The Shannon's bound for compression is one of the key restrictions for the compression of quantum information. Here we show that the unitarity of the compression operation imposes new bounds on the compression that are more limiting than Shannon's compression bound. This translates to a no-go theorem for the purification of quantum states. For a specific case of a two-qubit system, our results indicate that it is not possible to distill purity beyond the maximum of the individual purities. We show that this restriction results in the cooling limit of the heat-bath algorithmic cooling techniques. We formalize the limitations imposed by the unitarity of the compression operation in two theorems and use the theorems to show that the limitations of unitarity lead to the cooling limit of heat-bath algorithmic cooling. To this end, we introduce a new optimal cooling technique and show that without the limitations of the unitary operations, the new cooling technique would have exceeded the limit of Heat-bath algorithmic cooling. This work opens up new avenues to understanding the limits of dynamic cooling.
We show that the fidelity result of advantage distillation (Bennett et al, Phys. Rev. Lett., 76, 722(1996)) is not only for the product state of raw pairs, it is actually correct with whatever form of state of raw pairs. We then give a general theorem for unconditional entanglement purification. This theorem lists the conditions on which the fidelity result of a purification protocol keeps unchanged from product form of raw-pair state and arbitrary form of raw-pair state. Using this theorem, we find that all existing purification puricfication can work for arbitrary initial state of raw pairs.
The manipulation of quantum coherence is one of the principal issues in the resource theory of coherence, with two critical topics being the purification and enhancement of coherence. Here, we present two no-go theorems for the deterministic purification of coherence and the probabilistic enhancement of coherence, respectively. Specifically, we prove that a quantum state cannot be deterministically purified if it can be expressed as a convex combination of an incoherent state and a coherent state. Besides, we give an easy-to-verified sufficient and necessary condition to determine whether a st…
It has been recently shown that there exist universal fundamental limits to the accuracy and efficiency of the transformation from noisy resource states to pure ones (e.g.,~distillation) in any well-behaved quantum resource theory [Fang/Liu, Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 060405 (2020)]. Here, we develop a novel and powerful method for analyzing the limitations on quantum resource purification, which not only leads to improved bounds that rule out exact purification for a broader range of noisy states and are tight in certain cases, but also enable us to establish a robust no-purification theory for qu…
The manipulation of quantum "resources" such as entanglement, coherence and magic states lies at the heart of quantum science and technology, empowering potential advantages over classical methods. In practice, a particularly important kind of manipulation is to "purify" the quantum resources, since they are inevitably contaminated by noise and thus often lose their power or become unreliable for direct usage. Here we prove fundamental limitations on how effectively generic noisy resources can be purified enforced by the laws of quantum mechanics, which universally apply to any reasonable kind…
A general formlulation for discrete-time quantum mechanics, based on Feynman's method in ordinary quantum mechanics, is presented. It is shown that the ambiguities present in ordinary quantum mechanics (due to noncommutativity of the operators), are no longer present here. Then the criteria for the unitarity of the evolution operator is examined. It is shown that the unitarity of the evolution operator puts restrictions on the form of the action, and also implies the existence of a solution for the classical initial-value problem.
Forward-Assisted Purification: A Spatiotemporal Framework Beyond Conventional Limits
School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Glasgow（格拉斯哥大学物理与天文学学院）；School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh（爱丁堡大学信息学院）；Institute of High Performance Computing (IHPC), Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR)（新加坡科技研究局高性能计算研究所）
Preparing a quantum system in a pure state is ultimately limited by the nature of the system's evolution in the presence of its environment and by the initial state of the environment itself. We show that, when the system and environment are initially uncorrelated and arbitrary joint unitary dynamics is allowed, the system may be purified up to a certain (possibly arbitrarily small) threshold if and only if its environment, either natural or engineered, contains a "virtual subsystem" which has the same dimension and is in a state with the desired purity. Beside providing a unified understandin…
Quantum control is an essential tool for the operation of quantum technologies such as quantum computers, simulators, and sensors. Although there are sophisticated theoretical tools for developing quantum control protocols, formulating optimal protocols while incorporating experimental conditions remains a challenge. In this paper, motivated by recent advances in realization of real-time feedback control in circuit quantum electrodynamics systems, we study the effect of experimental imperfections on the optimality of qubit purification protocols. Specifically, we find that the optimal control …
To date, there has been no experimental evidence that invalidates quantum theory. Yet it may only be an effective description of the world, in the same way that classical physics is an effective description of the quantum world. We ask whether there exists an operationally-defined theory superseding quantum theory, but which reduces to it via a decoherence-like mechanism. We prove that no such post-quantum theory exists if it is demanded that it satisfy two natural physical principles: causality and purification. Causality formalises the statement that information propagates from present to fu…
Distilling Qubit Unitary Operations: A No-Go Theorem and Minimal Realization
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）
Tsinghua University（清华大学）；Freie Universität Berlin（柏林自由大学）；Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie（柏林亥姆霍兹材料与能源中心）；University of Oxford（牛津大学）
When a measurement is made on a quantum system in which classical information is encoded, the measurement reduces the observers average Shannon entropy for the encoding ensemble. This reduction, being the {\em mutual information}, is always non-negative. For efficient measurements the state is also purified; that is, on average, the observers von Neumann entropy for the state of the system is also reduced by a non-negative amount. Here we point out that by re-writing a bound derived by Hall [Phys. Rev. A {\bf 55}, 100 (1997)], which is dual to the Holevo bound, one finds that for efficient mea…
Unitarity of the global evolution is an extremely stringent condition on finite state models in discrete spacetime. Quantum cellular automata, in particular, are tightly constrained. In previous work we proved a simple No-go Theorem which precludes nontrivial homogeneous evolution for linear quantum cellular automata. Here we carefully define general quantum cellular automata in order to investigate the possibility that there be nontrivial homogeneous unitary evolution when the local rule is nonlinear. Since the unitary global transition amplitudes are constructed from the product of local tra…
Linearity and unitarity are two fundamental tenets of quantum theory. Any consequence that follows from these must be respected in the quantum world. The no-cloning theorem and the no-deleting theorem are the consequences of the linearity and the unitarity. Together with the stronger no-cloning theorem they provide permanence to quantum information, thus, suggesting that in the quantum world information can neither be created nor be destroyed. In this sense quantum information is robust, but at the same time it is also fragile because any interaction with the environment may lead to loss of in…
We formulate scattering in one dimension due to the coupled Schrödinger equation in terms of the $S$ matrix, the unitarity of which leads to constraints on the scattering amplitudes. Levinson's theorem is seen to have the form $η(0) = π(n_b + 1/2 n - 1/2 N)$, where $η(0)$ is the phase of the $S$ matrix at zero energy, $n_b$ the number of bound states with nonzero binding energy, $n$ the number of half-bound states, and $N$ the number of coupled equations. In view of the effects due to the half-bound states, the threshold behaviour of the scattering amplitudes is investigated in general, and is…
