We express the condition for a phase space Gaussian to be the Wigner distribution of a mixed quantum state in terms of the symplectic capacity of the associated Wigner ellipsoid. Our results are motivated by Hardy's formulation of the uncertainty principle for a function and its Fourier transform. As a consequence we are able to state a more general form of Hardy's theorem.
Hardy's paradox is analysed within Feynman's formulation of quantum mechanics. A transition amplitude is represented as a sum over virtual paths which different intermediate measurements convert into different sets of real pathways. Contradictory statements emerge when applying to the same statistical ensemble. The "strange" weak values result is also investigated in this context.
In Phys. Rev. A 70, 032104 (2004), M. Montesinos and G. F. Torres del Castillo consider various symplectic structures on the classical phase space of the two-dimensional isotropic harmonic oscillator. Using Dirac's quantization condition, the authors investigate how these alternative symplectic forms affect this system's quantization. They claim that these symplectic structures result in mutually inequivalent quantum theories. In fact, we show here that there exists a unitary map between the two representation spaces so that the various quantizations are equivalent.
We define an uncertainty observable, acting on several replicas of a continuous-variable bosonic state, whose trivial uncertainty lower bound induces nontrivial phase-space uncertainty relations for a single copy of the state. By exploiting the Schwinger representation of angular momenta in terms of bosonic operators, we construct such an observable that is invariant under symplectic transformations (rotation and squeezing in phase space). We first design a two-copy uncertainty observable, which is a discrete-spectrum operator vanishing with certainty if and only if it is applied on (two copie…
We discuss the relation between density matrices and the uncertainty principle; this allows us to justify and explain a recent statement by Man'ko et al. We thereafter use Hardy's uncertainty principle to prove a new result for Wigner distributions dominated by a Gaussian and we relate this result to the coarse-graining of phase-space by "quantum blobs".
We replace the usual notion of quantum cell from statistical mechanics by that of "quantum blob". A quantum blob is the transform, by a linaer symplectic transformation, of a phase space ball with radius equal to the square root of h-bar. The intersection of a quantum blob with any symplectic plane is an ellipse with area one half of h. This very special property, which is closed related to the principle of the symplectic camel, leads to a symplectic invariant statement of the uncertainty principle. We moreover prove that the average of a phase space Gaussian over a quantum blob is the Wigner …
In this paper we will establish a relation between geometric uncertainty relation and the determinant of the quantum covariance matrix for mixed quantum states. We will show that determinant of the covariance matrix represents the squared metric area of a parallelogram. In this setting the geometric uncertainty relation compares a metric area to a symplectic area. Moreover, we will in details investigate relation between J-holomorphic maps and geometric uncertainty relation for mixed quantum states. We will argue that determinant of the quantum covariance matrix is equal to the harmonic energy…
A hierarchy of multimode uncertainty relations on the second moments of n pairs of canonical operators is derived in terms of quantities invariant under linear canonical (i.e. symplectic) transformations. Conditions for the separability of multimode continuous variable states are derived from the uncertainty relations, generalizing the inequalities obtained in [Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 110402 (2006)] to states with some transposed symplectic eigenvalues equal to 1. Finally, to illustrate the methodology proposed for the detection of continuous variable entanglement, the separability of multimode n…
The notion of polarity between sets, well-known from convex geometry, is a geometric version of the Fourier transform. We exploit this analogy to propose a new simple definition of quantum indeterminacy, using what we call "hbar-polar quantum pairs", which can be viewed as pairs of position-momentum indeterminacy with minimum spread. The existence of such pairs is guaranteed by the usual uncertainty principle, but is at the same time more general. We use recent advances in symplectic topology to show that this quantum indeterminacy can be measured using a particular symplectic capacity related…
We analyze the quantum dynamics of the non-relativistic two-dimensional isotropic harmonic oscillator in Heisenberg's picture. Such a system is taken as toy model to analyze some of the various quantum theories that can be built from the application of Dirac's quantization rule to the various symplectic structures recently reported for this classical system. It is pointed out that that these quantum theories are inequivalent in the sense that the mean values for the operators (observables) associated with the same physical classical observable do not agree with each other. The inequivalence do…
We study the use of methods based on the real symplectic groups $Sp(2n,\mathcal{R})$ in the analysis of the Arthurs-Kelly model of proposed simultaneous measurements of position and momentum in quantum mechanics. Consistent with the fact that such measurements are in fact not possible, we show that the observable consequences of the Arthurs-Kelly interaction term are contained in the symplectic transformation law connecting the system plus apparatus variance matrices at an initial and a final time. The individual variance matrices are made up of averages and spreads or uncertainties for single…
Using the tomographic probability distribution (symplectic tomogram) describing the quantum state (instead of the wave function or density matrix) and properties of recently introduced tomographic entropy associated with the probability distribution, the new uncertainty relation for the tomographic entropy is obtained. Examples of the entropic uncertainty relation for squeezed states and solitons of the Bose--Einstein condensate are considered.
We define and study the notion of quantum polarity, which is a kind of geometric Fourier transform between sets of positions and sets of momenta. Extending previous work of ours, we show that the orthogonal projections of the covariance ellipsoid of a quantum state on the configuration and momentum spaces form what we call a dual quantum pair. We thereafter show that quantum polarity allows solving the Pauli reconstruction problem for Gaussian wavefunctions. The notion of quantum polarity exhibits a strong interplay between the uncertainty principle and symplectic and convex geometry and our a…
Geometrical structures of quantum mechanics provide us with new insightful results about the nature of quantum theory. In this work we consider mixed quantum states represented by finite rank density operators. We review our geometrical framework that provide the space of density operators with Riemannian and symplectic structures, and we derive a geometric uncertainty relation for observables acting on mixed quantum states. We also give an example that visualizes the geometric uncertainty relation for spin-$\frac{1}{2}$ particles.
It is shown that any two Hamiltonians H(t) and H'(t) of N dimensional quantum systems can be related by means of time-dependent canonical transformations (CT). The dynamical symmetry group of system with Hamiltonian H(t) coincides with the invariance group of H(t). Quadratic Hamiltonians can be diagonalized by means of linear time-dependent CT. The diagonalization can be explicitly carried out in the case of stationary and some nonstationary quadratic H. Linear CT can diagonalize the uncertainty matrix σ(ρ) for canonical variables p_k, q_j in any state ρ, i.e., σ(ρ) is symplectically congruent…
We study the minimum volume ellipsoid estimator associates to a cloud of points in phase space. Using as a natural measure of uncertainty the symplectic capacity of the covariance ellipsoid we find that classical uncertainties obey relations similar to those found in non-standard quantum mechanics.
We discuss two topics that are usually considered to be exclusively "quantum": the Schroedinger equation, and the uncertainty principle. We show (or rather recall) that the Schroedinger equation can be derived from Hamilton's equations using the metaplectic representation. We also show that the uncertainty principle, stated in the form of the Robertson-Schroedinger-Heisenberg inequalities can be formulated in perfectly classical terms using the topological notion of symplectic capacity.
We invite the reader (presumably an upper level undergraduate student) to a journey leading from the continent of Classical Mechanics to the new territories of Quantum Mechanics. We'll be riding the symplectic camel and have William of Occam as travel companion, so no excess baggage is allowed. The first part of our trip takes us from the symplectic egg to Gromov's non-squeezing theorem and its dynamical interpretation. The second part leads us to a symplectic formulation of the quantum uncertainty principle, which opens the way to new discoveries.
text of abstract (We present a utilitarian review of the family of matrix groups $Sp(2n,\Re)$, in a form suited to various applications both in optics and quantum mechanics. We contrast these groups and their geometry with the much more familiar Euclidean and unitary geometries. Both the properties of finite group elements and of the Lie algebra are studied, and special attention is paid to the so-called unitary metaplectic representation of $Sp(2n,\Re)$. Global decomposition theorems, interesting subgroups and their generators are described. Turning to $n$-mode quantum systems, we define and …
Symplectic Optimization on Bosonic Gaussian States
Universität Hamburg（汉堡大学）；University of Oxford（牛津大学）；The Hamburg Centre for Ultrafast Imaging（汉堡超快成像中心）；IBM Research Europe, The Hartree Centre STFC Laboratory（IBM欧洲研究院，哈特里STFC实验室）
In this paper we use symplectic reduction in an Uhlmann bundle to construct a principal fiber bundle over a general space of unitarily equivalent mixed quantum states. The bundle, which generalizes the Hopf bundle for pure states, gives in a canonical way rise to a Riemannian metric and a symplectic structure on the base space. With these we derive a geometric uncertainty relation for observables acting on quantum systems in mixed states. We also give a geometric proof of the classical Robertson-Schrödinger uncertainty relation, and we compare the two. They turn out not to be equivalent, becau…
The uncertainty relation for continuous variables due to Byalinicki-Birula and Mycielski expresses the complementarity between two $n$-uples of canonically conjugate variables $(x_1,x_2,\cdots x_n)$ and $(p_1,p_2,\cdots p_n)$ in terms of Shannon differential entropy. Here, we consider the generalization to variables that are not canonically conjugate and derive an entropic uncertainty relation expressing the balance between any two $n$-variable Gaussian projective measurements. The bound on entropies is expressed in terms of the determinant of a matrix of commutators between the measured varia…
The probability representation of quantum and classical statistical mechanics is discussed. Symplectic tomography, center-of-mass tomography, and spin tomography are studied. The connection of tomographic probabilities with dynamic symmetries like symplectic group is considered. Entropic uncertainty relations and inequalities for spin tomograms are reviewed.
We discuss a quantum counterpart, in the sense of the Berezin-Toeplitz quantization, of certain constraints on Poisson brackets coming from "hard" symplectic geometry. It turns out that they can be interpreted in terms of the quantum noise of observables and their joint measurements in operational quantum mechanics. Our findings include various geometric mechanisms of quantum noise production and a noise-localization uncertainty relation. The methods involve Floer theory and Poisson bracket invariants originated in function theory on symplectic manifolds.
A more general measurement disturbance uncertainty principle is presented in a Robertson-Schrödinger formulation. It is shown that it is stronger and having nicer properties than Ozawa's uncertainty relations. In particular is invariant under symplectic transformations. One shows also that there are states of the probe (measuring device) that saturate the matrix formulation of measurement disturbance uncertainty principle.
We present a general framework and procedure to derive uncertainty relations for observables of quantum systems in a covariant manner. All such relations are consequences of the positive semidefiniteness of the density matrix of a general quantum state. Particular emphasis is given to the action of unitary symmetry operations of the system on the chosen observables, and the covariance of the uncertainty relations under these operations. The general method is applied to the case of an $n$-mode system to recover the $Sp(2n,\,R)$-covariant multi mode generalization of the single mode Schrödinger-…
In this work we derive a matrix formulation of a noise-disturbance uncertainty relation, which is akin to the Robertson-Schrödinger uncertainty principle. Our inequality is stronger than Ozawa's uncertainty principle and takes noise-disturbance correlations into account. Moreover, we show that, for certain types of measurement interactions, it is covariant with respect to linear symplectic transformations of the noise and disturbance operators.
The theory of geometric quantum mechanics describes a quantum system as a Hamiltonian dynamical system with a complex projective Hilbert space as its phase space, thus equipped with a Riemannian metric in addition to a symplectic structure. This paper extends the geometric quantum theory to include aspects of the symplectic topology of the state space by identifying the Robertson-Schrödinger uncertainty relation for pure quantum states as the differential version of the energy identity in the theory of $J$-holomorphic curves. We consider a family of maps from a Riemann surface into a finite-di…
We apply the notion of polar duality from convex geometry to the study of quantum covariance ellipsoids in symplectic phase space. We consider in particular the case of "quantum blobs" introduced in previous work; quantum blobs are the smallest symplectic invariant regions of the phase space compatible with the uncertainty principle in its strong Robertson--Schrödinger form. We show that these phase space units can be characterized by a simple condition of reflexivity using polar duality, thus improving previous results. We apply these geometric constructions to the characterization of pure Ga…
A positive definite symmetric matrix σ qualifies as a quantum mechanical covariance matrix if and only if σ+(1/2)i\hbarΩ\geq0 where Ω is the standard symplectic matrix. This well-known condition is a strong version of the uncertainty principle, which can be reinterpreted in terms of the topological notion of symplectic capacity, closely related to Gromov's non-squeezing theorem. We show that a recent refinement of the latter leads to a new class of geometric invariants. These are the volumes of the orthogonal projections of the covariance ellipsoid on symplectic subspaces of the phase space. W…
We study the classical and semiclassical time evolutions of subsystems of a Hamiltonian system; this is done using a generalization of Heller's thawed Gaussian approximation introduced by Littlejohn. The key tool in our study is an extension of Gromov's "principle of the symplectic camel" obtained in collaboration with N. Dias and J. Prata. This extension says that the orthogonal projection of a symplectic phase space ball on a phase space with a smaller dimension also contains a symplectic ball with the same radius. In the quantum case, the radii of these symplectic balls are taken equal to s…
The Weyl correspondence and the related Wigner formalism lie at the core of traditional quantum mechanics. We discuss here an alternative quantization scheme, whose idea goes back to Born and Jordan, and which has recently been revived in another context, namely time-frequency analysis. We show that in particular the uncertainty principle does not enjoy full symplectic covariance properties in the Born and Jordan scheme, as opposed to what happens in the Weyl quantization.
We investigate properties of the covariance matrix in the framework of non-commutative quantum mechanics for an one-parameter family of transformations between the familiar Heisenberg-Weyl algebra and a particular extension of it. Employing as a measure of the Robertson-Schrödinger uncertainty principle the linear symplectic capacity of the Weyl ellipsoid (and its dual), we determine its corresponding bounds. Inequalities between the capacities for non-commutative phase-spaces are established. We also present a constructive example based on a simple model to justify our theoretical predictions…
New inequalities for symplectic tomograms of quantum states and their connection with entropic uncertainty relations are discussed within the framework of the probability representation of quantum mechanics.
In the usual approaches to mechanics (classical or quantum) the primary object of interest is the Hamiltonian, from which one tries to deduce the solutions of the equations of motion (Hamilton or Schrödinger). In the present work we reverse this paradigm and view the motions themselves as being the primary objects. This is made possible by studying arbitrary phase space motions, not of points, but of (small) ellipsoids with the requirement that the symplectic capacity of these ellipsoids is preserved. This allows us to guide and control these motions as we like. In the classical case these ell…
A review of the tomographic-probability representation of classical and quantum states is presented. The tomographic entropies and entropic uncertainty relations are discussed in connection with ambiguities in the interpretation of the state tomograms which are considered either as a set of the probability distributions of random variables depending on extra parameters or as a single joint probability distribution of these random variables and random parameters with specific properties of the marginals. Examples of optical tomograms of photon states, symplectic tomograms, and unitary spin tomo…
Starting from the famous Pauli problem on the possibility to associate quantum states with probabilities, the formulation of quantum mechanics in which quantum states are described by fair probability distributions (tomograms, i.e. tomographic probabilities) is reviewed in a pedagogical style. The relation between the quantum state description and the classical state description is elucidated. The difference of those sets of tomograms is described by inequalities equivalent to a complete set of uncertainty relations for the quantum domain and to nonnegativity of probability density on phase sp…
Let ρ the density matrix of a mixed Gaussian state. Assuming that one of the Robertson--Schrödinger uncertainty inequalities is saturated by ρ, e.g. (Δ^{ρ}X_1)^2(Δ^{ρ}P_1)^2=Δ^{ρ}(X_1,P_1)^2+(1/4)\hbar^2, we show that there exists a unique pure Gaussian state whose Wigner distribution is dominated by that of ρ and having the same variances and covariance Δ^{ρ}X_1,Δ^{ρ}P_1, and Δ^{ρ}(X_1,P_1) as ρ. This property can be viewed as an analytic version of Gromov's non-squeezing theorem in the linear case, which implies that the intersection of a symplectic ball by a single plane of conjugate coordi…
We define the Wigner entropy of a quantum state as the differential Shannon entropy of the Wigner function of the state. This quantity is properly defined only for states that possess a positive Wigner function, which we name Wigner-positive states, but we argue that it is a proper measure of quantum uncertainty in phase space. It is invariant under symplectic transformations (displacements, rotations, and squeezing) and we conjecture that it is lower bounded by $\lnπ+1$ within the convex set of Wigner-positive states. It reaches this lower bound for Gaussian pure states, which are natural min…
We propose a refinement of the Robertson-Schrodinger uncertainty principle (RSUP) using Wigner distributions. This new principle is stronger than the RSUP. In particular, and unlike the RSUP, which can be saturated by many phase space functions, the refined RSUP can be saturated by pure Gaussian Wigner functions only. Moreover, the new principle is technically as simple as the standard RSUP. In addition, it makes a direct connection with modern harmonic analysis, since it involves the Wigner transform and its symplectic Fourier transform, which is the radar ambiguity function. As a by-product …
In this work we present (and encourage the use of) the Williamson theorem and its consequences in several contexts in physics. We demonstrate this theorem using only basic concepts of linear algebra and symplectic matrices. As an immediate application in the context of small oscillations, we show that applying this theorem reveals the normal-mode coordinates and frequencies of the system in the Hamiltonian scenario. A modest introduction of the symplectic formalism in quantum mechanics is presented, useing the theorem to study quantum normal modes and canonical distributions of thermodynamical…
Quantum blobs are the smallest phase space units of phase space compatible with the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics and having the symplectic group as group of symmetries. Quantum blobs are in a bijective correspondence with the squeezed coherent states from standard quantum mechanics, of which they are a phase space picture. This allows us to propose a substitute for phase space in quantum mechanics. We study the relationship between quantum blobs with a certain class of level sets defined by Fermi for the purpose of representing geometrically quantum states.
