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# Construction of extremal local positive operator-valued measures under symmetry

## I Introduction

The nature of local and global quantum operations plays a key role in Quantum Information theory . However, although global quantum operations are well characterised , there is still no convenient mathematical classification of the so called LOCC transformations (operations that can be implemented locally with classical communication). In recent years some progress has been made by trying to understand the non-local properties of unitaries and by trying to implement operations with a minimum amount of prior entanglement . Nevertheless, a more general answer remains elusive, and so alternative classes of operations have been defined that can be more easily characterised. Perhaps the most interesting examples are the Separable and PPT operations introduced by Rains . These classes of operations (see section II for definitions) are mathematically more tractable than the LOCC class, and have been particularly useful as tools for investigating the entanglement of distillation and local state discrimination . They have also been used to extend the conventional definitions of entanglement measures , giving indications that quantum state transformations can adopt a simplified structure under the class of PPT operations .

The separable and PPT operations will also play an important role in this work, where we investigate the local implementation of quantum measurements. This question is significant as in many protocols for quantum communication it is important to know how a distantly separated Alice and Bob may be able to gain information about quantum states using only local operations and classical communication. Examples include entanglement distillation and cryptographic scenarios . The issue of local measurements is also important for efforts to locally infer some form of entanglement, such as in developing tests of non-locality, or the local detection of inseparability . However, there is perhaps a much more fundamental reason for the investigation of local measurements: in all uses of quantum states, all we ever ‘see’ at the end of the day are measurement outcomes, so one of the most important things to know is what kinds of statistics are possible according to the classes of operations that we are restricted to. As the LOCC operations are an important paradigm in quantum information, it is important to know what kinds of measurement outcomes we can obtain with them.

Most of the discussion of local measurements in recent years has been directed particularly towards local state discrimination . However, in this work we pay more attention to the actual implementation of measurements locally. We will be inspired by initial steps in this direction taken by , where both the concepts of PPT-operations and symmetry were used to design a certain type of cryptographic scheme for Werner states of dimensions $`2^n\times 2^n`$ (work that was extended to the multiparty setting in ). Unlike those investigations, however, we will not be directly interested in any particular application or cost functions, as our main aim will be to obtain techniques for deciding the local implementability of measurements, with particular regard to finding extreme points. Some of the methods are quite general, and have implications for finding extremal POVMs under constraints other than local implementability.

This paper is structured as follows. In section II we discuss the connection between the entanglement of POVM elements and implementability via the different classes of operations introduced by Rains . In sections III and IV we use these ideas to derive the entire (convex) set of local measurements that satisfy Isotropic and Werner symmetries, also giving the extreme points. These particular symmetries are amenable to an elegant form of solution that is not possible for more complicated symmetry groups, where we will require stronger methods. So in section V we discuss general techniques for deriving the extrema of POVMs under a quite general class of constraint that includes the constraints of separability and PPT-ness. In section VI we apply these techniques to Bell and $`OO`$  symmetries, deriving the sets of locally implementable measurements and their extreme points. The Bell symmetries are particularly interesting, as we show that the best way to locally discriminate Bell diagonal states is just to perform a 2-outcome POVM using local von Neumann projections. This is true regardless of the cost function, the number of states being discriminated, or the prior probabilities. Finally in section VII we summarise and discuss the implications of our results.

## II Entanglement classification of POVM elements and relationship to classes of operations

We begin by investigating the relationship between the entanglement properties of POVM elements and the resources required to implement the POVM. The key result of this section will be the demonstration that the separability (PPT-ness) of the POVM elements is equivalent to the implementability of the corresponding POVM by separable (PPT) operations.

Let us begin by reviewing the concepts of PPT and Separable operations. The set of PPT operations $`P`$ is the set of completely positive (CP) transformations that remain completely positive when conjugated with the partial transposition operator $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, i.e. both $`P`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }P\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ are completely positive. It is irrelevant whether the partial transposition is taken as transposition of Bob’s or Alice’s system, as long as the choice is fixed. The set of Separable operations is the class of operations $`S`$ that can be written as:

$$S(\rho )=\underset{n}{}A_nB_n\rho A_n^{}B_n^{}.$$
(1)
It is not too difficult to verify  that all LOCC operations are separable, and all separable operations are PPT. An example of a CP operation that is not PPT is the creation of an NPT state from a PPT one . The PPT and Separable operations can also be characterised in an interesting way in the light of the Jamiolkowsky isomorphism .

This classification of operations has allowed interesting bounds to be derived in the distillation and creation of entangled states , and is also useful for the study of local quantum state discrimination . In the following, we will be interested particularly in the question of when a measurement procedure can be implemented by LOCC. We will not be concerned with the residual states left over after any measurement process, so a POVM will be considered to be ‘locally implementable’ if we can perform a measurement using only local operations and classical communication that allows exactly the same statistical inferences to be made. It is important to note the differences between our use of the word ‘local’ and that of Beckman et. al.  and Groisman et. al. . Those authors are motivated by the implications of quantum operations and observations for causality, and hence they do allow the use of prior entanglement but disallow the use of classical communication.

In our context the classification introduced by  has a particularly elegant structure, as the PPT and separable definitions of operations directly map to the definitions of PPT and separable states . A given POVM described by a set of elements $`\{M_k|k=1..N,M_k0,M_k=𝟙\}`$ can be implemented by a PPT operation iff all the elements (after normalisation) correspond to PPT states, and can be implemented by a separable operation iff all the elements correspond to separable states:

can do POVM by Separable ops $``$ elements separable (2)
can do POVM by PPT ops $``$ elements PPT (3)
The fact that all measurements implemented by separable operations must involve separable POVM elements was noted in . The fact that a measurement can be implemented by a PPT operation iff the POVM elements are PPT was noted by . As far as we are aware, however, the fact that all POVMs with separable elements can be implemented by a separable operation has not been noted anywhere despite its relatively simple proof. For completeness we therefore present the following proof of correspondence (2):

Observation 1. A given POVM can be implemented by a separable superoperator iff the POVM elements associated with all $`N`$ outcomes $`\{M_k|k=1..N,M_k0,M_k=𝟙\}`$ correspond to separable states, i.e. the POVM can be implemented by a separable superoperator iff the density matrices defined by $`M_k/\text{tr}\{M_k\}`$ are separable.

Proof. Any POVM can be realised as a superoperator where the subscripts $`n`$ on the Kraus operators have been recorded classically. Any separable operation will correspond to POVM elements where the subscripts $`n`$ will be grouped into sets $`S_k`$ corresponding to the different inferences $`k`$. Hence the expectation values of any POVM element $`M_k`$ can be written:

$`\text{tr}\{M_k\rho \}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{nS_k}{}}\text{tr}\{A_nB_n\rho A_n^{}B_n^{}\}`$ (4)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{nS_k}{}}\text{tr}\{A_n^{}A_nB_n^{}B_n\rho \}.`$ (5)
Hence we can write that:

$$M_k=\underset{nS_k}{}A_n^{}A_nB_n^{}B_n$$
(6)
As this sum is completely in terms of positive operators, we have that $`\text{tr}\{M_k\}=_n\text{tr}\{A_n^{}A_n\}\text{tr}\{B_n^{}B_n\}`$. This means that we can also write:

$`\rho _k`$ $`:=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{M_k}{\text{tr}\{M_k\}}}`$ (7)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{nS_k}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{\text{tr}\{A_n^{}A_n\}\text{tr}\{B_n^{}B_n\}}{\text{tr}\{M_k\}}}{\displaystyle \frac{A_n^{}A_n}{\text{tr}\{A_n^{}A_n\}}}{\displaystyle \frac{B_n^{}B_n}{\text{tr}\{B_n^{}B_n\}}}.`$ (8)
Hence we see that each POVM element from a separable operation must correspond to a separable state. To see the converse, simply work backwards through the above procedure, using the fact that any positive operator $`X`$ has a decomposition $`X=Q^{}Q`$. The generalisation to multi-party systems is straightforward $`\mathrm{}`$.

Observation 1 is extremely powerful, and can be used to provide simple derivations of many results. For example we can immediately see that an entangled pure state cannot be perfectly locally discriminated from its orthogonal complement, as this would require a POVM with non-separable elements (see also ). A similar argument also shows that we cannot perfectly locally distinguish an Unextendible Product Basis (UPB)  from an equal mixture of the pure states in its orthogonal complement, adding to the other intriguing discrimination properties of such bases .

Is it possible that all separable discrimination protocols can be implemented locally? Unfortunately this is definitely not the case, as has been observed from the example of non-locality without entanglement presented in  (see also ). The authors of that paper present sets of orthogonal separable states that cannot be discriminated perfectly using only local operations. If all separable POVMs could be implemented locally then those sets of orthogonal states could be discriminated perfectly using only local operations. As this is not the case, this means that not all separable operations can be implemented locally.

Nevertheless, the constraint that any local POVMs must be separable is still quite a strong one, and in some simple cases of high symmetry we will see that it is exactly equivalent to the local implementability of POVMs. The results thereby allow the construction of optimal local discrimination protocols for any number of states of such symmetries under any cost function for any prior probabilities. The ideas may also have other applications in cryptographic schemes, demonstrations of non-locality, and the local detection of entanglement. We will begin by considering the Isotropic symmetries.

## III Local observations with Isotropic Symmetries

In this section we begin by analysing the so called Isotropic symmetries. The class of measurements invariant under this group is actually a subset of the $`OO`$ symmetric measurements that we will consider later in the paper. However, we consider the Isotropic and Werner cases independently in this section and the next, as they afford a particularly elegant form of solution and demonstrate the usefulness of the partial transposition mapping between Isotropic and Werner states.

The Isotropic states are those that commute with all local unitaries of the form $`UU^{}`$, where the  denotes complex conjugation in a fixed local basis. Any isotropic state $`\sigma (f)`$ on $`C^dC^d`$ can be written as:

$$\sigma (f)=f|++|+(1f)\frac{𝟙|++|}{𝕕^\mathrm{𝟚}\mathrm{𝟙}},$$
(9)
where $`f[0,1]`$, and $`|+`$ is a canonical maximally entangled state $`|+=|ii/\sqrt{d}`$. In the local observation of such states we can use standard symmetry arguments to restrict our attention to POVMs with elements of the form:

$`M_k=a_k|++|+b_k(𝟙|++|).`$ (10)
As we require these elements to form a valid POVM, they must satisfy the constraints:

$`a_k`$ $``$ $`0`$ (11)
$`b_k`$ $``$ $`0`$ (12)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}a_k`$ $`=`$ $`1`$ (13)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}b_k`$ $`=`$ $`1.`$ (14)
It is well known that isotropic states are separable iff they are PPT (see e.g. ), and so it is easy to compute the additional constraint that each $`M_k`$ must be separable from $`M_k^\mathrm{\Gamma }0`$:

$$(d+1)b_ka_k.$$
(15)
We will now see that there is a local protocol that can be used to attain any Isotropic POVM satisfying equations (14) and (15). The protocol consists of two steps:

* Alice and Bob perform an isotropic twirl , $`T(\rho )`$. This step is superfluous if the states to be observed are isotropic anyway. It is only included to make the total measurement exactly equal to the POVM satisfying (14) and (15).
* Then Alice and Bob perform a measurement with elements $`N_k`$ described by:

$$N_k=\underset{i=1}{\overset{d}{}}|ii|[x_k|ii|+y_k(𝟙_𝔹|𝕚𝕚|)]$$
(16)
with

$`x_k`$ $`=`$ $`a_k`$ (17)
$`y_k`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(d+1)b_ka_k}{d}},`$ (18)

where $`|i`$ is a pure state from the computational bases of Alice $`\&`$ Bob, and $`𝟙_𝔹`$ refers to the identity on Bob’s space.

The probability that Alice and Bob will find outcome $`k`$ from the above procedure given an input state $`\rho `$ is given by:

$$\text{tr}\{N_kT(\rho )\}=\text{tr}\{T(N_k)\rho \}.$$
(19)
It is not difficult to verify that $`M_k=`$T($`N_k`$) for all $`k`$, and so our two step protocol gives exactly the same statistics for each $`k`$ as the original measurement. Moreover, examination of the form of the $`N_k`$ shows that they correspond to a local measurement involving only one way communication, as long as the condition (15) holds (otherwise the $`N_k`$ will not be positive). Therefore any POVM consisting of PPT Isotropic elements can be attained locally. The transformation above also gives a direct derivation of the extreme points of this class of POVMs. The mapping from the PPT ($`a_k,b_k`$) to the ($`x_k,y_k`$) is linear and invertible. The $`x_k`$ and $`y_k`$ form two independent probability distributions, and so the extreme points will just correspond to situations when the $`x_k,y_k`$ take on values of $`\{0,1\}`$. This observation allows relatively straightforward optimisation of local discrimination of isotropic states under essentially all cost functions.

It is also worthwhile noting that there are many other possible local protocols that can match the PPT isotropic POVMs. This is because the above protocol essentially makes full use of the maximally entangled component of the isotropic states to leave Bob in a residual mixture of some pure state with the identity, which can then be used to discriminate between the original isotropic states. Indeed, any measurement that Alice can perform on a maximally entangled state that would leave Bob with a known pure state can be used to construct a similar protocol. One example is teleportation. Suppose Alice and Bob first teleport a known pure state $`|\psi `$ using whichever of the isotropic states that they share. Then if Bob performs a POVM defined by elements $`x_k|\psi \psi |+y_k(𝟙_𝔹|\psi \psi |)`$ then they will also achieve the same POVMs as the $`N_k`$ defined above.

## IV Local observations with Werner Symmetries

Having calculated the set of locally implementable isotropic POVMs, let us see why we can almost immediately write down the set of locally implementable Werner POVMs . The Werner states are those that commute with all local unitaries of the form $`UU`$. Any Werner symmetric POVM can be written with elements of the form:

$`M_k=a_kP_A+b_kP_S,`$ (20)
where $`P_A`$ and $`P_S`$ are the so called antisymmetric and symmetric projectors respectively .

The argument here follows from the partial transposition mapping between Isotropic and Werner operators that was discussed in . The authors of that paper point out that if a certain class of operators is invariant under a given group of local unitary operations $`U(\gamma )V(\gamma )`$, then the partial transpositions of those operators will be invariant under the ‘partially conjugated’ group $`U(\gamma )V^{}(\gamma )`$ (modulo a problem of phases, see ). This means that if we have a set of PPT POVM elements that is invariant under one local symmetry group,

$$\{M_k|M_k=𝟙,𝕄_𝕜\mathrm{𝟘},𝕄_𝕜^\mathbb{\Gamma }\mathrm{𝟘}\}$$
(21)
then the partial transposition of these elements will form another POVM that is a PPT POVM invariant under the partially conjugated group, and vice versa. Indeed the extremal PPT measurements under one group of local unitaries are in one-to-one correspondence with extremal PPT measurements under the ‘partially conjugated’ group:

Theorem 2. If $`\{M_k\}`$ forms an extremal PPT POVM for one local symmetry group, then the partial transposition $`\{M_k^\mathrm{\Gamma }\}`$ forms an extremal PPT POVM for the partially conjugated symmetry group.

Proof. If a POVM $`\{M_k|k=1\mathrm{}n\}`$ is PPT and not extremal, then it is possible to write:

$$\{M_k|k=1\mathrm{}n\}=\{pM_k^1+(1p)M_k^2|k=1\mathrm{}n\}$$
(22)
for some probability $`p`$, where $`\{M_k^1|k=1\mathrm{}n\}`$ and $`\{M_k^2|k=1\mathrm{}n\}`$ are also PPT POVMs. Therefore the partial transposition of this equation is also true:

$$\{(M_k)^\mathrm{\Gamma }|k=1\mathrm{}n\}=\{p(M_k^1)^\mathrm{\Gamma }+(1p)(M_k^2)^\mathrm{\Gamma }|k=1\mathrm{}n\},$$
(23)
where $`\{(M_k^1)^\mathrm{\Gamma }|k=1\mathrm{}n\}`$ and $`\{(M_k^2)^\mathrm{\Gamma }|k=1\mathrm{}n\}`$ are also PPT POVMs. So the partial tranposition of a PPT POVM is extremal iff the PPT POVM itself is extremal $`\mathrm{}`$.

This convenient partial transposition connection is precisely the relationship between PPT POVMs of Werner symmetry and PPT POVMs of Isotropic symmetries. Hence all implications discussed above for the local discrimination of isotropic states also immediately apply to local discrimination of Werner states. In particular, the partial transposition of the local protocols given for Isotropic symmetries above will allow us to obtain any PPT POVM with Werner symmetries. To be explicit, let us denote a Werner-symmetric POVM by elements:

$$M_k=a_kP_A+b_kP_S.$$
(24)
The condition that the POVM be PPT forces us to impose the requirement that:

$$b_k\left(\frac{d+1}{d1}\right)a_k$$
(25)
in addition to the other positivity and completeness constraints. Any such POVM can be attained by the partial transposition of a PPT isotropic measurement, and so can be attained by the ‘partial transposition’ of the local measurement used to attain that particular isotropic POVM, i.e.:

* First Alice and Bob perform a Werner twirl , $`T(\rho )`$. Again, this step is superfluous if the states to be observed are Werner anyway.
* Then Alice and Bob perform a measurement with elements $`N_k`$ described by:

$$N_k=\underset{i=1}{\overset{d}{}}|ii|[x_k|ii|+y_k(𝟙_𝔹|𝕚𝕚|)]$$
(26)
with

$`x_k`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(1d)a_k+(d+1)b_k}{2}}`$ (27)
$`y_k`$ $`=`$ $`a_k.`$ (28)

It can readily be verified that the protocol matches any PPT Werner POVM.

In the other symmetry groups that we will consider in this paper, no elegant and simple solution along the lines of the one found for the Isotropic/ Werner states can work. The reasons for this will be discussed in more detail in the section on $`OO`$ symmetries and in the appendix. Consequently, for other symmetry groups we have to adopt a different approach. Here we choose to construct the extremal points of the (convex) set of PPT POVMs for the groups that we consider, and then try to find local protocols that match these extrema. We then need to invoke a theorem of convex analysis which states that any convex compact set is the (closed) convex hull of its extreme points , and hence if we can show that the extremal points of the PPT measurements can be obtained locally, then by convexity so can the whole set (for a finite number of outcomes the set of PPT POVMS is clearly compact). In the cases that we consider here our search for local protocols will always be successful. In fact, the most difficult exercise is usually the construction of the extremal points. The task is made tractable by some general techniques that we will discuss next.

## V General Techniques and Notation

In this section we will explain the major tools that we will use throughout the rest of the paper. Sometimes we will describe these techniques in quite general language, as there may be applications to other problems.

The first technique, that we will also use later in this subsection, is a quite common method for determining constraints on the extrema of convex sets. Suppose that we have a convex set $`A`$, and we are trying to decide whether a candidate element $`s`$ of the set is extremal. When we write the phrase ‘by the following perturbation’, this will mean that we consider the following common approach to deciding extremality. We can consider perturbations of $`s`$ by a small amount $`\delta `$. We then try to decompose the candidate extremum $`s`$ in the following way:

$`s`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}s(+)+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}s()`$ (29)
$`s(+)`$ $`=`$ $`s+\delta `$ (30)
$`s()`$ $`=`$ $`s\delta .`$ (31)
In order that $`s`$ be extremal, we will require that at least one of $`s(+)`$ and $`s()`$ be outside the set $`A`$. In our specific application, we will usually choose $`\delta `$ such that the separability and completeness of the POVM is maintained, and so we will have to infer that either $`s(+)`$ or $`s()`$ be non-positive, and this will allow us to derive strong constriants of the form of the extrema. So when we write ‘by the perturbation $`\delta `$ we can see that the extremal points must be of the form…’ we are in fact referring to the inferences that can be made by the above process.

Now let us consider how we can use some of the structure of sets of separable POVMs in order to simplify the hunt for extremal points. The most important feature that we will rely on is the fact that the properties of positivity, separability and PPT-ness are closed under linear combinations with non-negative scalars. Some of the methods that we will employ can be used to extremise POVMs for any other constraints that have this property, and not only PPT-ness or separability. In light of this we will find it convenient to make the following general definition:

Definition 3. A constraint on two operators $`M_1,M_2`$ will be called homogeneous if whenever $`M_1`$ and $`M_2`$ satisfy the constraint then so does $`\alpha M_1+\beta M_2`$, for all non-negative scalars $`\alpha ,\beta `$. Hence both Separability and PPT-ness are homogeneous constraints. We will sometimes use the symbol H to denote any set of homogeneous constraints under consideration, not necessarily only PPT-ness or separability.

Definition 4. A POVM $`\{M_k|k=1\mathrm{}n,M_k0,M_k=𝟙\}`$ satisfying any extra homogeneous contraints H under consideration will be called a feasible measurement.

The set of feasible POVMs is clearly a convex set itself, in that if $`\{M_k^1|k=1\mathrm{}.n\}`$ and $`\{M_k^2|k=1\mathrm{}.n\}`$ are feasible POVMs, then so is $`\{pM_k^1+(1p)M_k^2|k=1\mathrm{}.n\}`$ where $`p[0,1]`$. Hence we can ask questions about what the extremal POVMs are, and how to find them. One particularly important result in this direction is the following:

Theorem 5. In any extremal feasible POVM, the non-zero operator elements must be linearly independent.

Proof. The proof can be adapted straightforwardly from a proof of this statement for global POVMs by Lo Presti $`\&`$ D’Ariano , and indeed their proof is essentially true for any constraints that are closed under multiplication by non-negative scalars $`\mathrm{}`$.

This theorem will be particularly useful as it will allow us to restrict the number of non-zero outcomes that we need to consider. It also provides another reason why in the case of Isotropic/Werner symmetries the extremal PPT POVMs have essentially two non-zero outcomes, simply because under these symmetries there are at most two non-zero linearly independent POVM elements.

The consideration of homogeneous constraints  will allow us to use a technique that involves what we call ‘basic vectors’. This should not be confused with the term ‘basic solution’ that is often used in linear programming problems. In the rest of this section we will explain exactly what we mean by a ‘basic vector’. Let us suppose that we can find a class of elements $`\{V(\alpha )\}`$ where $`\alpha `$ represents one or more parameters (discrete or continuous) with the following properties:

* Each element from $`\{V(\alpha )\}`$ is non-negative.
* Each element from $`\{V(\alpha )\}`$ satisfies the homogeneous constraints H under consideration.
* All POVM elements $`M_k`$ satisfy the homogeneous constraints under consideration iff they can be written in the following way:

$$M_k=\underset{i}{}p_i^kV(\alpha _i)$$
(32)
where the $`p_i^k`$ are non-negative real numbers.

Then the set $`\{V(\alpha )\}`$ will be referred to as a set of basic vectors. The coefficient $`p_i^k`$ will be referred to as the weight of the basic vector $`V(\alpha _i)`$ in $`M_k`$. Of course this decomposition, and hence the weights, need not be unique. Such sets of basic vectors can be very useful tools for deriving the set of extreme points, and in subsequent sections we will prove a few lemmas that will demonstrate their power. The source of this power is the fact that in the ‘basic vector’ approach, each feasible POVM element is automatically decomposed into a sum (with non-negative weights) of operators that automatically satisfy the homogeneous constraints that we are considering. So we are free to try to perturb any non-zero weights by small amounts without violation of our constraints. This allows us to derive strong limitations on which weights can be non-zero in an extremal measurement. In particular the following two Lemmas prove to be useful:

Lemma 6. In an extremal feasible POVM, no basic vector can have non-zero weight in more than one element $`M_k`$ of the POVM.

Proof. This can be proved along similar lines to the proof of the following lemma $`\mathrm{}`$.

Lemma 7. If a feasible POVM is extremal, then any set of linearly dependent basic vectors must have non-zero weights in at most one element $`M_k`$.

Proof. Suppose that we have a set of basic vectors $`\{V_m|m=1\mathrm{}L\}`$ such that:

$$\underset{m}{}\lambda _mV_m=0$$
(33)
for some set of non-zero $`\lambda _m`$’s. We can take the Hermitian conjugate of this equation and average it with the original to give:

$$\underset{m}{}\frac{1}{2}\lambda _mV_m+\frac{1}{2}\lambda _m^{}V_m=\underset{m}{}\text{Re}\{\lambda _m\}V_m=0.$$
(34)
Hence the $`\lambda _m`$s can be taken to be real without loss of generality (this is unless all the original $`\lambda _m`$ are purely imaginary, but in that case we can just divide the equation through by $`\sqrt{1}`$). Suppose that the basic vector $`V_L`$ has non-zero weight in element $`M_2`$, whereas the other basic vectors of the set have non-zero weight in $`M_1`$. Then we have that:

$$\underset{mL}{}\frac{\lambda _m}{\lambda _L}V_m=V_L$$
(35)
We define two new POVMs $`s(\pm )`$ with exactly the same elements and basic weights as the original POVM except for the following changes:

$$p_{mL}^1(\pm )=p_m^1\pm \delta \frac{\lambda _m}{\lambda _L};p_L^2(\pm )=p_L^2\pm \delta $$
(36)
The two new POVMs average to give the original, are complete by construction, and if the $`\delta `$ is chosen small enough, will not violate any of the homogeneous constraints or positivity. The same argument can easily be extended to the case where more than one of the vectors from the set is placed in $`M_2`$. Therefore we require that any set of linearly dependent basic vectors contains non-zero weights in at most one fixed element of an extremal POVM $`\mathrm{}`$.

The exact utility of the basic vectors approach will become clearer in the examples that we tackle later, where we will explicitly construct sets of basic vectors. Unfortunately it is not always easy to do this construction. Nevertheless, there is one approach based upon construction of two outcome extremal POVMs that can allow us to draw some interesting general conclusions. Let us consider the set of feasible two outcome POVMs:

$$\{M,𝟙𝕄\}.$$
(37)
Each such measurement is characterised by just one element $`M`$, as the other is fixed by completeness. Suppose then that we can somehow find the extreme points of this set, and they are given by the set $`\{M(\alpha )\}`$, where $`\alpha `$ represents some parameters (discrete or continuous) that label the extrema. Then it is clear that $`\{M(\alpha )\}`$ will form a set of basic vectors for feasible POVMs with any number of outcomes. This is because any particular element $`M_i`$ of an $`N`$-outcome POVM can be viewed as a member of a two outcome POVM $`M_i,𝟙𝕄_𝕚`$, where the remaining elements have been grouped together as one outcome, and so any element of a feasible measurement can always be written as a convex combination of the $`\{M(\alpha )\}`$. This feature will be particularly useful to us in the construction of the separable $`OO`$ symmetric extrema, as in that case we will be able to construct the two outcome extrema more easily.

There are also more general conclusions that can be made from this observation. Suppose that each two-outcome feasible POVM element can be constrained to live on a $`K`$-dimensional vector space. If the elements are $`m\times m`$ Hermitian operators, then there is a natural upper bound to $`K`$ of $`m^2`$, although this can be reduced in cases of symmetry. Then by Lemma 7 above, we know that each linearly dependent set of basic vectors can contribute non-zero weights to at most one POVM element. As any $`K+1`$ elements drawn from $`\{M(\alpha )\}`$ are linearly dependent, we must conclude that in any $`K`$ non-zero outcome extremal feasible measurement, each element must be proportional to one and only one distinct member of $`\{M(\alpha )\}`$. Hence we have that:

Lemma 8. In any feasible extremal measurement of $`K`$ non-zero outcomes, each POVM element must be proportional to an element of a 2-outcome extremal feasible POVM.

This result is interesting as it shows how information from 2-outcome optimisations may be used to draw conclusions about problems with higher numbers of outcomes. Note that the possible constants of proportionality will be uniquely fixed by completeness, as each of the $`K`$ 2-outcome extrema contributing to the POVM are linearly independent. It is important to note that there cannot be any extremal feasible measurements with more than $`K`$ non-zero outcomes anyway by the linear independence requirement.

We are now in a position to apply these tools to the cases of symmetry that we will consider in the rest of the paper.

## VI Bell and $`OO`$ symmetric measurements

In the previous section we have discussed a number of useful results that we can use calculate the extreme points of separable POVMs. Here we will now use these techniques and notations to derive the set of local measurements of Bell and $`OO`$ symmetries, and to characterise the extreme points.

The symmetry groups considered here are all taken from the examples discussed in . They have the convenient property that the invariant POVMs have elements that can be written as a decomposition into a finite number $`n`$ of orthogonal projectors $`A,B,C\mathrm{}`$:

$$M_i=a_iA+b_iB+c_iC\mathrm{}\mathrm{}$$
(38)
(i.e. the commutant  of the group is abelian). Therefore each POVM element can be represented by a vector of coefficients $`(a_i,b_i,c_i,\mathrm{})^T`$. As at most $`n`$ vectors with $`n`$ components can be linearly independent, this means that we will be able to write the most general extremal PPT POVM for the symmetry group under consideration as an $`n\times n`$ matrix, where each column $`j`$ contains the column vector $`(a_j,b_j,c_j,\mathrm{})^T`$ corresponding to the POVM element $`M_j`$.

Another key feature of the symmetries that we consider is that checking the positivity of the partial transposition of a particular POVM element is relatively simple, as the partial transposition of each invariant POVM element can always be written in the following way:

$$M_i^\mathrm{\Gamma }=a_i^{}A^{}+b_i^{}B^{}+c_i^{}C^{}\mathrm{}\mathrm{}$$
(39)
where the $`(a_i^{},b_i^{},c_i^{}\mathrm{}.)`$ form a vector of real coefficients and the $`(A^{},B^{},C^{}\mathrm{})`$ are a set of mutually orthogonal projectors. Note that this is not always the case, in that there can be local symmetry groups with an abelian commutant whose partial tranposition is no longer abelian. Nevertheless, there are many interesting symmetries that have this property, including those of Bell diagonal states that we consider next.

### A Local observation with Bell symmetries

In this section we will derive the extreme points of the set of Bell Diagonal PPT POVMs, and then see that they can be attained locally. We are forced to adopt this route, as no direct and simple solution in the manner of the Isotropic/ Werner case is possible for the Bell group. A more detailed explanation for this will be given in the appendix.

First we will explain our notation. The Bell basis is defined as the orthonormal set of two qubit pure states:

$`|\mathrm{\Phi }^\pm `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}(|00\pm |11)`$ (40)
$`|\mathrm{\Psi }^\pm `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}(|01\pm |10),`$ (41)
and it constitutes a set of projectors that is invariant under the symmetry group $`\{\sigma _x\sigma _x,\sigma _y\sigma _y,\sigma _z\sigma _z,𝟙𝟙\}`$ discussed in . Consequently, any POVM element invariant under the same group can be written as:

$`M_i`$ $`=`$ $`a_i|\mathrm{\Psi }^+\mathrm{\Psi }^+|+b_i|\mathrm{\Psi }^{}\mathrm{\Psi }^{}|`$ (42)
$`+`$ $`c_i|\mathrm{\Phi }^+\mathrm{\Phi }^+|+d_i|\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\mathrm{\Phi }^{}|.`$ (43)
As we require linear independence between the non-zero POVM elements, we can restrict our attention to candidate extremal measurements represented by a $`4\times 4`$ matrix, where each column $`i,i=1\mathrm{}4`$ has elements given by $`\{a_i,b_i,c_i,d_i\}^T`$, the quadruple representing the POVM element $`M_i`$:

$$s=\left(\begin{array}{cccc}a_1& a_2& a_3& a_4\\ b_1& b_2& b_3& b_4\\ c_1& c_2& c_3& c_4\\ d_1& d_2& d_3& d_4\end{array}\right).$$
(44)
In each column all elements must be non-negative, and each row must sum to 1 for completeness.

Definition 9. A largest element in a given column will be referred to as the a maximal element of the column. In many cases the maximal element of a column will not be unique, in which case we are free to choose among the possibilities.

The condition that each column corresponds to a PPT measurement is that a maximal element of a column must be less than or equal to the sum of the other three elements of the same column.

Definition 10. We will refer to a column as being tight if it has a maximal element equal to the sum of the remaining matrix elements in its column.

Lemma 11. In an extremal Bell POVM with a finite integer $`N`$ of non-zero outcomes, at least $`N1`$ columns must be tight.

Proof. Suppose that we consider two columns, say without loss of generality the first two. Suppose that there are two rows such that both columns contain non-zero matrix elements. Suppose w.l.o.g. these two rows are the top two rows. Then we can perturb the POVM as follows with a small positive $`\delta `$:

$$s(\pm )=s\pm \left(\begin{array}{cccc}+\delta & \delta & 0& 0\\ +\delta & \delta & 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(45)
If $`\delta `$ is small enough, this perturbation maintains positivity and completeness. Therefore PPT-ness must be violated. Computing the partial transpose of $`M_i`$ in eq. 43 the positivity of $`M_i^\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is equivalent to

$`a_i+b_i`$ $``$ $`|c_id_i|`$ (46)
$`c_i+d_i`$ $``$ $`|a_ib_i|.`$ (47)
If PPT-ness should be violated by arbitrarily small perturbations $`\delta `$ this implies that at least one of these conditions has to be an equality. Together with the positivity of the $`a_i,b_i,c_i`$ and $`d_i`$, this implies the tightness of at least one column.

Alternatively, it could be the case that there are no two rows in which both columns contain non-zero matrix elements. This can only be the case if one of the columns contains only two non-zero matrix elements. In that case both non-zero matrix elements of the column in question must be maximal in order for it to be PPT, and so that column must be tight.

We can take any two columns in this argument, and so at least $`N1`$ of the non-zero columns must be tight $`\mathrm{}`$.

Lemma 12. Any tight column $`j`$ can itself be written in the following way:

$$\underset{i}{}p_i^jP_i\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)+q^j\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right),$$
(48)
where the summation runs over all permutation matrices $`P_i`$ and the coefficients $`\{p_i^j,q^j\}`$ form a probability distribution.

Proof. Let the sum of the matrix elements in the column be $`2\sigma _j`$. Then as the column is tight, we must have that its maximal element is equal to $`\sigma _j`$. Therefore the column is majorised  by the column vector:

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}\sigma _j\\ \sigma _j\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right).$$
(49)
It is a well known result that if a column vector $`\stackrel{}{g}`$ majorises a column vector $`\stackrel{}{h}`$ then $`\stackrel{}{h}`$ can be written as a convex combination of permutations of $`\stackrel{}{g}`$ . Hence we can write that:

$$\sigma _j\underset{i}{}x_i^jP_i\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)+(1\sigma _j)\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right),$$
(50)
where the $`\{x_i^j\}`$ form a probability distribution. As no maximal element can be greater than 1 (from completeness), the $`\sigma _j,1\sigma _j`$ also form a probability distribution, and so by setting $`p_i^j=\sigma _jx_i^j`$ and $`q^j=\sigma _j`$ we have a decomposition of the column as stated in the lemma. Note that the decomposition need not be unique.

Lemma 13. All columns $`j`$ in a Bell PPT POVM can be expressed as

$$\underset{i}{}p_i^jP_i\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)+q^j\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)+r^j\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)$$
(51)
where the $`\{p_i^j,q^j,r^j\}_i`$ form a probability distribution.

Proof. Let us for now just consider extremal measurements of two non-zero outcomes. One of the two non-zero columns of any such measurement must be tight, let this w.l.o.g. be column 1. Then from completeness and Lemma 12 we can expand column 2 as:

$`\left(\begin{array}{c}a_2\\ b_2\\ c_2\\ d_2\end{array}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)\left[{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}p_i^1P_i\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)+q^1\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)\right]`$ (68)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}p_i^1P_i\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)+q^1\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)`$ (77)
$`:=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}p_i^2P_i\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)+r^2\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right),`$ (86)
where as before $`\{p_i^2,r^2\}`$ also forms a probability distribution. Hence the theorem holds for all 2 non-zero outcome extremal PPT Bell measurements, and by convexity holds for the non-extremal ones as well. But then any column from an $`N`$ outcome PPT measurement can be viewed as a member of a two outcome measurement where the remaining columns have been summed. Therefore the result is true for any column in any Bell PPT POVM. $`\mathrm{}`$.

A consequence of this lemma is that the set of column vectors of the form:

$$P_i\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)\text{or}\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)$$
(87)
forms a set of basic vectors for the Bell Diagonal PPT POVMs. For a column $`j`$, the probability $`p_i^j`$ or $`r^j`$ will hence be taken as the weights of the correponding basic vector. We will refer to as $`(1,1,1,1)^T`$ as the identity basic vector as it corresponds to the identity POVM.

Lemma 14. There are no 4 non-zero outcome extremal Bell POVMs.

Proof. In a 4 non-zero outcome extremal POVM, each non-zero column must have weight from only one basic vector distinct from the basic vectors contributing to the other columns. Otherwise the linear independence condition in Lemma 7 will be violated (as any five 4-component column vectors must be linearly dependent).

If one column contains weight from the identity, then the POVM cannot be extremal, as it can be expressed as the convex sum of the identity and a renormalised POVM that consists of only the remainder from the original.

For four outcomes where no column contains weight from the identity, a little thought shows that the only possibility that can maintain completeness is a POVM given by a row and/or column permutations of the following:

$$\left(\begin{array}{cccc}w& 0& 0& z\\ w& x& 0& 0\\ 0& x& y& 0\\ 0& 0& y& z\end{array}\right),$$
(88)
However, this measurement cannot be extremal as the columns are linearly dependent To see this, note that we can obtain the zero vector by (a) multiplying each column by a non-zero factor such that each non-zero matrix element has the same value, and then (b) subtracting the 2nd and 4th columns from the sum of the 1st and 3rd. Therefore, there are no four non-zero outcome extremal PPT Bell POVMs.

Lemma 15. There are no 3 non-zero outcome extremal Bell POVMs.

Proof. As with the proof for four non-zero outcomes, there can be no column with weight from the identity. Therefore we require that each column can be decomposed into convex sums of basic vectors other than the identity, such that no more than four basic vectors are involved in total. Therefore two columns must be directly proportional to a basic vector, as each basic vector can have non-zero weight in at most one column. Let these two columns be 1 and 2 w.l.o.g.. There are essentially only two possibilities upto row and column permutations - the first two columns have a common row in which they both have non-zero matrix elements, or they have no such common row. The third column is fixed by completeness. Therefore up to row and column permutations we have:

$$\left(\begin{array}{cccc}x& 0& 1x& 0\\ x& y& 1xy& 0\\ 0& y& 1y& 0\\ 0& 0& 1& 0\end{array}\right)\text{or}\left(\begin{array}{cccc}x& 0& 1x& 0\\ x& 0& 1x& 0\\ 0& y& 1y& 0\\ 0& y& 1y& 0\end{array}\right),$$
(89)
but these POVMs cannot be extremal unless they have one further zero column. For the first matrix we can see this from the following. Consider the perturbation

$$\pm \delta \left(\begin{array}{cccc}+1& 0& 1& 0\\ +1& 1& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& +1& 0\\ 0& 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(90)
Unless either $`x`$ or $`y`$ are zero, this perturbation maintains completeness, positivity and PPT-ness. Hence the first matrix cannot be extremal. For the second matrix we can consider the following perturbation:

$$\pm \delta \left(\begin{array}{cccc}+1& 0& 1& 0\\ +1& 0& 1& 0\\ 0& 1& +1& 0\\ 0& 1& +1& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(91)
This perturbation implies that to be extremal either $`x`$ or $`y`$ are zero, or that the third column is tight. We cannot have three non-zero columns if $`x`$ or $`y`$ are zero, so let us deal with the possibility that the third column is tight. The third column can only be tight if one of $`x`$ or $`y`$ is 1. Suppose w.l.o.g. that $`x=0`$, then the second and third columns become proportional, and so it cannot be extremal. Hence neither of the possibilities in (89) can be extremal $`\mathrm{}`$.

Therefore there the only extremal POVMs of Bell diagonal form are those of at most two non-zero outcomes.

Theorem 16. The extremal points of the PPT Bell diagonal POVMs can be obtained by local protocols. The extremal points are given by the possible row and column permutations of the following POVMs:

$$\left(\begin{array}{cccc}1& 0& 0& 0\\ 1& 0& 0& 0\\ 1& 0& 0& 0\\ 1& 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right);\left(\begin{array}{cccc}1& 0& 0& 0\\ 1& 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& 0& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(92)
Proof. The fact that these are the only extremal points can be proven using similar arguments to the ones above. They are also locally attainable, as the the first matrix corresponds to the ‘do nothing’ measurement, and the other POVMs correspond to POVMs of the form:

$$M=\sigma _k\sigma _l[|0000|+|1111|]\sigma _k^{}\sigma _l^{};𝟙𝕄$$
(93)
where the $`\sigma _i`$ are drawn from the four Pauli matrices. These POVMs are trivially locally attainable. They simply correspond to measurements in a product basis, and can be achieved using one way communication $`\mathrm{}`$.

Despite some prior results showing that the four orthogonal Bell states cannot be perfectly discriminated locally , this result is interesting as it shows that there can be a huge difference between locally and globally obtainable information under all figures of merit, even when we are only dealing with two qubits. Indeed, as the extremal local measurements involve only 2 non-zero outcomes, there can be at most 1 classical bit of information obtained by local measurements of Bell diagonal states. However, in the global case there can be 4 orthogonal Bell diagonal states that can be perfectly discriminated, thereby allowing a full 2 classical bits of information to be obtained globally. It might be tempting to propose a bit hiding scheme on the basis of this observation. However, the scheme would be susceptible to cheating with a prior shared singlet state (as then Alice could teleport her particle to Bob), and hence the technology required to break the scheme is equivalent to that required to implement it.

### B Local Observations with $`OO`$ Symmetries

In the notation of , the OO group is the set of unitaries of the form $`OO`$, where $`O`$ is an orthogonal transformation (i.e. $`OO^T=I_{A/B}`$) in some fixed local bases. Any POVM element invariant under this group can be written in the form:

$`a[|++|]+b\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(𝟙𝔽)}{\mathrm{𝟚}}}\right]+c[{\displaystyle \frac{(𝟙+𝔽)}{\mathrm{𝟚}}}|++|],`$ (94)
where $`F=|ijji|`$ is the swap operator, $`a,b,c`$ are real coefficients, and the three terms in square brackets are mutually orthogonal projections. Hence a full measurement obeying the $`OO`$ symmetry with $`N`$ outcomes is characterised completely by the triples $`(a_k,b_k,c_k)`$, corresponding to each of the POVM elements indexed by $`k=1,\mathrm{},N`$. One could try to look for local protocols to match these triples in a similar spirit to the solution presented for the Isotropic case. To be specific, it might be hoped that a linear invertible transformation could be found taking the $`(a_k,b_k,c_k)`$ to new triples $`(x_k,y_k,z_k)`$, such that the $`(x_k,y_k,z_k)`$ are the positive coefficients of some local protocol iff the original $`(a_k,b_k,c_k)`$ correspond to a PPT POVM. However, we can show that no such naive transformation exists for the $`OO`$ symmetries (see appendix 1 for details). Consequently, in the following we will instead restrict our attention to the extreme points of the convex set of $`OO`$ symmetric PPT POVMs. We will present local protocols that attain these extreme points, and thereby argue that all $`OO`$ symmetric PPT POVMS can be attained locally. First we need to show how to construct these extreme points.

#### 1 Extreme points of the $`OO`$ symmetric POVMs

First let us discuss the partial transposition of $`OO`$ symmetric operators. Partial transposition takes $`M`$ to an operator of the same form, with new coefficients given by:

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}a^{}\\ b^{}\\ c^{}\end{array}\right)=R\left(\begin{array}{c}a\\ b\\ c\end{array}\right).$$
(95)
where

$$R=\frac{1}{2d}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}2& d(1d)& (d+2)(d1)\\ 2& d& (d+2)\\ 2& d& (d2)\end{array}\right).$$
(96)
In order to satisfy the constraints of being a PPT POVM, all the triples $`(a_k,b_k,c_k)`$ corresponding to each element $`M_k`$ must satisfy:

$`a_k,b_k,c_k0\text{ (positivity)}`$ (97)
$`a_k^{},b_k^{},c_k^{}0\text{ (PPT-ness)}`$ (98)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}a_k={\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}b_k={\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}c_k=1\text{ (normalisation)}.`$ (99)
We would like to construct a set of basic vectors for the $`OO`$ symmetries. One way to do this is to first construct the set of 2-outcome PPT extrema under these symmetries. In such situations given one element $`M`$ the other is fixed as $`𝟙𝕄`$ by completeness. We hence require:

$`𝟙𝕄\mathrm{𝟘}`$ (100)
$`𝟙𝕄^\mathbb{\Gamma }\mathrm{𝟘}.`$ (101)
Denoting the only free element by a column vector of its triple $`M=(a,b,c)^T`$, the constraints will result in a polyhedron in $`R^3`$, for which the extreme points are the vertices (see figure 1).

It is trivial but tedious to calculate these vertices. They are given by the following POVM elements:

$`A1:\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 0\end{array}\right)A2:\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)`$ (108)
$`B1:\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 0\\ 2d/[d+2][d1]\end{array}\right)`$ (112)
$`B2:\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1\\ (d+1)(d2)/[d+2][d1]\end{array}\right)`$ (116)
$`C1:\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 1/[d1]\\ (d2)/[d+2][d1]\end{array}\right)`$ (120)
$`C2:\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ (d2)/[d1]\\ d^2/[d+2][d1]\end{array}\right)`$ (124)
$`D1:\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 0\\ 2/[d+2]\end{array}\right)D2:\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 1\\ d/[d+2]\end{array}\right)`$ (131)
Those POVM elements labelled with the same upper case letter are complementary, in the sense that they sum to the identity. Hence each letter labels a complete extremal PPT $`OO`$ symmetric POVM of 2 non-zero outcomes. The entire set of vectors in equation (131) hence also forms a set of basic vectors for $`OO`$ symmetries. We would like to use this set to construct the entire set of extremal points. We require any candidate extremal POVM to consist of measurement elements that are linearly independent. Therefore we need only restrict our attention to POVMs with at most 3 non-zero outcomes, i.e. those measurements that can be represented by a $`3\times 3`$ matrix:

$$s=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}a_1& a_2& a_3\\ b_1& b_2& b_3\\ c_1& c_2& c_3\end{array}\right),$$
(132)
where each column characterises one POVM element. As a consequence of Lemma 7, we can only use three of our basic vectors to construct the POVM, and as we require all three columns to be non-zero, each column of the extremal 3-outcome POVMs must be proportional to one and only one distinct basic vector. As there are essentially only 7 important basic vectors to choose from in the set above ($`A1`$ is trivial), we are already constrained as to the possible form. However, there is another observation that will provide much tighter constraints:

Lemma 17. It is not possible to have 2 basic vectors from the same complementary pair contributing non-zero weights in the same extremal POVM. Consequently, no extremal POVM can have any column with non-zero weight from the identity basic vector, unless it is the trivial POVM with only one non-zero outcome.

Proof. Let us suppose that the two complementary basic vectors are $`V_1`$ and $`V_2`$ respectively. Then suppose that two POVM elements $`j,k`$ (where we can have $`j=k`$) contain weights $`p_1^j`$ and $`p_2^k`$. Suppose that $`p_1^jp_2^k`$. Then we can write the whole POVM as a convex combination with probability $`p_1^j`$ of a two-outcome POVM ($`M_1=V_1,M_2=V_2`$) and $`1p_1^j`$ of the rest of the POVM rescaled to be complete. Hence the POVM cannot be extremal unless one of the $`p_1^j,p_2^k`$ is zero $`\mathrm{}`$.

An immediate consequence of Lemma 17 is that we cannot use either of the basic vectors $`A1,A2`$ to construct our POVM. Another consequence is that from the remaining possible basic vectors, we must utilise exactly one vector from each of the pairs $`\{B1,B2\}`$, $`\{C1,C2\}`$ and $`\{D1,D2\}`$. We also require that in choosing each basic vector, and its weight in a column, we must respect completeness. Therefore it is not possible to choose all three selected basic vectors with a 1 in the top component. This leaves only six possible choices for the basic vectors with non-zero weight:

$`\{B1,C1,D1\}`$ (133)
$`\{B1,C1,D2\}`$ (134)
$`\{B1,C2,D1\}`$ (135)
$`\{B2,C1,D2\}`$ (136)
$`\{B2,C2,D1\}`$ (137)
$`\{B2,C2,D2\}`$ (138)
It is not difficult, although tedious, to verify that the only combination that can be made complete with positive weights is the combination $`\{B1,C1,D2\}`$. We recommend the use of a standard computational package for algebraic manipulation, with which it can readily be verified that the selection $`\{B2,C1,D2\}`$ is linearly dependent, and that the remaining possibilities other than $`\{B1,C1,D2\}`$ all require negative weights in order to satisfy completeness . For $`\{B1,C1,D2\}`$ the weights are also fixed uniquely, as the solution involves a set of 3 linearly independent equations in 3 unknowns. It turns out that two of the three weights are 1 (those of $`B1`$ and $`C1`$), and as these elements are also 2-outcome extrema, they cannot be perturbed in any way while keeping the whole POVM feasible. Hence this whole 3-outcome POVM is extremal, and we have the following:

Lemma 18. The only genuine 3-outcome extremal POVM for $`OO`$ symmetries, upto relabelling the outcomes, is given by the POVM with elements represented by the following triples:

$`M_1`$ $`=`$ $`(0,0,{\displaystyle \frac{2d}{(d+2)(d1)}})`$ (139)
$`M_2`$ $`=`$ $`(0,{\displaystyle \frac{d2}{d1}},{\displaystyle \frac{d(d2)}{(d+2)(d1)}})`$ (140)
$`M_3`$ $`=`$ $`(1,{\displaystyle \frac{1}{d1}},{\displaystyle \frac{d2}{(d+2)(d1)}}),`$ (141)
where we have made the slight abuse of notation that a POVM element will be set equal to the triple representing it.

#### 2 Locally attaining the extreme points of the $`OO`$ symmetric POVMs

In trying to attain the extreme points derived above, we will first consider only the 2-outcome extrema, given in equation (131).The important question is how to realise the extreme points of this polyhedron using LOCC measurements. The measurement $`A`$ and its complement are trivial, they correspond to the do nothing POVM. The measurement $`D`$ and its complement are also not too difficult to obtain. It is easy to confirm that if Alice and Bob carry out an ‘orthogonal twirl’  followed by the locally implementable projection:

$$\underset{i=0}{\overset{d1}{}}|iiii|$$
(142)
then they will achieve the POVM $`D`$, and so both $`D`$ and its complement can be attained.

The points $`B,C,`$ and complements are a little more subtle. However, by performing an orthogonal twirl  it is not difficult to show that if we can find a set of overcomplete pure states on Alice’s particle $`\{|q\},q=1\mathrm{}L,Ld`$ with the properties that:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{L}}{\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{L}{}}}|qq|`$ $`=`$ $`I_A`$ (143)
$`q\text{tr}\{|qq|(|qq|)^T\}`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (144)
then the following local measurements:

$$\frac{d}{L}\underset{q=1}{\overset{L}{}}|qq||qq|$$
(145)
and

$$\frac{d}{L}\underset{q=1}{\overset{L}{}}|qq|(|qq|)^T$$
(146)
will attain points $`B`$ and $`C`$ respectively when preceded by the orthogonal twirl. It remains to show that a set of pure states satisfying equations (143) and (144) exists. Two pure states with property (144) are:

$`|u:=1/\sqrt{2}(|r+i|s)`$ (147)
$`|v:=1/\sqrt{2}(|ri|s)`$ (148)
for any two computational basis states $`|r,|s`$. Suppose that $`d`$ is even. Then Alice can obtain a complete set of $`\{|q\}`$ satisfying the properties by partitioning her space in 2-level orthogonal subspaces, and constructing a $`|u,|v`$ for each subspace. If $`d`$ is odd, then she can do the same until she is left with a 3-level subspace. We therefore need to construct such a set of pure states for this 3-level subspace. One route to a solution is as follows. Without loss of generality assume that this residual subspace is spanned by computational basis states $`|1,|2,|3`$. Then Alice can pick any irreducible representation of a finite group in $`3\times 3`$ real orthogonal matrices, i.e. $`OO^T=I`$. Suppose this set is $`\{O_m|m=1\mathrm{}L\}`$. Then the set of pure states:

$$O_m[1/\sqrt{2}(|1+i|2)]$$
(149)
will satisfy the requirements (143) and (144). It seems likely that this solution for odd $`d`$ is overly complicated, however, we were not able to find any significant simplifications.

Therefore we see that all extreme points of the set of 2-outcome PPT $`OO`$ symmetric measurements can be obtained by local protocols involving only one way communication. Now we need to turn to the 3-outcome element presented in equation (141). Given the existence of a set of pure states $`\{|q|q=1\mathrm{}L,Ld\}`$ satisfying the conditions (143) and (144), it is not too difficult to verify that the local POVM deifened by the following elements:

$`N_1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{L}}{\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{L}{}}}|qq||qq|`$ (150)
$`N_2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{L}}{\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{L}{}}}|qq|(|qq|)^T`$ (151)
$`N_3`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{L}}{\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{L}{}}}|qq|[𝟙_𝔹|𝕢𝕢|(|𝕢𝕢|)^𝕋]`$ (152)
achieves the $`M_1,M_2,M_3`$ of eq.(141) respectively when preceded by the orthogonal twirl.

Therefore all extreme points for N-outcome OO symmetric POVMs can be attained by local protocols.

## VII Summary $`\&`$ Discussion

The classification of Separable and PPT operations seems to be particularly suited to the question of measurements, where we find that a POVM can be implemented by a separable operation iff its elements are separable, and by a PPT operation iff its elements are PPT. As the Separable/PPT POVMs are mathematically more tractable than the LOCC measurements, and as we have the (strict) inclusions LOCC $``$ Separable $``$ PPT $``$ Global, these classes of operation are useful for deriving bounds on what we can achieve with LOCC observations. For this reason it is useful to have techniques for deriving extremal measurements under the constraints of separability and PPT-ness. In this context we have discussed a number of useful tools. The partial transposition isomorphism is particularly useful for PPT measurements under partially conjugated symmetries, whereas the linear independence requirements and basic vectors approach are more generally useful for extremising POVMs under any homogeneous constraints. Applying these techniques we were able to show that for Isotropic, Werner, Bell and $`OO`$ symmetries, the separability of POVM elements is necessary and sufficient for local implementability. There is no obvious reason why this is the case, as it is clear from the results of  that not all separable POVMs can be implemented locally.

Perhaps the most immediate consequences of our results are for local state discrimination. Imagine that we have been given one of $`i`$ states $`\rho _i`$ with probability $`p_i`$. What is the best way to tell which state we have been given? Questions such as this are significant for entanglement distillation protocols, where ‘target’ states are often locally measured to give information about ‘source’ states , and also for cryptographic schemes. In such scenarios one expects the extremal local POVMs to be the optimal possible measurements for most reasonable cost functions, regardless of the number of states or prior probabilities. Therefore our results also essentially give optimal protocols for the local discrimination of Isotropic, Werner, Bell and $`OO`$ states. In the context of state discrimination the Bell symmetries give the largest (in general) separation between local and global state discrimination. If we have global access to one of the four orthogonal Bell pure states, then we can discriminate them perfectly, potentially obtaining 2 classical bits of information. However, if we are restricted to acting locally, the best measurement we can do has at most 2 non-zero outcomes, showing that we can locally obtain at most 1 bit of information. Unfortunately this does not supply an interesting bit hiding scheme in the manner of , as the technology required to implement the scheme is the same as the technology required to break it - Alice and Bob can share prior Bell states and use them to teleport Alice’s state to Bob, thereby allowing Bob full access to the state without having to meet Alice. Nevertheless, our results give the first examples of mixed states for which a full quantitative analysis of optimal state discrimination can be performed.

We hope to be able to apply the techniques from this paper to more ambitious symmetries, perhaps considering more specific cost functions or prior probabilities in order to make the calculations more tractable. A fuller understanding of local measurements could have applications not only for local state discrimination and entanglement distillation, but also for any situation in which local observations are required to demonstrate a phenomenon, such as in demonstrations of non-locality, and also the recent program of research on the experimental implementation of entanglement witnesses .

## VIII Acknowledgements

SV thanks Oliver Rudolph, Adam Brazier and Tilo Eggeling for sharing their insights, and Paolo Lo Presti $`\&`$ Mauro D’Ariano for discussions about global extremal POVMs. We acknowledge financial support from EC project EQUIP (IST-1999-11053), EC project ATESIT (contract IST-2000-29681), EC project ATESIT (contract IST-2000-29681), INFM PRA 2001 CLON, US Army Grant DAAD 19-02-0161, the UK EPSRC and the European Science Foundation Programme on Quantum Information Theory and Quantum Computing.

## IX Appendix 1: No ‘naive’ solution possible for $`OO`$ symmetries.

In this appendix we will see that no ‘naive’ solution can be found for $`OO`$ symmetric POVMs with the same simplicity as the solution for the Isotropic/Werner measurements. First we need to clarify what we mean by ‘naive’. We will consider local measurement protocols consisting of POVM elements $`N_k`$, each of which can be written in the following form:

$$N_k=x_kX+y_kY+z_kZ$$
(153)
where the $`\{X,Y,Z\}`$ are orthogonal projectors that sum to the identity, and the ($`x_k`$, $`y_k`$, $`z_k`$) are triples of real coefficients. Then the requirements of completeness and positivity mean that the sets of $`\{x_k\}`$, $`\{y_k\}`$ and $`\{z_k\}`$ must form probability distributions. We will also assert that any such valid POVM is also local. Under these assertions we will also impose the following requirement:

* Any PPT POVM of $`OO`$ symmetry can be attained by performing an orthogonal twirl followed by a (local) measurement of the stipulated form (153).

We will show that no such solution is possible for the $`OO`$ case, even though a solution with essentially the same features was possible for the Isotropic case.

Let us represent each POVM element $`N_k`$ by the column vector $`\stackrel{}{v_k}=(x_k,y_k,z_k)^T`$. Then under twirling, $`N_k`$ will be taken to an $`OO`$ symmetric POVM element. Let this element be represented by the column vector $`\stackrel{}{w_k}=(a_k,b_k,c_k)^T`$, using the same notation as the main text. There will be a linear transformation $`L`$, such that $`L\stackrel{}{v_k}=\stackrel{}{w_k}`$ represents the effect of the twirling.

As stated in the main text, the the only non-zero elements in extremal (PPT) POVMs must be linearly independent (Theorem 5). Let us represent the set of general extremal POVMs of the stipulated form (153) by the set $`\{r_i\}`$, and the extrema of the PPT $`OO`$ symmetric form by the set $`\{s_i\}`$. As a consequence of the linear independence requirement, every one of these extrema can be expressed as $`3\times 3`$ matrices, where the columns are linearly independent and represent each of three non-zero POVM elements. Hence two general members $`r\{r_i\}`$ and $`s\{s_i\}`$ of these sets can be written:

$$r=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}x_1& x_2& x_3\\ y_1& y_2& y_3\\ z_1& z_2& z_3\end{array}\right),s=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}a_1& a_2& a_3\\ b_1& b_2& b_3\\ c_1& c_2& c_3\end{array}\right).$$
(154)
As the columns of these matrices are linearly independent, the matrices are invertible. This will be important in the subsequent discussion.

Now let us see the implications of the above assertions for the form of the transformation $`L`$. We are forced to have the following properties:

* $`L`$ must have non-negative matrix elements, as its elements are calculated from the traces of products of non-negative operators.
* Each row of $`L`$ must sum to 1. This is from the fact that twirling retains completeness of the POVM.
* $`L`$ must be invertible. As we wish all PPT $`OO`$ POVMs to be obtainable from the stipulated protocol, the extreme points $`\{s_i\}`$ of the PPT $`OO`$ symmetric POVMs must be contained within set obtained from $`L`$ acting on the extrema $`\{r_i\}`$ of the stipulated measurement. Consequently for some $`r,s`$ we have $`Lr=s`$, and hence $`L^1=rs^1`$.

Let us now consider the transformation $`R`$ of equation (95). The vector:

$$RL\stackrel{}{v_k}=R\stackrel{}{w_k}$$
(155)
gives the partial transpose of the twirled POVM element corresponding to $`N_k`$. As we wish any PPT POVM be attainable by a local protocol of our postulated form, and as we require that $`L`$ be invertible, we also require that both:

$$L\stackrel{}{v_k}0k$$
(156)
and

$$RL\stackrel{}{v_k}0k$$
(157)
hold if and only if the sets $`\{x_k\}`$, $`\{y_k\}`$ and $`\{z_k\}`$ form probability distributions. We also must require the following properties for the matrix product $`RL`$:

* $`RL`$ must contain only non-negative elements. This can be seen as follows. If we pick a three element local measurement characterised by:

$$\stackrel{}{v_1}=(1,0,0)^T;\stackrel{}{v_2}=(0,1,0)^T;\stackrel{}{v_3}=(0,0,1)^T$$
(158)
then this must produce vectors $`\stackrel{}{w_k}`$ with non-negative partial transposition, and it can readily be verified that this implies that the elements of $`RL`$ must be non-negative.
* The rows of $`RL`$ must sum to 1. This can be shown from the fact that the same property holds for both $`R`$ and $`L`$.

Now consider the following disallowed choice for the vectors $`\stackrel{}{v_k}`$, where $`ϵ`$ is small and positive:

$`\stackrel{}{v_1}=(1/3,1/3,ϵ)^T`$ $`;`$ $`\stackrel{}{v_2}=(1/3,1/3,(1+ϵ)/2)^T;`$ (159)
$`\stackrel{}{v_3}=(1/3,`$ $`1/3`$ $`,(1+ϵ)/2)^T.`$ (160)
This choice of vectors does not give a valid choice of measurement vectors, as the first one contains a negative component. However, the vectors $`\stackrel{}{v_2}`$ and $`\stackrel{}{v_3}`$ can in principle come from valid probability distributions by themselves, and so it must be the case that either $`L\stackrel{}{v_1}`$ or $`RL\stackrel{}{v_1}`$ contains a negative component. It can be shown that this, together with the fact that both $`L`$ and $`RL`$ must be row stochastic, implies that at least one row of either $`L`$ or $`RL`$ must be $`(0,0,1)`$. Similarly we can ‘place the $`ϵ`$’ in different rows in the above vectors to show that in fact we require that at least one row of either $`L`$ or $`RL`$ must be $`(0,1,0)`$ and at least one row should be $`(1,0,0)`$. Regardless of where these rows appear, as $`R=R^1`$ contains some negative matrix elements, no such solution is possible, as both $`L`$ and $`RL`$ are required to have non-negative matrix elements. Although the proof that we have given is tailored to $`OO`$ symmetries, it can be modified relatively easily for other situations, including bases of Bell diagonal states.


text:
# High 𝑝_𝑇 hadrons in Au+Au collisions at RHIC

## Abstract

High $`p_T`$ hadrons produced in ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions at RHIC probe nuclear matter at extreme conditions of high energy density. Experimental measurements in Au+Au collisions at $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$=130, 200 GeV establish the existence of strong medium effects on hadron production well into the perturbative regime.

One of the fundamental predictions of the Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) is the existence of a deconfined state of quarks and gluons at the energy densities above 1 GeV/fm3 . This strongly interacting medium, the Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP), may be created in the laboratory by the collision of heavy nuclei at high energy. The current experimental program at the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider (RHIC) is aimed at detecting the new state of matter and studying its properties.

High $`p_T`$ hadrons are produced in the initial collisions of incoming partons with large momentum transfer. Hard scattered partons fragment into a high energy cluster (jet) of hadrons. Partons propagating through a dense system may interact with the surrounding medium radiating soft gluons at a rate proportional to the energy density of the medium. The measurements of radiative energy loss (jet quenching) in dense matter may provide a direct probe of the energy density.

The large multiplicities in nuclear collisions make full jet reconstruction impractical. Correlations of high $`p_T`$ hadrons in pseudorapidity and azimuth allow the identification of jets on a statistical basis. First hints of jets at RHIC came from the two-particle azimuthal correlations of high $`p_T`$ charged hadrons in Au+Au collisions at $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$=130 GeV . Similar analyses performed for $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$=200 GeV  directly show that hadrons at $`p_T>34`$ GeV/c result from the fragmentation of jets.

Hadrons from jet fragmentation may carry a large fraction of jet momentum (leading hadrons). In the absence of nuclear medium effects, the rate of hard processes should scale with the number of binary nucleon-nucleon collisions. The yield of leading hadrons measured in Au+Au collisions at $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$=130 GeV has been shown to be significantly suppressed, indicating substantial in-medium interactions. The high statistics 200 GeV data extended the measurements of hadron spectra to $`p_T=`$12 GeV/c. Fig.1 shows the suppression of charged

hadrons in central Au+Au collisions relative to scaled peripheral Au+Au collisions (STAR) and of neutral pions in central Au+Au collisions relative to scaled p+p collisions (PHENIX). Suppression factors of 4-5 are observed for both $`\pi ^0`$s and charged hadrons, with weak dependence on $`p_T`$ at $`p_T>`$5 GeV/c. The recent pQCD calculations incorporating effects of Cronin enhancement, nuclear shadowing and energy loss may describe the observed suppression, but a disentangling of the effects awaits the upcoming data from d+Au collisions.

The initial spatial almond-shaped geometry of the reaction zone in non-central nuclear collisions can be used to study the propagation of partons and/or their fragmentation products through the azimuthally asymmetric system. The azimuthal anisotropy of final state hadrons in non-central collisions is quantified by the coefficients of the Fourier decomposition of the azimuthal particle distributions, with the second harmonic coefficient $`v_2`$ referred to as elliptic flow. The elliptic flow measurements for $`p_T<2`$ GeV/c agree in detail with hydrodynamic calculations.

Fig.2 (left panel) shows the elliptic flow $`v_2`$ as a function of $`p_T`$ for Au+Au collisions at 130 GeV . Elliptic flow rises almost linearly with transverse momentum up to 2 GeV/c, behavior that is well described by hydrodynamic calculation. Above $`p_T2`$ GeV/c, $`v_2(p_T)`$ deviates from a linear rise and saturates for $`p_T>3`$ GeV/c. The azimuthal anisotropies measured at $`p_T=46`$ GeV/c are in qualitative agreement with the pQCD calculations including energy loss. Fig.2 (right panel) shows the centrality dependence of $`v_2(p_T)`$ measured at 200 GeV by the PHENIX Collaboration. Finite values of $`v_2`$ persist to $`p_T=4.5`$ GeV/c for all centralities. The results from the STAR Collaboration show the finite values of $`v_2`$ up to $`p_T<10`$ GeV/c for non-central collisions. However, at present the measured values of $`v_2`$ contain a non-flow component which at high $`p_T`$ comes from intra-jet correlations. A quantitative understanding of this effect at the highest $`p_T`$ is still needed.

Additional striking evidence of in-medium effects on high $`p_T`$ particle production comes from the analysis of back-to-back jet correlations by the STAR Collaboration. Fig.3 shows the azimuthal angular distribution between pairs

of high $`p_T`$ hadrons for the peripheral and most central Au+Au collisions at $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$=200 GeV. The strength of near-side correlations for both centralities is consistent with that measured in p+p collisions. The away-side (back-to-back) correlations in peripheral Au+Au collisions may be described by an incoherent superposition of jet-like correlations measured in p+p and elliptic flow. However, back-to-back jet production is strongly suppressed in the most central Au+Au collisions. This indicates a substantial interaction as the hard-scattered partons or their fragmentation products traverse the medium.

Up to now, the high $`p_T`$ data from RHIC have provided a lot of exciting results. What is missing, however, is a coherent theoretical description of the experimental data. Many different approaches are taken in attempt to describe the data, such as the pQCD with energy loss, gluon saturation, parton cascade, surface emission, etc. The upcoming d+Au run at RHIC will shed light on the magnitude of initial state effects and will help to rule out certain theoretical scenarios.


text:
# Active suppression of dephasing in Josephson-junction qubits

\[

## Abstract

Simple majority code correcting $`k`$ dephasing errors by encoding a qubit of information into $`2k+1`$ physical qubits is studied quantitatively. We derive an equation for quasicontinuous evolution of the density matrix of encoded quantum information under the error correction procedure in the presence of dephasing noise that in general can be correlated at different qubits. Specific design of the Josephson-junction circuit implementing this scheme is suggested.

\]

Josephson qubits are among the most promising devices to implement solid state quantum computation . Quantum manipulations of individual  and coupled  qubits has been demonstrated experimentally. At present, probably the main obstacle to the development of a larger-scale solid state quantum logic circuits is presented by decoherence. It is therefore important to develop strategies to minimize the effects of decoherence on the dynamics of the qubit systems.

Known approaches to reduction of decoherence include both error-correction and error-avoiding schemes that either employ symmetries of the qubit-environment interaction to create areas of the Hilbert space not affected by decoherence  or use rapid random dynamic perturbations of the system to average out the effects of external noise . The error-avoiding approaches appear to be less suitable for the solid-state qubits. Indeed, noise in solid-state systems typically does not have any particular symmetry and its correlation time is short, so that the application of the control pulses within this time-scale, as required by the dynamic averaging schemes, is problematic. This leaves error-correction as the main strategy for suppression of decoherence in solid-state qubits. In this work, we suggest an implementation of one of the basic error-correction algorithms for the suppression of dephasing errors (which can be expected to be the dominant type of errors in solid-state circuits \- see, e.g., Ref. ), and develop its quantitative description. Our scheme employs the Josephson-junction qubits that combine charge and flux dynamics , and requires only a small number of qubit transformations to operate.

From the perspective of the general theory of error-correction, an interesting feature of the scheme considered in this work is the possibility of developing its detailed quantitative description within the realistic model of the qubit-environment interaction and analyzing, for instance, the effect of the correlations in the noise acting on different qubits. While discussions of the error-correction rely typically in an essential way on independent noise models, environments of the solid-state qubits can be to a large degree correlated because of the finite distance between the qubits in a circuit. A clear illustration of this is provided by the background charge fluctuations that are the main source of dephasing in charge qubits . Long-range nature of the Coulomb interaction creates noise correlations by coupling the qubits to the same charge fluctuators.

We consider specifically the problem of “quantum memory”, when the task is to preserve the stationary state of the qubit in the presence of dephasing noise. The qubit Hamiltonian contains then only the coupling to the environment. Under the assumption that the environment has many degrees of freedom each of which is only weakly coupled to qubits, it can be modeled as an ensemble of harmonic oscillators  (see however ), so that the Hamiltonian of the qubit register is:

$$H=\underset{j}{}\sigma _z^{(j)}\xi _j,$$
(1)
where $`\xi _j=_{m,k}[\lambda _{m,j}(\omega )a_{m,\omega }+\text{h.c.}]`$. Here we assumed several independent ensembles of environmental oscillators (numbered by $`m`$), as needed to model different profiles of spatial correlations of random forces $`\xi _j`$. The index $`j=1,2\mathrm{}`$ in (1) numbers the qubits, and coefficients $`\lambda _{m,j}(\omega )`$ are coupling constants of the qubit $`j`$ to the oscillators of reservoir $`m`$ in the mode $`\omega `$ and creation/annihilation operators $`a_{m,\omega },a_{m,\omega }^{}`$. Time evolution of the “qubits+environment” system is described conveniently in the interaction representation with respect to the interaction Hamiltonian of Eq. (1). The evolution operator $`U(t)`$ can then be calculated explicitly by separating the two non-commuting parts, $`a_{m,\omega }`$, and $`a_{m,\omega }^{}`$, of the qubit-oscillator coupling, and using the fact that their commutator is a $`c`$-number:

$$U(t)=\mathrm{exp}\{i\underset{j}{}\phi _j(t)\sigma _z^{(j)}\}U_r(t),$$
(2)
$`U_r(t)=\mathrm{exp}\{i{\displaystyle \underset{m,\omega }{}}{\displaystyle \frac{\omega t\mathrm{sin}\omega t}{\omega ^2}}|{\displaystyle \underset{j}{}}\lambda _{m,j}\sigma _z^{(j)}|^2\}.`$

The first term in $`U(t)`$ represents fluctuating phases $`\phi _j(t)`$ of the qubit basis states induced by the environmental forces $`\xi _j(t)`$: $`\phi _j(t)=_0^t\xi _j(t^{})𝑑t^{}`$. The second term, $`U_r(t)`$, results from the renormalization of the qubit parameters by the qubit-environment interaction. To see this more explicitly, we note that the sum over frequencies $`\omega `$ in this exponent has a natural cut-off at large frequencies $`\omega \tau _c^1`$, where $`\tau _c`$ is the time scale at which environment forces acting on different qubits are correlated. For weak decoherence we are interested in the time scales much larger that $`\tau _c`$. In this regime, the phase represented by $`U_r(t)`$ is dominated by the term that grows linearly with $`t`$, and can be viewed as arising from the renormalization of the qubit energy. Equation (2) shows that such a renormalization includes then the shift of the total energy of the register and creation of the qubit-qubit interaction. The total energy shift is irrelevant as long as we consider an individual register. Neglecting it, we see that $`U_r(t)`$ results from the Hamiltonian evolution with the Hamiltonian

$$H_r=\underset{j,j^{}}{}V_{jj^{}}\sigma _z^{(j)}\sigma _z^{(j^{})},$$
(3)
and $`V_{jj^{}}=2\text{Re}_{m,\omega }(\lambda _{m,j}(\omega )\lambda _{m,j^{}}^{}(\omega )/\omega )`$, if the sum over frequencies $`\omega `$ in this expression is converging at low frequencies. The qubit-qubit interaction strength $`V_{jj^{}}`$ is non-vanishing only if the same reservoir $`m`$ couples to more than one qubit, so that the reservoir forces $`\xi _j`$ at different qubits are correlated.

The time evolution with the Hamiltonian $`H_r`$, and more generally, the evolution operator $`U_r`$ in Eq. (2) represent deterministic part of the qubit evolution induced by the qubit-reservoir interaction. As a result, it can in principle be compensated for by adjusting the regular (non-dissipative) part of the Hamiltonian of the qubit register. This procedure, however, is impractical even in the case of constant $`H_r`$, since the interaction constants $`V_{jj^{}}`$ are apriori unknown and incommesurate quantities. This complexity means that a more appropriate approach is to treat the time evolution represented by $`U_r`$ as dephasing despite its deterministic character.

The time evolution of the density matrix $`\rho (t)`$ of the qubit register is obtained from Eq. (2) through the relation $`\rho (t)=\text{Tr}_{env}\{U^{}(t)\sigma (0)U(t)\}`$, where $`\sigma `$ is the total density matrix of the “qubits+environment” system. The environment will dephase the qubits if they are prepared initially in the state $`\rho (0)`$ that is uncorrelated with the state of the environment, $`\sigma (0)=\rho _{env}\rho (0)`$. Assuming that the environment is in thermal equilibrium at temperature $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$, and no error correction procedure is applied, we get using the standard property of the Gaussian noise:

$`\rho (t)=\mathrm{exp}\{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \underset{j,j^{}}{}}\phi _j(t)\phi _j^{}(t)(\sigma _z^{(j)}\overline{\sigma }_z^{(j)})(\sigma _z^{(j^{})}\overline{\sigma }_z^{(j^{})})\}`$

$$U_r^{}(t)\rho (0)U_r(t).$$
(4)
Here we introduced the convention that the bar over $`\sigma _z`$ operators means that they act on $`\rho `$ from the right. Qualitatively, Eq. (4) shows that the matrix elements of $`\rho `$ that are further away from the diagonal in the $`\sigma _z`$ basis decay faster. The diagonal elements (on which $`\sigma _z\overline{\sigma }_z=0`$) remain constant. In the case of one physical qubit, Eq. (4) gives $`\rho (t)=e^{\phi ^2(t)(1\sigma _z\overline{\sigma }_z)}\rho (0)`$, i.e., the off-diagonal elements of $`\rho `$ are suppressed with time as $`e^{2\phi ^2(t)}e^{P(t)}`$. If the environment density of states is Ohmic, i.e., $`_{m,\omega }|\lambda _m(\omega )|^2\mathrm{}=g_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\omega \omega e^{\omega \tau _0}\mathrm{}`$, direct evaluation for $`\mathrm{\Theta }1/\tau _0`$ gives: $`P(t)=2g\mathrm{ln}[\mathrm{sinh}(\pi t\mathrm{\Theta })/(\pi \tau _0\mathrm{\Theta })]`$. At large $`t`$, when the random force $`\xi `$ appears $`\delta `$-correlated, $`P(t)`$ reduces to $`P(t)=\mathrm{\Gamma }t`$, where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=2\pi g\mathrm{\Theta }`$ is the dephasing rate.

One can reduce the effective dephasing rate by the encoding that corrects the phase errors . Generalized to $`k`$ errors, this encoding is:

$$\alpha |0+\beta |1\alpha |\underset{2k+1}{\underset{}{++\mathrm{}+}}+\beta |\underset{2k+1}{\underset{}{\mathrm{}}}.$$
(5)
In Equation (5), a bit of quantum information is encoded in the state of the $`2k+1`$ physical qubits, and the $`|\pm `$ states of each of these qubits are obtained through the Hadamard transform $`\widehat{H}`$ (the $`\pi /2`$-rotation around $`y`$ axis) from the $`|0,1`$ states. All of the $`\sigma _z`$ operators in the dephasing-induced time evolution (2) are changed by $`\widehat{H}`$: $`\widehat{H}\sigma _z\widehat{H}=\sigma _x`$, so that for the states on the right-hand-side of Eq. (5) the dephasing looks like transitions between the $`|\pm `$ states of each qubit, and can be directly detected by measurements in this basis and corrected by applying simple pulses returning the qubit into the initial state. The error-detecting measurements, however, should not destroy the quantum information encoded in the state (5), i.e., they should not distinguish the $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ parts of this state. This condition is not satisfied by measurements on individual qubits but can be satisfied by the measurements on pairs of the nearest-neighbor qubits comparing their states. Despite the apparent complexity of this scheme, it has quite natural implementation in the Josephson-junction qubits \- see Fig. 1.

To describe this process quantitatively we assume that its measurement/correction part can be done on the time scale that is much shorter than the one set by the characteristic dephasing rate $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$. Different terms in the environment-induced evolution of the encoded state, Eq. (5), during the time interval $`T`$ between the successive application of the “measurement+correction” operations can be conveniently classified by the number of qubits flipped during this time interval. In the relevant regime of sufficiently short $`T`$: $`P(T)1`$, the probability amplitude of these terms decreases rapidly when this number increases. If we keep only the terms that flip up to $`k`$ qubits, we see directly from Eq. (2) that the time evolution at this level of accuracy (denoted by $`U_k(T)`$) preserves the superposition of the $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ parts of the encoded state:

$$U_k(T)[\alpha |+\beta |]=\underset{q}{}[\alpha |\psi _q+\beta \widehat{R}|\psi _q]u_q.$$
(6)
Here index $`q`$ runs over $`2^{2k}`$ different register states obtained from the state $`||+\mathrm{}+`$ by flipping up to $`k`$ qubits, $`u_q`$ are the probability amplitudes of these states, $`\widehat{R}|\psi _q`$ denotes the state $`|\psi _q`$ with all $`2k+1`$ qubits inverted, and $`||\mathrm{}`$.

The measurements that compare the qubit states in all pairs of the nearest-neighbor qubits do not distinguish states $`|\psi _q`$ and $`\widehat{R}|\psi _q`$, and therefore also preserve the superposition of the $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ terms in Eq. (6). The $`2^{2k}`$ different outcomes (“equal” or “different”) of the $`2k`$ such measurements distinguish all terms with different $`q`$ in Eq. (6) and enable one to decide what qubits were flipped during the time interval $`T`$. Application of the correcting pulses should then bring the state of the qubit register back to its initial form (5) so that the encoded quantum state does not change in this approximation. The residual evolution of the encoded state is associated with the possibility that environment flips more that $`k`$ different qubits; for $`P(T)1`$ – precisely $`k+1`$ qubits. Following the same steps as above, we see that when $`k+1`$ qubits are flipped, the measurement/correction cycle interchanges the $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ weights in the encoded state (5). Since the probability $`p`$ of this mistake is small, $`p1`$, the encoded state changes substantially only on the time scale larger than the period $`T`$ of one error-correction cycle, and its evolution on this scale can be conveniently described by the continuous equation for the density matrix $`\rho ^{(c)}`$ in the basis of $`|`$ and $`|`$ states. The interchange of the $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ terms in (5) leads to the following evolution of $`\rho ^{(c)}`$:

$$\dot{\rho }_{++}^{(c)}=\frac{\gamma _k}{2}(\rho _{}^{(c)}\rho _{++}^{(c)}),\dot{\rho }_+^{(c)}=\frac{\gamma _k}{2}(\rho _+^{(c)}\rho _+^{(c)}).$$
(7)
Here $`\gamma _k2p/T`$ is the effective dephasing rate of the encoded quantum information, and the superscript $`(c)`$ indicates that $`\rho ^{(c)}`$ is the reduced density matrix in the presence of error correction. Thus, our error-correcting procedure replaces the dephasing in the individual physical qubit with the dephasing of encoded quantum information at a smaller rate. Indeed, if one writes Eqs. (7) in the rotated basis $`|\pm |`$, they explicitly acquire the form characteristic for pure dephasing: constant diagonal elements of the density matrix and decay of the off-diagonal elements with the rate $`\gamma _k`$. The dephasing rate $`\gamma _k`$ can be calculated from the evolution operator (2). Now we discuss several important limits.

For $`k=1`$, when the relevant errors flip 2 out of 3 qubits, we get:

$`\gamma _1={\displaystyle \frac{2}{T}}{\displaystyle \underset{j>j^{}}{}}(T^2V_{jj^{}}^2+2\phi _j(T)\phi _j^{}(T)^2+\phi _j^2(T)\phi _j^{}^2(T)).`$

The first two terms in this expression represent contribution to dephasing from noise correlations at different qubits, while the last term exists also for uncorrelated noise. If the noise is $`\delta `$-correlated in time, $`\gamma _1`$ reduces to $`\gamma _1=T_{j>j^{}}(2V_{jj^{}}^2+\mathrm{\Gamma }_{jj^{}}^2+\mathrm{\Gamma }_j\mathrm{\Gamma }_j^{}/2)`$, where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_j`$ is the dephasing rate in the $`j`$th qubit, and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{jj^{}}`$ is introduced through $`2\phi _j(t)\phi _j^{}(t)=\mathrm{\Gamma }_{jj^{}}t`$.

For $`k=2`$, the dephasing rate of the encoded state is:

$$\gamma _2=\frac{2}{T}\underset{j>j^{}>j^{\prime \prime }}{}\phi _j^2\phi _j^{}^2\phi _{j^{\prime \prime }}^2.$$
(8)
Since the effective coupling induced by the environment – see Eq. (3), flips the qubits only in pairs, it does not contribute to $`\gamma _2`$. If the dephasing noise is $`\delta `$-correlated in time, its space correlations are non-vanishing only for the nearest-neighbor qubits, and the corresponding dephasing rates are the same for all qubits, Eq. (8) gives: $`\gamma _2=5\mathrm{\Gamma }T^2(\overline{\mathrm{\Gamma }}^2+\mathrm{\Gamma }^2/2)`$, where $`\overline{\mathrm{\Gamma }}\mathrm{\Gamma }_{jj+1}`$.

If the dephasing forces at different qubits are uncorrelated, the encoded dephasing rate can be easily calculated for arbitrary $`k`$:

$$\gamma _k=\frac{1}{2^kT}\underset{j_1>j_2>\mathrm{}>j_{k+1}}{}P_{j_1}(T)P_{j_2}(T)\mathrm{}P_{j_{k+1}}(T),$$
(9)
and one sees that $`\gamma _k`$ decreases exponentially with the “degree of encoding” $`k`$. When the probabilities $`P(T)`$ of dephasing errors in individual qubits can be expressed through the dephasing rate $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, Eq. (9) reduces to $`\gamma _k=\mathrm{\Gamma }(\mathrm{\Gamma }T)^k(2k+1)!/(2^kk!(k+1)!)`$, if $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is the same for all qubits.

Exponential suppression of $`\gamma _k`$ with $`k`$ is limited in the scheme considered above by possible imperfections of the measurement/correction operations. The most important is direct dephasing of the encoded state by measurements, which, in contrast to correction steps, need to be performed each period $`T`$. For example, one of the specific non-idealities of measurement detectors that leads to direct dephasing of the encoded state is residual linear response coefficient of the quadratic detectors needed to perform pair-wise comparison of the qubit states – see Eq. (11) below. Linear terms couple the detector directly to the $`|\pm `$ states of individual qubits and introduce finite phase shifts between them. Since the number of required measurements is proportional to $`k`$, the rate of introduced dephasing should also be proportional to $`k`$, and can be denoted as $`\overline{\gamma }k`$. The effect of this dephasing on the evolution of the encoded quantum information is described then by adding the usual dephasing term to the equation for the off-diagonal element of the density matrix $`\rho ^{(c)}`$ (7):

$$\dot{\rho }_+^{(c)}=\frac{\gamma _k}{2}(\rho _+^{(c)}\rho _+^{(c)})\overline{\gamma }k\rho _+^{(c)}.$$
(10)
Qualitatively, the two types of dephasing processes in Eq. (10) have similar effect of suppressing the fidelity of the encoded state, but depend differently on $`k`$. The optimum degree of encoding is estimated crudely by minimizing the total dephasing rate: $`k_{opt}\mathrm{ln}(\overline{\gamma }/\mathrm{\Gamma })/\mathrm{ln}(T\mathrm{\Gamma })`$. One obvious result of this optimization is that for the considered scheme of the dephasing suppression to make sense, the dephasing introduced by imperfections of the correcting procedure should be much weaker than the original qubit dephasing $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$.

This condition can be satisfied in Josephson-junction qubits, where the dynamics of magnetic flux characterized by longer coherence times (at least tens of nanoseconds – see, e.g., ) can be used to suppress dephasing in charge-based qubits. The charge qubits have quite short decoherence times, $`1`$ ns , limited by the background charge fluctuations, but offer some advantages, e.g., demonstrated simplicity of the qubit-qubit coupling . Therefore it would be of interest to use the approach discussed in this work to suppress dephasing of charge degrees of freedom with the help of controlled flux dynamics. A sketch of the possible set-up achieving this is shown in Fig. 1. Its main elements are the charge qubits, formed by two small tunnel junctions in series, enclosed in small superconducting loops threaded by magnetic flux $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ equal to half of the magnetic flux quantum $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$. It can be shown  that the current in each loop represents the $`\sigma _x`$ component of the qubit dynamics, and its monitoring measures therefore the qubit in the $`\sigma _x`$ basis as needed for detection of the dephasing errors. Comparison of the states of the nearest-neighbor qubits can be achieved by measuring not directly the currents in the loops, but the square of the difference (or of the sum) between the currents. Such a quadratic detection measures the product operator $`\sigma _x^{(j)}\sigma _x^{(j+1)}`$:

$$(\sigma _x^{(j)}\pm \sigma _x^{(j+1)})^2=2(1\pm \sigma _x^{(j)}\sigma _x^{(j+1)}),$$
(11)
and provides information on whether the states of the two qubits are the same or not without measuring them. Quadratic detection can be realized by the usual magnetometers but operated at a point where the linear response coefficient vanishes. These measurements, subsequent classical calculations, and application of correction pulses, can be done with sufficient frequency by existing “SFQ” superconductor electronics  compatible with the qubits.

In summary, we suggested a simple scheme of performing basic error-correction in Josephson-junction qubits. The scheme suppresses dephasing errors and can be analyzed quantitatively within the realistic model of environment, including the possibility of noise correlations at different qubits. If the errors introduced by the correction procedure are negligible, the residual dephasing rate for the encoded quantum information decreases exponentially with the degree of encoding.

This work was supported in part by the NSF under grant # 0121428, and by the NSA and ARDA under the ARO contract (D.V.A.), and by EC-grant IST-FET-SQUBIT (R.F.)