Nonseparable States Research Articles

Experimental demonstration of elastic analogues of nonseparable qutrits

The creation of multilevel quantum states, qudits, has revolutionized concepts for quantum computing. Classical systems that capture behavior analogous to quantum systems have been demonstrated. In this spirit, we consider a three-level classical analogue of the qudit composed of coupled acoustic waveguides. Here, we demonstrate both the experimental realization of a three-level classical analogue of the qudit and the creation and tuning of nonseparable superpositions of two of these analogues, which are classically “entangled.” Measurements of velocities and transmission inform our assignment of these nonseparable states.

Turbulence aberration correction for vector vortex beams using deep neural networks on experimental data.

The vector vortex beams (VVB) possessing non-separable states of light, in which polarization and orbital angular momentum (OAM) are coupled, have attracted more and more attentions in science and technology, due to the unique nature of the light field. However, atmospheric transmission distortion is a recurring challenge hampering the practical application, such as communication and imaging. In this work, we built a deep learning based adaptive optics system to compensate the turbulence aberrations of the vector vortex mode in terms of phase distribution and mode purity. A turbulence aberration correction convolutional neural network (TACCNN) model, which can learn the mapping relationship of intensity profile of the distorted vector vortex modes and the turbulence phase generated by first 20 Zernike modes, is well designed. After supervised learning plentiful experimental samples, the TACCNN model compensates turbulence aberration for VVB quickly and accurately. For the first time, experimental results show that through correction, the mode purity of the distorted VVB improves from 19% to 70% under the turbulence strength of D/r0 = 5.28 with correction time 100 ms. Furthermore, both spatial modes and the light intensity distribution can be well compensated in different atmospheric turbulence.

Exponentially Complex "Classically Entangled" States in Arrays of One-Dimensional Nonlinear Elastic Waveguides.

We demonstrate theoretically, using multiple-time-scale perturbation theory, the existence of nonseparable superpositions of elastic waves in an externally driven elastic system composed of three one-dimensional elastic wave guides coupled via nonlinear forces. The nonseparable states span a Hilbert space with exponential complexity. The amplitudes appearing in the nonseparable superposition of elastic states are complex quantities dependent on the frequency of the external driver. By tuning these complex amplitudes, we can navigate the state’s Hilbert space. This nonlinear elastic system is analogous to a two-partite two-level quantum system.

The sound of Bell states

Nonseparable states, analogous to “entangled” states, have generated great scientific interest since the very beginning of quantum mechanics. To date, however, the concept of “classical nonseparability” has only been applied to nonseparable states of different degrees-of-freedom in laser beams. Here, we experimentally demonstrate the preparation and tunability of acoustic nonseparable states, i.e. Bell states, supported by coupled elastic waveguides. A Bell state is constructed as a superposition of elastic waves, each a tensor product of a spinor part and an orbital angular momentum (OAM) part, which cannot be factored as a single tensor product. We also find that the amplitude coefficients of the nonseparable superposition of states must be complex. By tuning these complex amplitudes, we are able to experimentally navigate a sizeable portion of the Bell state’s Hilbert space. The current experimental findings open the door to the extension of classical nonseparability to the emerging field of phononics.

Classical simulation of high-dimensional entanglement by non-separable angular-radial modes.

An analogous model system for high-dimensional quantum entanglement is proposed, based on the angular and radial degrees of freedom of the improved Laguerre Gaussian mode. Experimentally, we observed strong violations of the Bell-CGLMP inequality for maximally non-separable states of dimension 2 through 10. The results for violations in classical non-separable state are in very good agreement with quantum instance, which illustrates that our scheme can be a useful platform to simulate high-dimensional non-local entanglement. Additionally, we found that the Bell measurements provide sufficient criteria for identifying mode separability in a high-dimensional space. Similar to the two-dimensional spin-orbit non-separable state, the proposed high-dimensional angular-radial non-separable state may provide promising applications for classical and quantum information processing.

Relations among k-ME concurrence, negativity, polynomial invariants, and tangle

The $k$-ME concurrence as a measure of multipartite entanglement (ME) unambiguously detects all $k$-nonseparable states in arbitrary dimensions, and satisfies many important properties of an entanglement measure. Negativity is a simple computable bipartite entanglement measure. Invariant and tangle are useful tools to study the properties of the quantum states. In this paper we mainly investigate the internal relations among the $k$-ME concurrence, negativity, polynomial invariants, and tangle. Strong links between $k$-ME concurrence and negativity as well as between $k$-ME concurrence and polynomial invariants are derived. We obtain the quantitative relation between $k$-ME ($k$=$n$) concurrence and negativity for all $n$-qubit states, give a exact value of the $n$-ME concurrence for the mixture of $n$-qubit GHZ states and white noise, and derive an connection between $k$-ME concurrence and tangle for $n$-qubit W state. Moreover, we find that for any $3$-qubit pure state the $k$-ME concurrence ($k$=2, 3) is related to negativity, tangle and polynomial invariants, while for $4$-qubit states the relations between $k$-ME concurrence (for $k$=2, 4) and negativity, and between $k$-ME concurrence and polynomial invariants also exist. Our work provides clear quantitative connections between $k$-ME concurrence and negativity, and between $k$-ME concurrence and polynomial invariants.

Measuring the orbital angular momentum spectrum with a single point detector.

It is tough work to measure the orbital angular momentum (OAM) spectrum due to the requirement of a reference light or photodetector arrays, while measuring the spin angular momentum (SAM) is readily convenient and matured. In this work, the so-called OAM-SAM nonseparable states are employed, and the OAM spectrum can be obtained only by measuring the Stokes parameters of an arbitrary light beam with low loss noncascading structure and a single point detector. According to the experimental results, the fidelity of the measured OAM spectrum can be as high as 95.2% and 94.3% for OAM eigenstates and superposed states, respectively.

Decoherence-assisted detection of entanglement of two qubit states

We show that the decoherence, which in the long run destroys quantum features of a system, can be used to reveal the entanglement in a two-qubit system. To this end, we consider a criterion that formally resembles the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality. In our case the local observables are set by the coupling of each qubit to the environmental noise, controlled with the dynamical decoupling method. We demonstrate that the constructed inequality is an entanglement criterion---it can only be violated by non-separable initial two-qubit states, provided that the local noises are correlated. We also show that for a given initial state, this entanglement criterion can be repurposed as a method of discriminating between Gaussian and non-Gaussian noise generated by the environment of the qubits. The latter application is important for ongoing research on using qubits to characterize the dynamics of environment that perturbs them and causes their decoherence

Roton entanglement in quenched dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates

We study quasi-two-dimensional dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates, in which the Bogoliubov excitation spectrum displays, at sufficiently large gas density, a deep roton minimum due to the spatially anisotropic behavior of the dipolar two-body potential. A rapid quench, performed on the speed of sound of excitations propagating on the condensate background, leads to the dynamical Casimir effect, which can be characterized by measuring the density-density correlation function. It is shown, for both zero and finite initial temperatures, that the continuous-variable bipartite quantum state of the created quasiparticle pairs with opposite momenta, resulting from the quench, displays an enhanced potential for the presence of entanglement (represented by nonseparable and steerable quasiparticle states), when compared to a gas with solely repulsive contact interactions. Steerable quasiparticle pairs contain momenta from close to the roton, and hence quantum correlations significantly increase in the presence of a deep roton minimum.

Elastic waves with correlated directional and orbital angular momentum degrees of freedom

We introduce a formalism that enables the calculation of elastic wave functions supported by parallel arrays of coupled one-dimensional elastic waveguides. These wave functions are expressed as tensor products of a spinor part associated with directional degrees of freedom and an orbital angular momentum (OAM) part associated with the phase of the coupled waveguides. We demonstrate that one can construct wave functions as a superposition of these elastic waves, which cannot be written as a tensor product of a spinor part and an OAM part. These elastic wave functions are not separable in the tensor product Hilbert space of directional and OAM subspaces. We show that we can construct maximally nonseparable states that are similar to Bell states.

Spin-orbit beams for optical chirality measurement

Accurate measurement of chirality is essential for the advancement of natural and pharmaceutical sciences. We report here a method to measure chirality using non-separable states of light with geometric phase-gradient in the circular polarization basis, which we refer to as spin-orbit beams. A modified polarization Sagnac interferometer is used to generate spin-orbit beams wherein the spin and orbital angular momentum of the input Gaussian beam are coupled. The out-of-phase interference between counter-propagating Gaussian beams with orthogonal spin states and lateral-shear or/and linear-phase difference between them results in spin-orbit beams with linear and azimuthal phase gradient. The spin-orbit beams interact efficiently with the chiral medium, inducing a measurable change in the center-of-mass of the beam, using the polarization rotation angle and hence the chirality of the medium are accurately calculated. Tunable dynamic range of measurement and flexibility to introduce large values of orbital angular momentum for the spin-orbit beam, to improve the measurement sensitivity, highlight the techniques' versatility.

A deterministic detector for vector vortex states

Encoding information in high-dimensional degrees of freedom of photons has led to new avenues in various quantum protocols such as communication and information processing. Yet to fully benefit from the increase in dimension requires a deterministic detection system, e.g., to reduce dimension dependent photon loss in quantum key distribution. Recently, there has been a growing interest in using vector vortex modes, spatial modes of light with entangled degrees of freedom, as a basis for encoding information. However, there is at present no method to detect these non-separable states in a deterministic manner, negating the benefit of the larger state space. Here we present a method to deterministically detect single photon states in a four dimensional space spanned by vector vortex modes with entangled polarisation and orbital angular momentum degrees of freedom. We demonstrate our detection system with vector vortex modes from the |{boldsymbol{ell }}| = 1 and |{boldsymbol{ell }}| = 10 subspaces using classical and weak coherent states and find excellent detection fidelities for both pure and superposition vector states. This work opens the possibility to increase the dimensionality of the state-space used for encoding information while maintaining deterministic detection and will be invaluable for long distance classical and quantum communication.

Direct transfer of classical non-separable states into hybrid entangled two photon states

Hybrid entangled states, having entanglement between different degrees-of-freedom (DoF) of a particle pair, are of great interest for quantum information science and communication protocols. Among different DoFs, the hybrid entangled states encoded with polarization and orbital angular momentum (OAM) allow the generation of qubit-qudit entangled states, macroscopic entanglement with very high quanta of OAM and improvement in angular resolution in remote sensing. Till date, such hybrid entangled states are generated by using a high-fidelity polarization entangled states and subsequent imprinting of chosen amount of OAM using suitable mode converters such as spatial light modulator in complicated experimental schemes. Given that the entangled sources have feeble number of photons, loss of photons during imprinting of OAM using diffractive optical elements limits the use of such hybrid states for practical applications. Here we report, on a simple generic experimental scheme to generate hybrid entangled states in polarization and OAM through direct transfer of classical non-separable states of the pump beam in parametric down conversion process. As a proof of principle, using local non-separable pump states of OAM mode l = 3, we have produced quantum hybrid entangled states with entanglement witness parameter of ~1.25 ± 0.03 violating by 8 standard deviation.

Non-separable states in a bipartite elastic system

We consider two one-dimensional harmonic chains coupled along their length via linear springs. Casting the elastic wave equation for this system in a Dirac-like form reveals a directional representation. The elastic band structure, in a spectral representation, is constituted of two branches corresponding to symmetric and antisymmetric modes. In the directional representation, the antisymmetric states of the elastic waves possess a plane wave orbital part and a 4x1 spinor part. Two of the components of the spinor part of the wave function relate to the amplitude of the forward component of waves propagating in both chains. The other two components relate to the amplitude of the backward component of waves. The 4x1 spinorial state of the two coupled chains is supported by the tensor product Hilbert space of two identical subsystems composed of a non-interacting chain with linear springs coupled to a rigid substrate. The 4x1 spinor of the coupled system is shown to be in general not separable into the tensor product of the two 2x1 spinors of the uncoupled subsystems in the directional representation.

Characterizing quantum channels with non-separable states of classical light

High-dimensional entanglement with spatial modes of light promises increased security and information capacity over quantum channels. Unfortunately, entanglement decays due to perturbations, corrupting quantum links that cannot be repaired without performing quantum tomography on the channel. Paradoxically, the channel tomography itself is not possible without a working link. Here we overcome this problem with a robust approach to characterize quantum channels by means of classical light. Using free-space communication in a turbulent atmosphere as an example, we show that the state evolution of classically entangled degrees of freedom is equivalent to that of quantum entangled photons, thus providing new physical insights into the notion of classical entanglement. The analysis of quantum channels by means of classical light in real time unravels stochastic dynamics in terms of pure state trajectories, and thus enables precise quantum error correction in short- and long-haul optical communication, in both free space and fibre. Classical light is as good as quantum light to characterize a quantum channel. This unexpected result has practical consequences that make an experimentalist’s life easier in some situations.

Lower bounds of concurrence for N-qubit systems and the detection of k-nonseparability of multipartite quantum systems

Concurrence, as one of entanglement measures, is a useful tool to characterize quantum entanglement in various quantum systems. However, the computation of the concurrence involves difficult optimizations and only for the case of two qubits an exact formula was found. We investigate the concurrence of four-qubit quantum states and derive analytical lower bound of concurrence using the multiqubit monogamy inequality. It is shown that this lower bound is able to improve the existing bounds. This approach can be generalized to arbitrary qubit systems. We present an exact formula of concurrence for some mixed quantum states. For even-qubit states, we derive an improved lower bound of concurrence using a monogamy equality for qubit systems. At the same time, we show that a multipartite state is $k$-nonseparable if the multipartite concurrence is larger than a constant related to the value of $k$, the qudit number and the dimension of the subsystems. Our results can be applied to detect the multipartite $k$-nonseparable states.

Pancharatnam phase in non-separable states of light

We generate the non-separable state of polarization and orbital angular momentum using a laser beam. The generated state undergoes a cyclic polarization evolution which introduces a Pancharatnam geometric phase to the polarization state and, in turn, a relative phase in the non-separable state. We experimentally study the violation of the Bell-like inequality for different Pancharatnam phases introduced by various cyclic polarization evolutions with linear and circular states as measurement bases. While measuring in linear bases, the Bell-CHSH parameter oscillates with a Pancharatnam phase. One can overcome this dependence by introducing a relative phase in one of the projecting states. However, for measurements in circular bases, the Pancharatnam phase does not affect the Bell-like inequality violation.

Entanglement in algebraic quantum mechanics: Majorana fermion systems

Many-body entanglement is studied within the algebraic approach to quantum physics in systems made of Majorana fermions. In this framework, the notion of separability stems from partitions of the algebra of observables and properties of the associated correlation functions, rather than on particle tensor products. This allows a complete characterization of non-separable Majorana fermion states to be obtained. These results may have direct application in quantum metrology: using Majorana systems, sub-shot-noise accuracy in parameter estimations can be achieved without preliminary resource-consuming, state entanglement operations.

Scattering of non-separable states of light

We experimentally show that the non-separability of polarization and orbital angular momentum present in a light beam remains preserved under scattering through a random medium like rotating ground glass. We verify this by measuring the degree of polarization and observing the intensity distribution of the beam when projected to different polarization states, before as well as after the scattering. We extend our study to the non-maximally non-separable states also.

Detectingk-nonseparability via quantum Fisher information

The $k$-nonseparability is a kind of multipartite quantum correlation which can be used to characterize some aspects of multipartite entanglement. In this paper, we discuss the detection of $k$-nonseparability of $n$-partite quantum states from an information perspective and obtain some $k$-nonseparability criteria in terms of quantum Fisher information. These criteria can identify many $k$-nonseparable states, and their advantages over an important and well-known $k$-nonseparability criterion [M. Huber et al., Phys. Rev. A 88, 042328 (2013)] are illustrated by several typical examples.