
Quantum coherence, emerging from the 'superposition' of quantum states, is widely used in various information processing tasks. Recently, the resource theory of multilevel quantum coherence is attracting substantial attention. In this paper, we mainly study the deterministic transformations of resource pure states via free operations in the theoretical framework for multilevel coherence. We prove that any two multilevel coherent resource pure states can be interconverted with a nonzero probability via a completely positive and trace non-increasing $k$-coherence-preserving map. Meanwhile, we pr…
We characterize the operational capabilities of quantum channels which can neither create nor detect quantum coherence vis-à-vis efficiently manipulating coherence as a resource. We study the class of dephasing-covariant operations (DIO), unable to detect the coherence of any input state, as well as introduce an operationally-motivated class of channels $ρ$-DIO which is tailored to a specific input state. We first show that pure-state transformations under DIO are completely governed by majorization, establishing necessary and sufficient conditions for such transformations and adding to the li…
We consider the physical situations where the resource theories of coherence and thermodynamics play competing roles. In particular, we study the creation of quantum coherence using unitary operations with limited thermodynamic resources. We first find the maximal coherence that can be created under unitary operations starting from a thermal state and find explicitly the unitary transformation that creates the maximal coherence. Since coherence is created by unitary operations starting from a thermal state, it requires some amount of energy. This motivates us to explore the trade-off between t…
We propose the notion of faithful coherent states based on the fidelity-based coherence witness. The criterion for detecting faithful coherent states can be restricted to a subclass of fidelity-based criterion under unitary transformations for single and bipartite systems. We can realize these unitary transformations by using quantum gates and circuits, and establish the connection of faithful coherence states and coherence distillation, maximum relative entropy of coherence.
Causal-Class Hierarchies in Coherence-Constrained Channel Transformation
The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou)（香港科技大学（广州））；Quantum Science Center of Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area（粤港澳大湾区量子科学中心）；The University of Hong Kong（香港大学）
Quantum resource manipulation may include an ancillary state called a catalyst, which aids the transformation while restoring its original form at the end, and characterizing the enhancement enabled by catalysts is essential to reveal the ultimate manipulability of the precious resource quantity of interest. Here, we show that allowing correlation among multiple catalysts can offer arbitrary power in the manipulation of quantum coherence. We prove that any state transformation can be accomplished with an arbitrarily small error by covariant operations with catalysts that may create a correlati…
The remarkable phenomenon of catalyst tells us that adding a catalyst could help state transformation. In this paper, we consider the problem of catalyst-assisted probabilistic coherence distillation for mixed states under strictly incoherent operations. To this end, we first present the necessary and sufficient conditions for distilling a target pure coherent state from an initial mixed state via stochastic strictly incoherent operations and the maximal probability of obtaining the target pure state from the initial state. With the help of these results, we present the necessary and sufficien…
A new type of an optical interferometer is discussed the phase difference between the interfering beams in which is substantially wavelength dependent. It is shown that the function measured with this device is an integral transform of the field correlation function. Possible applications for data encoding and spectral linewidth measurements are considered.
Coherence distillation is one of the central problems in the resource theory of coherence. In this Letter, we complete the deterministic distillation of quantum coherence for a finite number of coherent states under strictly incoherent operations. Specifically, we find the necessary and sufficient condition for the transformation from a mixed coherent state into a pure state via strictly incoherent operations, which recovers a connection between the resource theory of coherence and the algebraic theory of majorization lattice. With the help of this condition, we present the deterministic coher…
We study the ability of a quantum channel to generate quantum coherence when it applies to incoherent states. Based on probabilistic averages, we define a measure of such coherence generating power (CGP) for a generic quantum channel, based on the average coherence generated by the quantum channel acting on a uniform ensemble of incoherent states. Explicit analytical formula of the CGP for any unitary channels are presented in terms of subentropy. An upper bound for CGP of unital quantum channels has been also derived. Detailed examples are investigated.
In this work, we address the problem of maximizing fidelity in a quantum state transformation process controlled in such a way as to keep decoherence within given bounds. We consider a three-level $Λ$-type atom subjected to Markovian decoherence characterized by non-unital decoherence channels. We introduce fidelity as the performance index for the quantum state transformation process since the goal is to maximize the similarity of the final state density operator with the one of the desired target state. We formulate the quantum optimal control problem with state constraints where the later r…
We complete the task of optimal probabilistic coherence distillation protocol, whose aim is to transform a general state into a set of n-level maximally coherent states via strictly incoherent operations (SIO). Specifically, we present the necessary and sufficient condition for the transformation from a mixed state into a pure-state ensemble via SIO. With the aid of this condition and the simplex algorithm, we can accomplish the probabilistic distillation protocol by presenting an analytical expression of the maximal average distillable coherence of a general state and constructing the corresp…
Considerable work has recently been directed toward developing resource theories of quantum coherence. In most approaches, a state is said to possess quantum coherence if it is not diagonal in some specified basis. In this letter we establish a criterion of physical consistency for any resource theory in terms of physical implementation of the free operations, and we show that all currently proposed basis-dependent theories of coherence fail to satisfy this criterion. We further characterize the physically consistent resource theory of coherence and find its operational power to be quite limit…
The quark model and the parton model are known to be two different manifestations of the same covariant entity. However, the interaction amplitudes of partons are incoherent while they are coherent in the quark model. According to Feynman, this is due to the dilation of the interaction time among the quarks. We present a quantitative analysis of this time-dilation problem using Lorentz boosts as squeeze transformations.
The unitary generation of coherence from an incoherent thermal state is investigated. We consider a completely controllable Hamiltonian allowing to generate all possible unitary transformations. Optimizing the unitary control to achieve maximum coherence leads to a micro-canonical energy distribution on the diagonal energy representation. We demonstrate such a control scenario starting from a Hamiltonian utilizing optimal control theory for unitary targets. Generating coherence from an incoherent initial state always costs external work. By constraining the amount of work invested by the contr…
We derive a necessary condition for the existence of a completely-positive, linear, trace-preserving map which deterministically transforms one finite set of pure quantum states into another. This condition is also sufficient for linearly-independent initial states. We also examine the issue of quantum coherence, that is, when such operations maintain the purity of superpositions. If, in any deterministic transformation from one linearly-independent set to another, even a single, complete superposition of the initial states maintains its purity, the initial and final states are related by a un…
Coherence and correlations represent two related properties of a compound system. The system can be, for instance, the polarization of a photon, which forms part of a polarization-entangled two-photon state, or the spatial shape of a coherent beam, where each spatial mode bears different polarizations. Whereas a local unitary transformation of the system does not affect its coherence, global unitary transformations modifying both the system and its surroundings can enhance its coherence, transforming mutual correlations into coherence. The question naturally arises of what is the best measure …
We experimentally investigate problems of one-shot coherence distillation [Regula, Fang, Wang, and Adesso, Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 010401 (2018)]. Based on a set of optical devices, we design a type of strictly incoherent operation (SIO), which is applicable in high-dimensional cases and can be applied to accomplish the transformations from higher-dimensional states to lower-dimensional states. Furthermore, a relatively complete process of the one-shot coherence distillation is experimentally demonstrated for three- and four-dimensional input states. Experimental data reveal an interesting resul…
Quantum states transformation under free operations plays a central role in the resource theory of coherence. In this paper, we investigate the transformation from a mixed coherent state into a pure one by using both incoherent operations and stochastic incoherent operations. We show that contrary to the strictly incoherent operations and the stochastic strictly incoherent operations, both the incoherent operations and the stochastic incoherent operations can increase the dimension of the maximal pure coherent subspace of a state. This means that the incoherent operations are generally stronge…
Quantum coherence has received significant attention in recent years, but its study is mostly conducted in single party settings. In this paper, we generalize important results in multipartite entanglement theory to their counterparts in quantum coherence theory. First, we give a necessary and sufficient condition for when two pure multipartite states are equivalent under local quantum incoherent operations and classical communication (LICC), i.e., two states can be deterministically transformed to each other under LICC operations. Next, we investigate and give the conditions in which such a t…
In this paper, by providing a class of coherence measures in finite dimensional systems, a sufficient and necessary condition for the existence of coherence transformations that convert one probability distribution of any pure states into another one is obtained.
Quantum coherence is an essential feature of quantum mechanics which is responsible for the departure between classical and quantum world. The recently established resource theory of quantum coherence studies possible quantum technological applications of quantum coherence, and limitations which arise if one is lacking the ability to establish superpositions. An important open problem in this context is a simple characterization for incoherent operations, constituted by all possible transformations allowed within the resource theory of coherence. In this work, we contribute to such a character…
A field dependent $su(2)$ gauge transformation connects between the adiabatic and diabatic pictures in the (Landau-Zener-Stueckelberg) potential curve crossing problem. It is pointed out that weak and strong potential curve crossing interactions are interchanged under this transformation, and thus realizing a naive strong and weak duality. A reliable perturbation theory should thus be formulated in the both limits of weak and strong interactions. In fact, main characteristics of the potential crossing phenomena such as the Landau-Zener formula including its numerical coefficient are well-descr…
