Spin correlation tensor for measurement of quantum entanglement in electron–electron scattering

Abstract

We consider the problem of correct measurement of a quantum entanglement in the two-body electron–electron scattering. An expression is derived for a spin correlation tensor of a pure two-electron state. A geometric measure of a quantum entanglement as the distance between two forms of this tensor in entangled and separable cases is presented. Due to such definition, one does not need to look for the closest separable state to the analyzed state. We prove that introduced measure satisfies properties of a valid entanglement measure: nonnegativity, discriminance, normalization, non-growth under local operations and classical communication. This measure is calculated for a problem of electron–electron scattering. We prove that it does not depend on the azimuthal rotation angle of the second electron spin relative to the first electron spin before scattering. We specify how to find a spin correlation tensor and the related measure of a quantum entanglement in an experiment with electron–electron scattering. Finally, the introduced measure is extended to the mixed states.