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# An Entangled Tale of Quantum Entanglement Version 1.5

## 1. Introduction

These lecture notes were written for the American Mathematical Society (AMS) Short Course on Quantum Computation held 17-18 January 2000 in conjunction with the Annual Meeting of the AMS in Washington, DC in January 2000.

The objective of this lecture is to discuss quantum entanglement from the perspective of the theory of Lie groups. More specifically, the ultimate objective of this paper is to quantify quantum entanglement in terms of Lie group invariants, and to make this material accessible to a larger audience than is currently the case. These notes depend extensively on the material presented in Lecture I . It is assumed that the reader is familiar with the material on density operators and quantum entanglement given in the AMS Short Course Lecture I, i.e., with sections 5 and 7 of .

Of necessity, the scope of this paper is eventually restricted to the study of qubit quantum systems, and to a specific problem called the *Restricted Fundamental Problem in Quantum Entanglement* (*RFPQE*). References to the broader scope of quantum entanglement are given toward the end of the paper.

### 1.1. Preamble

Figure 1. Quantum Entanglement Lab???

At first sight, a physics research lab dedicated to the pursuit of quantum entanglement might look something like the drawing found in Figure 1, i.e., like an indecipherable, incoherent jumble of wires, fiber optic cable, lasers, bean splitters, lenses. Perhaps some large magnets for NMR equipment, or some supercooling equipment for rf SQUIDs are tossed in for good measure. Whatever .. It is indeed a most impressive collection of adult “toys.”

However, to a mathematician, such a lab appears very much like a well orchestrated collection of intriguing mathematical “toys,” just beckoning with new tantalizing mathematical challenges.

### 1.2. A Sneak Preview

In the hope of piquing your curiosity to read on, we give the following brief preview of what is to come:

The RFPQE reduces to the mathematical problem of determining the orbits of the big adjoint action of the group of local unitary transformations $`𝕃\left(2^n\right)`$ on the Lie algebra $`u\left(2^n\right)`$ of the unitary group $`𝕌\left(2^n\right)`$, as expressed by the following formula:

$$\overline{)𝕃\left(2^n\right)\times u(2^n)\stackrel{Ad}{}u(2^n)}$$

where “$`Ad`$” denotes the big adjoint operator, and where the remaining symbols are defined in the table below.

| $`𝕃\left(2^n\right)={\displaystyle \underset{1}{\overset{n}{}}}𝕊𝕌\left(2\right)`$ | Local Unitary Group |
| --- | --- |
| $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)=\underset{1}{\overset{𝑛}{}}su\left(2\right)`$ | Lie Algebra of $`𝕃\left(2^n\right)`$ |
| $`𝕌\left(2^n\right)`$ | Unitary Group |
| $`u\left(2^n\right)`$ | Lie Algebra of $`𝕌\left(2^n\right)`$ |

We attack this problem by lifting the above big adjoint action to the induced infinitesimal action

$$\overline{)\mathrm{}(2^n)\stackrel{\Omega }{}\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}((𝐮(2^n))}$$

which, for a $`3`$ qubit density operator $`\rho `$, is explicitly given by111This expression will be explained later in the paper. I hope that this will make you curious enough to read on?

$$\overline{)\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)\left(i\rho \right)=\underset{q_1,q_2=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(a^{(1)}x_{q_1q_2}\times \frac{}{x_{q_1q_2}}+a^{(2)}x_{q_1q_2}\times \frac{}{x_{q_1q_2}}+a^{(3)}x_{q_1q_2}\times \frac{}{x_{q_1q_2}}\right)\end{array}}$$

where $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^3\right)`$ and $`i\rho 𝐮\left(2^3\right)`$ are given by

$$\{\begin{array}{ccc}v& =& a^{(1)}\xi _{00}+a^{(2)}\xi _{00}+a^{(3)}\xi _{00}\hfill \\ & & \\ i\rho & =& \underset{r_1,r_2,r_3=0}{\overset{3}{}}x_{r_1r_2r_3}\xi _{r_1r_2r_3}\hfill \end{array}$$

and where $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}((𝐮(2^n))`$ denotes the Lie algebra of vector fields on $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$.

The induced infinitesimal action can then be used to quantify and to classify quantum entanglement through the construction of a complete set of quantum entanglement invariants.

In the pages to follow, we make every effort to make the above sneak preview more transparent and understandable. Our goal is to present the underlying intuitions without getting lost in an obscure haze of technicalities. However, presenting this topic is much like tiptoeing through a mine field. One false move, and everything explodes into a dense jungle and clutter of technicalities. We leave it to the reader to determine how successful this endeavor is.

### 1.3. How our view of quantum entanglement has dramatically changed over this past century

Finally, we close this introduction with a brief historical perspective.

Over the past twentieth century, the scientific community’s view of quantum entanglement has dramatically changed. It continues to do so even today.

Initially, quantum entanglement was viewed as an unnecessary and unwanted wart on quantum mechanics. Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen tried to surgically remove it. Bell, showed that such surgery can not be performed without destroying the very life of physical reality.

Today, quantum entanglement is viewed as a useful resource within quantum mechanics. It is now viewed as a commodity to be utilized and traded, much as would be a commodity on the stock exchange.

Quantum entanglement appears to be one of the physical phenomena at the central core of quantum computation. Many believe that it is quantum entanglement that somehow enables us to harness the vast parallelism of quantum superposition.

But what is quantum entanglement?

How do we measure, quantify, classify quantum entanglement? When is the quantum entanglement of two quantum systems the same? different? When is the quantum entanglement of one quantum system greater than that of another?

It is anticipated that answers to the above questions will have a profound impact on the development of quantum computation. Finding answers to these questions is challenging, intriguing, and indeed very habit forming.

## 2. A Story of Two Qubits, or How Alice & Bob Learn to Live with Quantum Entanglement and Love It.

Our tangled tale of quantum entanglement begins with Alice and Bob’s first encounter with quantum entanglement.

Alice and Bob, who happen to be good friends (as attested, time and time again, by the open literature on quantum computation), meet one day. A discussion ensues. The topic, of course, is quantum entanglement. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how one looks at it, their discussion explodes into a heated argument. After a lengthy debate, they agree that the only way to resolve their conflict is to purchase the real McCoy, i.e., a pair of entangled qubits. So they rush to the nearest Toys for Aging Children Store to see what they can find.

Almost immediately upon entering the store, they happen to spy, on one of the store shelves, an elaborately decorated box labelled:

| $``$.$`𝔼`$., Inc. |
| --- |
| Two Entangled Qubits |
| $`𝒬_{AB}`$ |
| Consisting of qubits |
| $`𝒬_A\text{ and }𝒬_B`$ |

On the back of the box is the content label, required by federal law, which reads:

Alice and Bob hurriedly purchase the two qubit quantum system $`𝒬_{AB}`$. Outside the store, they rip open the box. Alice grabs the qubit labelled $`𝒬_A`$. Bob then takes the remaining qubit $`𝒬_B`$.

Alice and Bob then immediately222For some unknown reason, everyone involved with the quantum world is always in a hurry. Perhaps such haste is caused by concerns in regard to decoherence? depart for their separate destinations. Alice flies to Queensland, Australia to continue with her Ph.D. studies at the University of Queensland. She arrives just in time to attend the first class lecture on quantum mechanics. Bob, on the other hand, flies to Vancouver, British Columbia to continue with his Ph.D. studies at the University of British Columbia. He just barely arrives in time to hear the first lecture in a course on differential geometry and Lie groups.

Soon after her quantum mechanics lecture, Alice begins to have second thoughts about their joint purchase of two entangled qubits. She quickly reaches for her cellphone, calls Bob, and nervously fires off in rapid succession three questions:

> “Did we get our money’s worth of quantum entanglement?”
>
> “How much quantum entanglement did we actually purchase?”
>
> “Are we the victims of a modern day quantum entanglement scam?”

After the phone conversation, Bob is indeed deeply concerned. In desperation, he calls the U.S. Quantum Entanglement Protection Agency, which refers him to the U.S. National Institute of Quantum Entanglement Standards and Technology (NIQEST) in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

After a long conversation, a representative of NIQEST agrees to send Alice and Bob, free of charge, the NIQEST Quantum Entanglement Standards Kit. On hanging up, the NIQEST representative takes the NIQEST standard entangled two qubit quantum system $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ off the shelf, places $`𝒬_A^{}^{}`$ together with a User’s Manual into a box marked “Alice.” He/She also places the remaining qubit $`𝒬_B^{}^{}`$ together with a User’s Manual into a second box labeled “Bob,” and then sends the two boxes by overnight mail to Alice and Bob respectively.

The very next day (in different time zones, of course) Alice and Bob each receive their respective packages, take out their respective qubits, and read the enclosed user’s manuals.

The NIQEST User’s Manual reads as follows:

> $``$.$`𝔼`$. Yardstick 1. An EPR pair $`𝒬_{AB}`$ possess the same quantum entanglement as the NIQEST standard EPR pair $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ if it is possible for you, Alice and Bob, to use your own local reversible operations (either individually or collectively) to transform $`𝒬_{AB}`$ and $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ into one another. If this is possible, then $`𝒬_{AB}`$ and $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ are of the same entanglement type, written
>
> $$𝒬_{AB}\underset{loc}{}𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}$$
>
> $``$.$`𝔼`$. Yardstick 2. An EPR pair $`𝒬_{AB}`$ possesses more quantum entanglement than the NIQEST standard EPR pair $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ if it is possible for you, Alice and Bob, (either individually or collectively) to apply your own reversible and irreversible operations to your respective qubits to transform $`𝒬_{AB}`$ into $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$. In this case, we write
>
> $$𝒬_{AB}\underset{loc}{}𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}$$

> Caveat. Quantum entanglement may be irrevocably lost if Quantum Entanglement Yardstick 2 is applied.

In summary, the above story about Alice and Bob has raised the following questions:

* Question: What type of entanglement do Alice and Bob collectively possess?
* Question: Is the quantum entanglement of $`𝒬_{AB}`$ the same as the quantum entanglement of $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ ?
* Question: Is the quantum entanglement of $`𝒬_{AB}`$ greater than the quantum entanglement of $`𝒬_{A^{}B^{}}^{}`$ ?

## 3. Lest we forget, quantum entanglement is …

Before we continue with our story of Alice and Bob, now is a good opportunity to restate the definition of quantum entanglement found in . Readers not familiar with this definition or related concepts should refer to sections 5 and 7 of .

###### Definition 1.

Let $`𝒬_1`$, $`𝒬_2`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`𝒬_n`$ be quantum systems with underlying Hilbert spaces $`_1`$, $`_2`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`_n`$, respectively. And let $`𝒬`$ denote the global quantum system consisting of all the quantum systems $`𝒬_1`$, $`𝒬_2`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`𝒬_n`$, where $`=_{j=1}^n_j`$ denotes the underlying Hilbert space of $`𝒬`$. Finally let the density operator $`\rho `$ on the Hilbert space $``$ denote the state of the global quantum system $`𝒬`$. Then $`𝒬`$ is said to be entangled with respect to the Hilbert space decomposition

$$=\underset{j=1}{\overset{n}{}}_j$$

if it can not be written in the form

$$\rho =\underset{k=1}{\overset{K}{}}\lambda _k\left(\underset{j=1}{\overset{n}{}}\rho _{(j,k)}\right)\text{ ,}$$

for some positive integer $`K`$, where the $`\lambda _k`$’s are positive real numbers such that

$$\underset{k=1}{\overset{K}{}}\lambda _k=1\text{ ,}$$

and where each $`\rho _{(j,k)}`$ is a density operator on the Hilbert space $`_j`$. If $`\rho `$ is a pure state, then $`𝒬`$ is entangled if $`\rho `$ can not be written in the form

$$\rho =\underset{j=1}{\overset{n}{}}\rho _j\text{ ,}$$

where $`\rho _j`$ is a density operator on the Hilbert space $`_j`$.

## 4. Back to Alice and Bob: Local Moves and the Fundamental Problem of Quantum Entanglement (FPQE)

Although the story of Alice and Bob was told with two qubits, the same story could have been told instead with three people, Alice, Bob, Cathy, and three qubits. Or for that matter, it could have equally been told for $`n`$ people with $`n`$ qubits. From now on, we will consider the more general story of $`n`$ people and $`n`$ qubits.

What Alice, Bob, Cathy, et al were trying to understand can be stated most succinctly as the Fundamental Problem of quantum entanglement, namely:

Fundamental Problem of Quantum Entanglement (FPQE). Let $`\rho `$ and $`\rho ^{}`$ be density operators representing two different states of a quantum system $`𝒬`$. Is it possible to move $`𝒬`$ from state $`\rho `$ to state $`\rho ^{}`$ by applying only local moves?

$$\overline{)\begin{array}{c}\text{But what is meant by the phrase “}\text{local move” }\text{?}\end{array}}$$

We define the standard local moves as:

###### Definition 2.

The standard local moves are:

* Local unitary transformations of the form

$$\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}U_k\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}𝕌\left(_k\right)$$

For example, for bipartite quantum systems, unitary transformations of the form $`U_AI`$, $`IU_B`$, $`U_AU_B`$
* Measurement of local observables of the form

$$\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}𝒪_k\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}Observables\left(_k\right)$$

###### Example 1.

For example, for bipartite quantum systems333A bipartite quantum system is a global quantum system consisting of two quantum systems., measurement of local observables of the form $`𝒪_AI`$, $`I𝒪_B`$, $`𝒪_A𝒪_B`$

We also define the extended local moves as

###### Definition 3.

The extended local moves are:

* Extended local unitary transformations of the form

$$\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}𝕌\left(_k\stackrel{~}{}_k\right)\text{ ,}$$

where $`_1`$, $`\stackrel{~}{}_1`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`_n`$, $`\stackrel{~}{}_n`$ are distinct non-overhapping Hilbert spaces
* Measurement of extended local observables of the form

$$\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}Observables\left(_k\stackrel{~}{}_k\right)\text{ ,}$$

where $`_1`$, $`\stackrel{~}{}_1`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`_n`$, $`\stackrel{~}{}_n`$ are distinct non-overlapping Hilbert spaces

###### Definition 4.

Moves based on unitary transformation are called reversible. Those based on measurement are called irreversible.

The Horodecki’s, , , Jonathan, , Linden, , Nielsen, , , , Plenio, , Popescu, , ,  have made some progress in understanding the FPQE in terms of all four of the above local moves. For the rest of the talk, we restrict our discussion to reversible standard local moves.

## 5. A momentary digression: Two different perspectives

Before continuing, it should be mentioned that physics and mathematics approach quantum mechanics from two slightly different but equivalent viewpoints. To avoid possible confusion, we describe below the minor terminology differences that arise from these two slightly different perspectives.

Physics describes the state of a quantum system in terms of a traceless Hermitian operator $`\rho `$, called the density operator. Observables are Hermitian operators $`𝒪`$. Quantum states change via unitary transformations $`U`$ according to the rubric

$$\rho U\rho U^{}\text{ .}$$

On the other hand, mathematics describes the state of a quantum system in terms of a skew Hermitian operator $`i\rho `$, also called the density operator. Observables are skew Hermitian operators $`i𝒪`$. Quantum dynamics are defined via the rule

$$i\rho Ad_U\left(i\rho \right)\text{ ,}$$

where $`U`$ is a unitary operator lying in the Lie group of unitary transformations $`𝕌\left(N\right)`$, and where $`Ad`$ denotes the big adjoint operator. Please note that both density operators $`i\rho `$ and the observables $`i𝒪`$ lie in the Lie algebra $`u\left(N\right)`$ of the unitary group $`𝕌\left(N\right)`$.

These minor, but nonetheless annoying differences are summarized in the table below.

Physics  Math        Hilbert Space $``$  $`Dim()=N`$     Unitary Group  Lie Group  $`𝕌(N)`$         $`\begin{array}{cc}\text{Observables:}\hfill & 𝒪\hfill \\ \text{Density Ops:}\hfill & \rho \hfill \end{array}\}`$     $`N\times N`$ Hermitian Ops  $`A^{}=\overline{A}^T=A`$      $`\begin{array}{cc}\text{Observables:}\hfill & i𝒪\hfill \\ \text{Density Ops:}\hfill & i\rho \hfill \end{array}\}`$     $`N\times N`$ skew Hermitian Ops $`u(N)`$  $`\left(iA\right)^{}=\overline{\left(iA\right)}^T=iA`$  where $`u(N)=`$ Lie algebra of $`𝕌(N)`$       Dynamics via $`U𝕌(N)`$  $`|\psi U|\psi `$  $`\rho U\rho U^{}`$     Dynamics via $`U𝕌(N)`$  $`|\psi U|\psi `$  $`i\rho Ad_U\left(i\rho \right)`$  where $`Ad_U(i\rho )=U(i\rho )U^1`$  is the Big adjoint rep.

We will use the two different terminologies and conventions interchangeably. Which terminology we are using should be clear from context.

###### Remark 1.

From  we know that an element $`i\rho `$ of the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ is a physical density operator if and only if $`\rho `$ is positive semi-definite and of trace 1. Thus, the set

$$\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(N\right)=\{i\rho 𝐮\left(N\right)\rho \text{ is positive semi-definite of trace 1}\}$$

of physical density operators is a convex subset of the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$.

## 6. The Group of Local Unitary Transformations and the Restricted FPQE

For the sake of clarity of exposition and for the purpose of avoiding minor technicalities, from on we consider only qubit quantum systems, i.e., quantum systems consisting of qubits. The reader, if he/she so wishes, should be able to easily rephrase the results of this paper to more general quantum systems.

Moreover, from this point on, we limit the scope of this talk to the study of quantum entanglement from the perspective of the standard local unitary transformations, i.e., from the perspective of standard reversible local moves as defined in section 5 of this paper. To emphasize this point, we define the group of local unitary transformations $`𝕃(2^n)`$ as follows:

###### Definition 5.

The group of local unitary transformations $`𝕃(2^n)`$ is the subgroup of $`𝕌(2^n)`$ defined by

$$𝕃(2^n)=\underset{1}{\overset{n}{}}𝕊𝕌(2)\text{ ,}$$

where $`𝕊𝕌(2)`$ denotes the special unitary group.

Henceforth, the phrase “local move” will mean an element of the group $`𝕃(2^n)`$ of local unitary transformations..

Convention. From this point on,

$$\overline{)\begin{array}{c}\text{Local Moves }=𝕃(2^n)\end{array}}$$

Thus, for the rest of this paper we consider only the Restricted Fundamental Problem of Quantum Entanglement (RFPQE), which is defined as follows:

Restricted Fundamental Problem of Quantum Entanglement (RFPQE). Let $`i\rho `$ and $`i\rho ^{}`$ be density operators lying in the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$. Does there exist a local move $`U`$, i.e., a $`U𝕃(2^n)`$ such that

$$i\rho ^{}=U\left(i\rho \right)U^{}=Ad_U\left(i\rho \right)\text{ ?}$$

We will need the following definition:

###### Definition 6.

Two elements $`i\rho `$ and $`i\rho ^{}`$ in $`u(2^n)`$ are said to be locally equivalent (or, of the same entanglement type), written

$$i\rho \underset{loc}{}i\rho ^{}$$

provided there exists a $`U𝕃(2^n)`$ such that

$$i\rho ^{}=Ad_U\left(i\rho \right)=U\left(i\rho \right)U^1$$

The equivalence class

$$\left[i\rho \right]_E=\{i\rho ^{}i\rho \underset{loc}{}i\rho ^{}\}$$

is called an entanglement class (or, an orbit of the big adjoint action of $`𝕃(2^n)`$ on the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$). Finally, let

$$𝐮(2^n)/𝕃(2^n)$$

denote the set of entanglement classes.

Figure 2. Quantum entanglement classes.

The entanglement classes of the Lie algebra $`𝐮(2^n)`$ are just the orbits of the big adjoint action of $`𝕃(2^n)`$ on $`𝐮(2^n)`$. Two states are entangled in the same way if and only if they lie in the same entanglement class, i.e., in the same orbit.

###### Remark 2.

Local unitary transformations can not entangle quantum systems with respect to the above tensor product decomposition. However, global unitary transformations (i.e., unitary transformations lying in $`𝕌\left(2^n\right)𝕃\left(2^n\right)`$ ) are those unitary transformations which can and often do produce interactions which entangle quantum systems.

$$\overline{)\begin{array}{c}\text{But what is quantum entanglement?}\end{array}}$$

## 7. Summary and List of Objectives

We are now in a position to state clearly the main objectives of this paper. Namely, in regard to the Restricted Fundamental Problem of Quantum Entanglement (RFPQE), our objectives are twofold:

* Given a density operator $`i\rho `$, devise a means of determining the dimension of its entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$. We will accomplish this by determining the dimension of the tangent plane $`T_{i\rho }\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ to the manifold $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ at the point $`i\rho `$.

* Given two states $`i\rho `$ and $`i\rho ^{}`$, devise a means of determining whether they belong to the same or different entanglement class. We will accomplish this by constructing a complete set of quantum entanglement invariants, i.e., invariants that completely specify all the orbits ( i.e., all the entanglement classes). In this sense, we have completely quantified quantum entanglement. In other words, find a finite set $`\{f_1,f_2,\mathrm{},f_K\}`$ of real valued functions on $`𝐮(2^n)`$ which distinguish all entanglement classes, i.e.,

$$i\rho \underset{loc}{}i\rho ^{}f_k(i\rho )=f_k(i\rho ^{})\text{ for every }k\text{}$$

## 8. If you are unfamiliar with … , then make a quantum jump to Appendices A & B

This section is meant to play the role of a litmus test for the reader. If the reader feels reasonably comfortable with the concepts listed below, then it is suggested that the reader proceed to the next section of this paper. If not, it is strongly suggested that the reader read Appendices A and B of this paper before proceeding to the next section.

Let $`𝔾`$ be a Lie group, and let $`𝔤`$ denote its Lie algebra.

### 8.1. Litmus Test 1. The exponential map

The reader should be familiar with the exponential map

$$\mathrm{exp}:𝔤𝔾\text{ ,}$$

which for matrix Lie Groups is given by the power series

$$\mathrm{exp}\left(M\right)=\underset{k=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{1}{k!}M^k$$

### 8.2. Litmus Test 2. The Lie bracket

The reader should be familiar with the Lie bracket

$$[,]:𝔤\times 𝔤𝔤\text{ ,}$$

which for matrix Lie groups is given by the commutator

$$[A,B]=ABBA$$

### 8.3. Litmus Test 3. The Lie algebra under three different guises

The Lie algebra $`𝔤`$ of the Lie group $`𝔾`$ can be viewed in each of the following mathematically equivalent ways:

* As $`T_I𝔾`$, i.e., as the tangent space to the Lie group $`𝔾`$ at the identity $`I`$.
* As $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$, i.e., as the Lie algebra of right invariant smooth vector fields on the Lie group $`𝔾`$.
* As $`\mathrm{𝐃𝐞𝐫}_{\mathrm{}}\left(𝔾\right)`$, i.e., as the Lie algebra of all derivations (i.e., directional derivatives) on the algebra $`C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝔾\right)`$ of all smooth real valued functions on $`𝔾`$.

In summary,

$$\overline{)𝔤=T_I𝔾=\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)=\mathrm{𝐃𝐞𝐫}_{\mathrm{}}\left(𝔾\right)}$$

If you feel comfortable with the above three litmus tests, then please proceed to the next section.

## 9. Definition of Quantum Entanglement Invariants

Let $`C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$ denote the algebra of smooth ($`C^{\mathrm{}}`$) real valued functions on the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$, i.e.,

$$C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)=\{f:𝐮\left(2^n\right)f\text{ is smooth}\}$$

###### Definition 7.

A function $`fC^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$ is called a (quantum) entanglement invariant if $`f`$ is invariant under the big adjoint action of $`𝕃\left(2^n\right)`$, i.e., if

$$f\left(Ad_U(i\rho )\right)=f(i\rho )$$

for all $`U𝕃\left(2^n\right)`$, and for all $`i\rho `$ in $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$. The collection of all (quantum) entanglement invariants forms an algebra, which we denote by

$$C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}\text{ .}$$

###### Definition 8.

A subset $`\{f_1,f_2,\mathrm{},f_m\}`$ of $`C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}`$ is called a complete set of entanglement invariants if

$$i\rho \underset{loc}{}i\rho ^{}\text{ iff }f_k\left(i\rho \right)=f_k\left(i\rho ^{}\right)\text{ for all }f_k\text{ in }\{f_1,f_2,\mathrm{},f_m\}\text{ .}$$

###### Definition 9.

Let $`𝒫\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)`$ be the subalgebra of $`C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$ of all functions $`fC^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$ which are polynomial functions, i.e., of all functions $`f`$ for which $`f\left(v\right)`$ is a polynomial function of the entries in $`v`$. We define the algebra of polynomial entanglement invariants as

$$𝒫\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}=𝒫\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}$$

###### Theorem 1.

$`𝒫\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}`$ is a finitely generated algebra.

###### Definition 10.

A minimal set of generators of $`𝒫\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}`$ is called a basic set of entanglement invariants.

###### Remark 3.

It is important to note that a basic set of entanglement invariants is not always a complete set of entanglement invariants. We will show that this is the case for entanglement invariants for two qubit quantum systems.

## 10. The Lie Algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ of $`𝕃(2^n)`$

To understand and work with the big adjoint action

$$𝕃\left(2^n\right)\times 𝐮\left(2^n\right)\stackrel{Ad}{}𝐮\left(2^n\right)$$

we will need to lift this action to the corresponding infinitesimal action of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ of $`𝕃(n)`$. The Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ will play a crucial role in our achieving objectives 1 and 2 as stated in the previous section.

###### Definition 11.

The Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ is the (real) Lie algebra given by the following Kronecker sum

$$\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)=\underset{n\text{ terms}}{\underset{}{\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(2\right)\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(2\right)\mathrm{}\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(2\right)}}\text{ ,}$$

where $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(2\right)`$ denotes the Lie algebra of the special unitary group $`𝕊𝕌\left(2\right)`$, and where the Kronecker sum$`AB`$’ of two matrices (or operators) $`A`$ and $`B`$ is defined by

$$AB=A\mathrm{𝟏}+\mathrm{𝟏}B\text{ ,}$$

with ‘$`\mathrm{𝟏}`$’ denoting the identity matrix (or operator).

A basis444For more information, please refer to Appendix B. of the (real) Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ is given by

$$\{\xi _{k_1k_2\mathrm{}k_n}k_1,k_2,\mathrm{},k_n=0,1,2,3\}\text{ ,}$$

where

$$\xi _{k_1k_2\mathrm{}k_n}=\frac{i}{2}\sigma _{k_1}\sigma _{k_2}\mathrm{}\sigma _{k_n}\text{ ,}$$

and where

$$\sigma _1=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right)\text{}\sigma _2=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& \hfill i\\ i& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}\sigma _3=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& \hfill 0\\ 0& \hfill 1\end{array}\right)\text{}$$

denote the Pauli spin matrices, and where

$$\sigma _0=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right)$$

denotes the $`2\times 2`$ identity matrix.

It follows that a basis of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ as a subalgebra of $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ is:

$$\{\xi _{k_1k_2\mathrm{}k_n}k_1,k_2,\mathrm{},k_n=0,1,2,3\text{, where exactly one }k_j0\}$$

For example,

* $`\left\{\xi _1\text{}\xi _2\text{}\xi _3\right\}`$ is a basis of $`\mathrm{}\left(1\right)`$
* $`\left\{\xi _{01}\text{}\xi _{02}\text{}\xi _{03}\text{}\xi _{10}\text{}\xi _{20}\text{}\xi _{30}\right\}`$ is a basis of $`\mathrm{}\left(2\right)`$
* $`\left\{\xi _{001}\text{}\xi _{002}\text{}\xi _{003}\text{}\xi _{010}\text{}\xi _{020}\text{}\xi _{030}\text{}\xi _{100}\text{}\xi _{200}\text{}\xi _{300}\right\}`$ is a basis of $`\mathrm{}\left(3\right)`$

Thus, we have the following proposition:

###### Proposition 1.

The Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ of the Lie group $`𝕃\left(2^n\right)`$ of local unitary transformations is of dimension $`3n`$, i.e.,

$$Dim\left(\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)\right)=3n$$

## 11. Definition of the Infinitesimal Action

We now show how quantum entanglement invariants can be found by lifting the big adjoint action to the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$, where the problem becomes a linear one.

The big adjoint action

$$𝕃\left(2^n\right)\times 𝐮\left(2^n\right)\stackrel{Ad}{}𝐮\left(2^n\right)$$

induces an infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)\stackrel{\Omega }{}\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)$$

as follows.

Let $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$. We define the vector field $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)`$ on $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ by constructing a tangent vector $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)|_{i\rho }`$ for each $`i\rho 𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$.

Let $`\gamma _v\left(t\right)`$ be the smooth curve in $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ defined by

$$\gamma _v\left(t\right)=Ad_{\mathrm{exp}\left(tv\right)}\left(i\rho \right)\text{ .}$$

Then $`\gamma _v\left(t\right)`$ is a curve which passes through $`i\rho `$ at time $`t=0`$. We define $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)|_{i\rho }`$ as the tangent vector to $`\gamma _v\left(t\right)`$ at $`t=0`$.

Figure 3. Induced infinitesimal action.

But what is the meaning of the infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)\stackrel{\Omega }{}\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)$$

that we have just defined?

Each $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(i\rho \right)|_{i\rho }`$ is a direction in $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ from $`i\rho `$ that we can move without leaving the quantum entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$. Movement in all directions not in $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$ will force us to immediately leave $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$.

Figure 4. Moving in a direction that stays within the entanglement class.

As the reader might expect, the infinitesimal action $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ can naturally be expressed in terms of the small adjoint operator $`ad`$. In particular, we have:

###### Proposition 2.

$`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)=ad_v`$ for all $`v`$ in the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$

###### Proof.

Let $`v`$ be an arbitrary element of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$, and let $`i\rho `$ be an arbitrary element of the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$.

By definition, $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)(i\rho )`$ is the tangent vector at $`t=0`$ to the curve $`\gamma _v\left(t\right)`$ in $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ given by

$$\gamma _v\left(t\right)=Ad_{\mathrm{exp}\left(tv\right)}\left(i\rho \right)\text{ .}$$

Hence,

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)\left(i\rho \right)& =& \frac{d}{dt}Ad_{\mathrm{exp}\left(tv\right)}\left(i\rho \right)|_{t=0}\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& \frac{d}{dt}\mathrm{exp}\left(ad_{tv}\right)\left(i\rho \right)|_{t=0}\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& \frac{d}{dt}\mathrm{exp}\left(tad_v\right)\left(i\rho \right)|_{t=0}\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& \frac{d}{dt}\left(1+tad_v+o(t^2)\right)\left(i\rho \right)|_{t=0}\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& ad_v\left(i\rho \right)\hfill \end{array}$$

The above formula will prove to be useful when we actually calculate the entanglement invariants of some examples given in later sections.

## 12. The significance of the infinitesimal action $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$

As stated in the appendices, the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$ of all smooth vector fields on $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ can be identified with the Lie algebra of derivations $`\mathrm{𝐃𝐞𝐫}\left(C^{\mathrm{}}𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$.

The significance of the infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{\Omega }:\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)$$

is best expressed in terms of the following theorem:

###### Theorem 2.

Let

$$\{v_1,v_2,\mathrm{},v_{3n}\}$$

be a basis for the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$. Then a smooth real valued function

$$f:𝐮\left(2^n\right)$$

is an entanglement invariant if and only if it satisfies the following system of partial differential equations

$$\{\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_1\right)f& =& 0\\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_2\right)f& =& 0\\ & & \\ \mathrm{}& \mathrm{}& \mathrm{}\\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_{3n}\right)f& =& 0\end{array}$$

The intuition underlying the above theorem is that $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_1\right)`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_2\right)`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_{3n}\right)`$ are the linearly independent directions we can move without leaving the entanglement class we are currently in. Hence, if $`f`$ is an entanglement invariant, then its rate of change (i.e., its directional derivative) in each of the directions $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_1\right)`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_2\right)`$, $`\mathrm{}`$ , $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_{3n}\right)`$ must be zero, and vice versa.

This theorem provides us with a means of determining a complete set of entanglement invariants. All that we need to do is to solve the above system of partial differential equations.

## 13. Achieving our two objectives, … finally

We now show how the infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)\stackrel{\Omega }{}\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)$$

can be used to achieve the two objectives listed in section 8 of this paper.

* Given an arbitrary density operator $`i\rho `$, devise a means of determining the dimension of its entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$.

Objective 1 is achieved as follows:

We begin by noting that $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)|_{i\rho }`$ is the same as the tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)`$ to $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ at the point $`i\rho `$, and that $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$ is the same as the tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)`$ to the entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ at $`i\rho `$. Hence, the dimension of $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ is same as the dimension as its tangent space at $`i\rho `$, i.e.,

$$Dim\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)=Dim\left(T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)\right)=Dim\left(\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }\right)$$

The task of finding the dimension of the entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ reduces to that of computing the dimension of the vector space $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$. We will give examples of this dimension calculation in the next two sections.

We next use the infinitesimal action to achieve:

* Given two states $`i\rho `$ and $`i\rho ^{}`$, devise a means of determining whether they belong to the same or different entanglement class.

as follows:

We begin by noting that $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2^n\right)\right)`$ can be identified with the Lie algebra $`Der\left(C^{\mathrm{}}𝐮(2^n)\right)`$ of derivations on $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$. Next we recall that $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)`$ consists of all directions in $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ that we can move without leaving an entanglement class that we are in. If

$$f\left(C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}$$

is an entanglement invariant, then $`f`$ will not change if we move in any direction within $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)`$. As a result we have the following theorem:

###### Theorem 3.

Let $`v_1,v_2,\mathrm{},v_{3n}`$ be a vector space basis of the (real) Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$. Then

$$f\left(C^{\mathrm{}}\left(𝐮(2^n)\right)\right)^{𝕃\left(2^n\right)}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_j\right)f=0$$

for all $`j`$, where $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v_j\right)`$ is interpreted as a differential operator in $`Der\left(C^{\mathrm{}}𝐮(2^n)\right)`$.

In other words, the task of finding entanglement invariants reduces to that of solving a system of linear partial differential equations. We will give examples of this calculation in the examples found in the next two sections of this paper.

## 14. Example 1. The entanglement classes of $`n=1`$ qubits

We now make use of the methods developed in the previous section to study the entanglement classes associated with $`n=1`$ qubits. This is a trivial but nonetheless instructive case. As we shall see, there is no entanglement in this case. But there are many entanglement classes!

For this example, the local unitary group $`𝕃\left(2^1\right)`$ is the same as the special unitary group $`𝕊𝕌\left(2^1\right)`$. The corresponding Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^1\right)`$ is the same as the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}(2)`$. Each density operator $`i\rho `$ lies in the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^1\right)`$.

As an immediate consequence of Proposition 2 of Section 11, the infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{\Omega }:\mathrm{}\left(2^1\right)\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2\right)\right)$$

is simply the small adjoint action, i.e.,

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)=ad_v\text{ ,}$$

for all $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^1\right)`$.

We can now use the bases555See Section 10.

$$\begin{array}{c}\left\{\xi _1=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _1,\xi _2=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _2,\xi _3=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _3\right\}\\ \text{ and }\\ \left\{\xi _0=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _0,\xi _1=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _1,\xi _2=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _2,\xi _3=\frac{1}{2}\sigma _3\right\}\end{array}$$

of the respective Lie algebras $`\mathrm{}\left(2^1\right)`$ and $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$ to find a more useful expression for $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)`$.

Each element $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^1\right)`$ can be uniquely expressed in the form

$$v=a\xi \text{ ,}$$

where $`a=(a_1,a_2,a_3)^3`$ and $`\xi =(\xi _1,\xi _2,\xi _3)`$. Thus,

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)=\mathrm{\Omega }\left(a\xi \right)=ad_{a\xi }=aad_\xi \text{ ,}$$

where

$$ad_\xi =(ad_{\xi _1},ad_{\xi _2},ad_{\xi _3})\text{ .}$$

Moreover, each element $`i\rho 𝐮\left(2\right)`$ can be uniquely written in terms of the basis of $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$ as

$$i\rho =x_0\xi _0+x\xi \text{ ,}$$

where $`x=(x_1,x_2,x_3)`$ and $`\xi =(\xi _1,\xi _2,\xi _3)`$.

In terms of the basis of $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$,

$$ad_{\xi _j}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 0& L_j\end{array}\right)=0L_j\hfill & \text{if }j=1,2,3\hfill \\ & \\ \left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 0& 0\end{array}\right)=0\hfill & \text{if }j=0\hfill \end{array}\text{ ,}$$

where

$$L_1=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 1& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}L_2=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}L_3=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 1& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)$$

is the basis666This follows from the following calculation:
$$\begin{array}{ccccccc}ad_{\xi _j}\left(\xi _k\right)& =& ad_{i\sigma _j/2}\left(i\sigma _k/2\right)\hfill & =\hfill & [i\sigma _j/2,i\sigma _k/2]\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{4}[\sigma _j,\sigma _k]\hfill \\ & =& \frac{1}{2}iϵ_{jkp}\sigma _p\hfill & =\hfill & ϵ_{jkp}\xi _p\hfill & & \end{array}$$
where $`L_j=\left(ϵ_{jkp}\right)`$. of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐨}\left(3\right)`$ of the special orthogonal group $`𝕊𝕆\left(3\right)`$ given in Appendix B.

Let

$$\left\{\frac{}{x_0}\text{}\frac{}{x_1}\text{}\frac{}{x_2}\text{}\frac{}{x_3}\right\}$$

denote the basis777For those unfamiliar with this basis, please refer to Appendix A page 18.1. of $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2\right)\right)`$ induced by the chart

$$\begin{array}{ccc}𝐮\left(2\right)& \stackrel{𝜋}{}& ^4\\ & & \\ i\rho =_{j=0}^3x_j\xi _j& & (x_0,x_1,x_2,x_3)=(x_0,x)\end{array}\text{ .}$$

In other words, for each $`j`$, $`/x_j`$ denotes the vector field on $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$ defined at each point $`i\rho `$ as the tangent vector to the curve $`\pi ^1(x_0,\mathrm{},x_j+t,\mathrm{},x_3)=i\rho +t\xi _j`$ at $`t=0`$.

Then,

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)\left(i\rho \right)& =& (x_0,x)\left(0aL\right)\left(\begin{array}{c}/x_0\\ /x_1\\ /x_2\\ /x_3\end{array}\right)\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& x(aL)\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& ax\times \text{ ,}\hfill \end{array}\text{ ,}$$

where ‘$`\times `$’ denotes the vector cross product, and where

$$L=(L_1,L_2,L_3)\text{ and }=\left(\begin{array}{c}/x_1\\ /x_2\\ /x_3\end{array}\right)\text{ .}$$

We can now achieve objective 1.

Objective 1. Given an arbitrary density operator $`i\rho `$ in $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$, find the dimension of an arbitrary entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$.

From the above discussion, it follows that the image $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)`$ of the infinitesimal action $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is spanned by the three vector fields

$$\{\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _1\right)& =& x_3\frac{}{x_2}x_2\frac{}{x_3}\\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _2\right)& =& x_1\frac{}{x_3}x_3\frac{}{x_1}\\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _3\right)& =& x_2\frac{}{x_1}x_1\frac{}{x_2}\end{array}\text{ ,}$$

defined on $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)=\{i\rho =_{j=0}^3x_j\xi x_0,x_1,x_2,x_3\}`$. In particular, the tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)=\left(\mathrm{Im}\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$ of the entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ at the point $`i\rho `$ is spanned by

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _1\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _2\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _3\right)|_{i\rho }$$

As can be easily verified by the reader, the above three vectors span a two dimensional space if $`\left|x\right|0`$ and a zero dimensional vector space if $`\left|x\right|=0`$.

Since $`\left(\mathrm{Im}\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$ is the tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)`$ of $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ at the point $`i\rho `$, and since the dimension of $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ is the same as the dimension of its tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)`$ at $`i\rho `$, it follows that the dimension of the entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ is given by:

$$Dim\left[i\rho \right]_E=\{\begin{array}{ccc}2& \text{if}& \left|x\right|0\\ & & \\ 0& \text{if}& \left|x\right|0\end{array}$$

We are now ready to achieve objective 2:

Objective 2. Given two states $`i\rho `$ and $`i\rho ^{}`$, devise a means of determining whether they belong to the same or different entanglement class.

We achieve this objective by determining a complete set of entanglement invariants888As we shall see, in this particular case of $`n=1`$ qubits, the complete set of entanglement invariants consists of only one invariant. for one qubit quantum systems, i.e., by determining a set of entanglement invariants $`\{f_1,f_2,\mathrm{},f_k\}`$ such that

$$i\rho \underset{loc}{}i\rho ^{}\text{ if and only if }f_j\left(i\rho \right)=f_j\left(i\rho ^{}\right)\text{ for all }j\text{ .}$$

.

We begin by recalling that the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2\right)\right)`$ of vector fields on $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$ can be identified with the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐃𝐞𝐫}\left(C^{\mathrm{}}𝐮(2)\right)`$ of all derivations on the smooth real valued functions on $`𝐮(2)`$. Thus, the elements of $`\mathrm{Im}\mathrm{\Omega }`$ can be viewed as directional derivatives, directional derivatives in those directions in which we can move and still remain in the same entanglement class.

From theorem 2, it immediately follows that a real valued function $`f:𝐮(2)`$ is an entanglement invariant if and only it is a solution of the system of partial differential equations (PDEs):

$$\{\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _1\right)f=0\\ \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _2\right)f=0\\ \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _3\right)f=0\end{array}$$

Since from above we know that $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _j\right)\left(i\rho \right)=xL_j`$, we can write the above system of PDEs more explicitly as:

$$\{\begin{array}{c}x_3\frac{f}{x_2}x_2\frac{f}{x_3}=0\\ \\ x_1\frac{f}{x_3}x_3\frac{f}{x_1}=0\\ \\ x_2\frac{f}{x_1}x_1\frac{f}{x_2}=0\end{array}\text{ ,}$$

where, as before, $`i\rho =x_0\xi _0+x\xi `$.

From theorem 2, we know that a complete set of quantum entanglement invariants for one qubit systems is the same as a complete functionally independent set of solutions of the above system of PDEs. Thus, solving the above system of PDEs by standard methods found in the theory of differential equations, we find that

$$\left\{f\left(x\right)=\sqrt{x_1^2+x_2^2+x_3^2}\right\}$$

is a complete set of entanglement invariants.

A functionally equivalent complete set of entanglement invariants is

$$\left\{f^{}=x_1^2+x_2^2+x_3^2\right\}\text{ ,}$$

which is also a basic set of entanglement invariants.

###### Remark 4.

Fortunately, in this simplest case, a complete set of entanglement invariants and a basic set of entanglement invariants are one and the same. This will not be the case for quantum systems of more than one qubit.

### 14.1. The Bloch “sphere”

As a result of the previous calculation, we have a complete set of entanglement invariants, namely

$$f\left(x\right)=\sqrt{x_1^2+x_2^2+x_3^2}=\left|x\right|$$

We have completely classified all the entanglement classes for 1 qubit quantum systems. For in this case,

$$\left[i\rho \right]_E=\left[i\rho ^{}\right]f(i\rho )=f(i\rho ^{})\text{ .}$$

As a consequence of this result, the induced foliation of the space $`\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(2^1\right)`$ of all physical density operators lying in in the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^1\right)`$ can be visualized in terms of the 3-ball or radius 1 in $`^3`$, called the Blochsphere.”

Recall from remark on page 1 that

$$\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(2^1\right)=\{i\rho 𝐮\left(2^1\right)\rho \text{ is positive semi-definite and of trace one}\}$$

is a convex subset of the of the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^1\right)`$. In this special case of $`n=1`$ qubit, it is a straight forward exercise to show that

$$\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(2^1\right)=\{i\rho =x_0\xi _0+x\xi \left|x\right|1\text{ and }x_0=1\}\text{ .}$$

Thus, the convex subset $`\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(2^1\right)`$ of $`𝐮\left(2^1\right)`$ of all physical density operators $`i\rho `$ in $`𝐮\left(2^1\right)`$ can naturally be identified with the 3-ball of radius one via the one-to-one correspondence

$$i\rho =x_0\xi _0+x_1\xi _1+x_2\xi _2+x_3\xi _3(x_1,x_2,x_3)$$

as illustrated in Figure 5.

Figure 5. The Bloch “sphere”

It follows that each entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ is simply a sphere of radius $`f(i\rho )=\left|x\right|`$. The sphere of radius one is the entanglement class of all pure ensembles. All other spheres represent entanglement classes of mixed ensembles. The “sphere” of radius $`0`$ (i.e., the origin) represents the entanglement class of the maximally mixed ensemble.

IAnd so we can conclude that the space of entanglement classes lying in the space formed by identifying the elements of the convex set $`\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(2^1\right)`$ via the action of the local transformation group $`𝕃\left(2^1\right)`$, namely

$$\mathrm{𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲}\left(2^1\right)/𝕃\left(2^1\right)\text{ ,}$$

is simply a closed999The adjective “closed” means that the line segment contains both its endpoints. line segment.

In terms of this picture, it is easy to visualize the tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)`$ to $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ at $`i\rho `$. Moreover, it is easy to visualize the normal bundle of $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$. For the normal vector field is simply

$$x_1\frac{}{x_1}+x_2\frac{}{x_2}+x_3\frac{}{x_3}|_{\left[i\rho \right]_E}$$

Unfortunately, for quantum systems of more than one qubit, such a visualization is by no means as easy.

## 15. Example 2. The entanglement classes of $`n=2`$ qubits

As one might expect, the entanglement of two qubit quantum systems is much more complex than that of one qubit quantum systems. In fact, with each additional qubit, the entanglement becomes exponentially more complex than before. Perhaps this is a strong hint as to where the power of quantum computation is coming from?

For this example, the local unitary group $`𝕃\left(2^2\right)`$ is the Lie group $`𝕊𝕌\left(2^1\right)𝕊𝕌\left(2^1\right)`$. The corresponding Lie algebra $`\mathrm{}\left(2^2\right)`$ is Kronecker sum101010We remind the reader that the Kronecker sum $`AB`$ of two matrices (operators) $`A`$ and $`B`$ is defined as
$$AB=A\mathrm{𝟏}+\mathrm{𝟏}B$$
where $`\mathrm{𝟏}`$ denotes the identity matrix (operator). $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}(2)\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}(2)`$. Each density operator $`i\rho `$ lies in the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^2\right)`$.

As an immediate consequence of Proposition 2 given in Section 11, the infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{\Omega }:\mathrm{}\left(2^2\right)\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2^2\right)\right)$$

is simply the small adjoint action, i.e.,

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)=ad_v\text{ ,}$$

for all $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^2\right)`$.

We can now use the bases111111See Section 10.

$$\begin{array}{c}\{\xi _{10},\xi _{20},\xi _{30},\xi _{01},\xi _{02},\xi _{03},\}\\ \text{ and }\\ \{\xi _{ij}i,j=0,1,2,3\}\end{array}$$

of the respective Lie algebras $`\mathrm{}\left(2^2\right)`$ and $`𝐮\left(2^2\right)`$ to find a more useful expression for $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)`$, where

$$\xi _{ij}=\frac{i}{2}\sigma _i\sigma _j\text{ .}$$

.

Each element $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^2\right)`$ can be uniquely expressed in the form

$$v=\left(a\xi \right)I_4+I_4\left(b\xi \right)=a\xi b\xi \text{ ,}$$

where $`a=(a_1,a_2,a_3)`$ and $`b=(b_1,b_2,b_3\text{,})`$ lie in $`^3`$, where $`\xi =(\xi _1,\xi _2,\xi _3)`$, and where $`I_4`$ is the $`4\times 4`$ identity matrix. Thus,

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)& =& \mathrm{\Omega }\left(_{j=1}^3\left(a_j\xi _{j0}+b_j\xi _{0j}\right)\right)\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& \mathrm{\Omega }\left(a\xi b\xi \right)\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& ad_{a\xi b\xi }\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& ad_{\left(a\xi \right)I_4}+ad_{I_4\left(b\xi \right)}\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& I_4\left(aad_\xi \right)+\left(bad_\xi \right)I_4\hfill \end{array}$$

where

$$ad_\xi =(ad_{\xi _1},ad_{\xi _2},ad_{\xi _3})\text{ .}$$

But as in example 1,

$$ad_{\xi _j}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 0& L_j\end{array}\right)=0L_j\hfill & \text{if }j=1,2,3\hfill \\ & \\ \left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 0& 0\end{array}\right)=0\hfill & \text{if }j=0\hfill \end{array}\text{ ,}$$

where

$$L_1=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 1& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}L_2=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}L_3=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 1& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)$$

is the basis of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐨}\left(3\right)`$ of the special orthogonal group $`𝕊𝕆\left(3\right)`$ given in Appendix B on page 19.4.3.

Let

$$\{/x_{jk}j,k=0,1,2,3\}$$

denote the basis of $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝐮\left(2^2\right)\right)`$ induced by the chart

$$\begin{array}{ccc}𝐮\left(2^2\right)& \stackrel{𝜋}{}& ^{16}\\ & & \\ i\rho =_{i,j=0}^3x_{ij}\xi _{ij}& & (x_{00},x_0,x_{10},x_1,x_{20},x_2,x_{30},x_3)\end{array}$$

where

$$\begin{array}{c}(x_{00},x_0,x_{10},x_1,x_{20},x_2,x_{30},x_3)\hfill \\ \\ =(x_{00},x_{01},x_{02},x_{03},x_{10},x_{11},x_{12},x_{13},x_{20},x_{21},x_{22},x_{23},x_{30},x_{31},x_{32},x_{33})\hfill \end{array}$$

In other words, for each pair $`(j,k)`$, $`/x_{jk}`$ denotes the vector field on $`𝐮\left(2^2\right)`$ defined at each point $`i\rho `$ as the tangent vector to the curve

$$\pi ^1(x_{00},\mathrm{},x_{jk}+t,\mathrm{},x_{33})=i\rho +t\xi _{jk}$$

at $`t=0`$.

In terms of the above chart, $`\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)\left(i\rho \right)`$ can be written as

$$(x_{00},x_0,x_{10},x_1,x_{20},x_2,x_{30},x_3)\left[I_4\left(0aL\right)+\left(0bL\right)I_4\right]\left(\begin{array}{c}/x_{00}\\ /x_0\\ /x_{10}\\ /x_1\\ /x_{20}\\ /x_2\\ /x_{30}\\ /x_3\end{array}\right)\text{ ,}$$

which simplifies to

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)\left(i\rho \right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(ax_q\times \frac{}{x_q}+bx_q\times \frac{}{x_q}\right)\text{ ,}$$

where ‘$`\times `$’ denotes the vector cross product121212The vector cross product is computed according to the right-hand rule..

We can now achieve objective 1.

Objective 1. Given an arbitrary density operator $`i\rho `$ in $`𝐮\left(2\right)`$, find the dimension of an arbitrary entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$.

From the above discussion, it follows that the image $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)`$ of the infinitesimal action $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is spanned by the six vector fields

$$\begin{array}{c}\{\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{01}\right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(x_{q2}\frac{}{x_{q3}}x_{q3}\frac{}{x_{q2}}\right)\\ \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{02}\right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(x_{q3}\frac{}{x_{q1}}x_{q1}\frac{}{x_{q3}}\right)\\ \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{03}\right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(x_{q1}\frac{}{x_{q2}}x_{q2}\frac{}{x_{q1}}\right)\end{array}\\ \\ \{\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{10}\right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(x_{2q}\frac{}{x_{3q}}x_{3q}\frac{}{x_{2q}}\right)\\ \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{20}\right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(x_{3q}\frac{}{x_{1q}}x_{1q}\frac{}{x_{3q}}\right)\\ \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{30}\right)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{3}{}}\left(x_{1q}\frac{}{x_{2q}}x_{2q}\frac{}{x_{1q}}\right)\end{array}\end{array}$$

In particular, the tangent space $`T_{i\rho }\left(\left[i\rho \right]_E\right)=\left(\mathrm{Im}\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$ to the entanglement class $`\left[i\rho \right]_E`$ at the point $`i\rho `$ is spanned by

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{01}\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{02}\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{03}\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{10}\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{20}\right)|_{i\rho }\text{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{30}\right)|_{i\rho }$$

We leave it as an exercise for the reader to verify that the above six vector fields are linearly independent almost every where. Thus, it follows that almost all entanglement classes are of dimension six.

However, there are notable exceptions. Consider the Bell state131313It should be noted that all four 2 qubit Bell states lie in the same entanglement class. It is this fact that makes quantum teleportation possible., $`|\psi =\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left(|00|11\right)`$. The corresponding density operator $`i\rho `$ is

$$i\rho =\frac{i}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cccc}\hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\end{array}\right)=\left(\frac{1}{2}\right)\xi _{00}+\left(\frac{1}{2}\right)\xi _{11}+\left(\frac{1}{2}\right)\xi _{22}+\left(\frac{1}{2}\right)\xi _{33}\text{ ,}$$

where

$$\xi _{jk}=\frac{i}{2}\sigma _j\sigma _k\text{ .}$$

Hence,

$$x_{jk}=\{\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \frac{1}{2}& \text{if}& j=k=0,2,3\hfill \\ & & \\ \hfill \frac{1}{2}& \text{if}& j=k=1\hfill \\ & & \\ \hfill 0& \text{if}& jk\hfill \end{array}$$

Thus, in this case $`\mathrm{Im}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho }`$ is spanned by

$$\begin{array}{c}\{\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{01}\right)|_{i\rho }\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{}{x_{23}}\frac{}{x_{32}}\right)\hfill \\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{02}\right)|_{i\rho }\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{}{x_{31}}+\frac{}{x_{13}}\right)\hfill \\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{03}\right)|_{i\rho }\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{}{x_{12}}\frac{}{x_{21}}\right)\hfill \end{array}\\ \\ \{\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{10}\right)|_{i\rho }\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{}{x_{32}}\frac{}{x_{23}}\right)\hfill \\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{20}\right)|_{i\rho }\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{}{x_{13}}+\frac{}{x_{31}}\right)\hfill \\ & & \\ \mathrm{\Omega }\left(\xi _{30}\right)|_{i\rho }\hfill & =\hfill & \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{}{x_{21}}\frac{}{x_{12}}\right)\hfill \end{array}\end{array}$$

Hence,

$$Dim\left[i\rho _{Bell}\right]_E=Dim\left[\left(\mathrm{Im}\mathrm{\Omega }\right)|_{i\rho _{Bell}}\right]=3$$

This only confirms the conventional wisdom that the entanglement class of the Bell states is truly exceptional.

We are now ready for objective 2:

Objective 2. Given two states $`i\rho `$ and $`i\rho ^{}`$, devise a means of determining whether they belong to the same or to different entanglement classes.

The complete functionally independent set of solutions to the above system of PDEs (hence, a complete set of entanglement invariants) was found by Linden and Popescu in. These invariants are as described below141414We are using a notation different from that found in .. For further details please refer to .

Let $`i\rho `$ be an arbitrary element of the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^2\right)`$. Then in terms of the earlier described chart $`\pi `$,

$$i\rho =\underset{j,k=0}{\overset{3}{}}x_{jk}\xi _{jk}\text{ ,}$$

where $`\left\{\xi _{jk}\right\}`$ denotes the basis of $`𝐮\left(2^2\right)`$ described earlier.

We will change our notation slightly. Let $`x_{}`$ denote the $`3\times 3`$ matrix

$$x_{}=\left(x_{jk}\right)_{j,k=1,2,3}\text{ ,}$$

and let $`x_0`$ and $`x_0`$ denote the vectors

$$\{\begin{array}{ccc}x_0& =& (x_{01},x_{02},x_{02})\\ & & \\ x_0& =& (x_{10},x_{20},x_{30})\end{array}$$

Finally, let $`Z`$ denote the matrix

$$Z=x_{}x_{}^T\text{ ,}$$

where the superscript ‘$`T`$’ denotes the transpose. Then the nine algebraically independent polynomial functions listed in the table

| $`Tr\left(Z\right)`$ | $`\underset{}{\overset{}{Tr\left(Z^2\right)}}`$ | $`det\left(x_{}\right)`$ |
| --- | --- | --- |
| $`x_0x_0^T`$ | $`\underset{}{\overset{}{x_0Zx_0^T}}`$ | $`x_0Z^2x_0^T`$ |
| $`x_0x_{}x_0^T`$ | $`\underset{}{\overset{}{x_0Zx_{}x_0^T}}`$ | $`x_0Z^2x_{}x_0^T`$ |

form a basic set of entanglement invariants.

But the above nine entanglement invariants do not form a complete set of entanglement invariants! A tenth polynomial function

$$x_0\left(Zx_0^T\right)\times \left(Z^2x_0^T\right)\text{ }$$

is needed to form a complete system of entanglement invariants. Although this tenth entanglement invariant is algebraically dependent on the above nine entanglement invariants, it is still needed to determine the sign of the components of $`i\rho `$.

## 16. Example $`n`$. The entanglement classes of $`n`$ qubits, $`n>2`$

For $`n`$ qubits ($`n>2`$), the same methods lead to the following formula for the infinitesimal action

$$\overline{)\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Omega }\left(v\right)\left(i\rho \right)=\underset{q_1,q_2\mathrm{}q_{n1}=0}{\overset{3}{}}\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}a^{(k)}x_{q_1q_2\mathrm{}q_{k1}q_{k+1}\mathrm{}q_{n1}}\times \frac{}{x_{q_1q_2\mathrm{}q_{k1}q_{k+1}\mathrm{}q_{n1}}}\end{array}}$$

where $`v\mathrm{}\left(2^n\right)`$ and $`i\rho 𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ are given by

$$\{\begin{array}{ccc}v& =& \underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}a^{(k)}\xi \underset{\text{ in }k\text{-th position}}{_{\underset{}{00\mathrm{}00\mathrm{}0}}}\hfill \\ & & \\ i\rho & =& \underset{r_1,r_2,\mathrm{},r_n=0}{\overset{3}{}}x_{r_1r_2\mathrm{}r_n}\xi _{r_1r_2\mathrm{}r_n}\hfill \end{array}$$

We will leave the solution to the corresponding system of PDEs to future papers.

## 17. Conclusion

There is much more that could be said about quantum entanglement. This paper presents only a small part of the big picture. But hopefully this paper will provide the reader with some insight into this rapidly growing research field. Since this paper was written, research in quantum entanglement has literally had an explosive expansion, and even now continues to do so. We refer the reader to the references at the end of this paper, which represent only a few of the many papers in this rapidly expanding field.

## 18. Appendix A. Some Fundamental Concepts from the Theory of Differential Manifolds

### 18.1. Differential manifolds, tangent bundles, and vector fields

###### Definition 12.

A topological space $`M^m`$ is an $`𝐦`$-dimensional manifold if it is locally homeomorphic to $`^m`$, i.e., if there exists an open cover $`𝒲=\left\{W_\alpha \right\}`$ of $`M^m`$ such that for each $`W_\alpha 𝒲`$, there is associated a homeomorphism

$$W_\alpha \stackrel{\phi _\alpha }{}^m$$

$$x(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m)$$

which maps $`W_\alpha `$ onto an open subset of $`^m`$. We call

$$(\phi _\alpha ,W_\alpha )$$

a chart on $`\mathrm{M}^\mathrm{m}`$, and

$$\mathrm{\Phi }=\left\{(\phi _\alpha ,W_\alpha )\right\}$$

an Atlas on $`M^m`$.

An Atlas is said to be smooth ($`C^{\mathrm{}}`$), if whenever

$$\phi _\beta \phi _\alpha ^1:\phi _\alpha \left(W_\alpha W_\beta \right)\phi _\beta \left(W_\alpha W_\beta \right)$$

is defined, is a smooth ($`C^{\mathrm{}}`$) map of $`\phi _\alpha \left(W_\alpha W_\beta \right)^n`$ into $`\phi _\beta \left(W_\alpha W_\beta \right)^n`$. A smooth ($`C^{\mathrm{}}`$) manifold is a topological manifold with a smooth atlas.

Figure 6. A chart $`\pi _\alpha :𝐌^\mathrm{𝟒}`$ on a manifold $`𝐌`$.

Figure 7. An atlas is smooth if every $`\pi _\alpha \pi _\beta ^1`$ is smooth when defined.

###### Definition 13.

Let $`M`$ and $`N`$ be smooth manifolds. Then a map

$$f:MN$$

is said to be smooth if for every $`xM`$ there exist charts $`(\phi _\alpha ,W_\alpha )`$ of $`M`$ and $`(\psi _\beta ,V_\beta )`$ of $`N`$ containing $`x`$ and $`f(x)`$ respectively such that

$$\psi _\beta f\phi _\alpha ^1:\phi _\alpha \left(W_\alpha \right)\phi _\beta \left(V_\beta \right)$$

is smooth.

###### Definition 14.

Let x be an element of a smooth manifold $`M`$, and let $`\gamma _1(t)`$ and $`\gamma _2(t)`$ be smooth curves in $`M`$ which pass through $`x`$, i.e., such that there exists $`t_1,t_2`$ for which

$$\gamma _1(t_1)=x=\gamma _2(t_2)$$

Then $`\gamma _1`$ and $`\gamma _2`$ are said to be tangentially equivalent at $`x`$, written

$$\gamma _1\underset{𝑥}{}\gamma _2\text{ ,}$$

if they are tangent at the point $`x`$, i.e., if there is a chart $`(\phi _\alpha ,W_\alpha )`$ on $`M`$ containing $`x`$ such that

$$\frac{d}{dt}\left(\phi _\alpha \gamma _1\right)(t)_{t=t_1}=\frac{d}{dt}\left(\phi _\alpha \gamma _2\right)(t)_{t=t_2}$$

###### Remark 5.

It can easily be shown that the relation $`\underset{𝑥}{}`$ is independent of the chart selected.

###### Definition 15.

A tangent vector $`(x,v)`$ (also written simply as $`v`$) to $`M`$ at $`x`$ is a tangential equivalence class at $`x`$. The tangent space of $`M^n`$ at $`x`$, denoted by $`T_xM^n`$, is the set of tangent vectors to $`M`$ at $`x`$. $`T_xM`$ can be shown to be an $`n`$-dimensional vector space.

Let

$$TM=\underset{xM}{}T_xM\text{ ,}$$

and let $`\pi `$ be the map

$$TM\stackrel{𝜋}{}M$$

$$(x,v)x$$

If $`\phi _\alpha :W_\alpha ^m`$ is a chart on $`M`$, then

$$\phi _\alpha \pi :\pi ^1W_\alpha ^m$$

can be shown to be a chart on $`TM`$. In this way, $`TM`$ becomes a smooth manifold and $`\pi `$ becomes a smooth map. $`TM`$ together with the map $`\pi `$ is called the tangent bundle of $`M`$.

###### Definition 16.

A vector field $`v`$ on a smooth manifold $`M^m`$ is a smooth map

$$v:M^mTM^m$$

Let $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M^m)`$ be the set of all vector fields on the smooth manifold $`M^m`$. This is easily seen to be a vector space where, for example, the sum $`u+v`$ of two vector fields is defined by

$$(u+v)|_x=u|_x+v|_x\text{ }$$

for all $`xM^m`$.

We will now consider the charts of the tangent bundle $`TM`$ in a more explicit way.

Let

$$W_\alpha \stackrel{\phi _\alpha }{}^m$$

$$x(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m)$$

be a chart on the smooth manifold $`M^m`$, and let $`a`$ be an arbitrary point in $`U_\alpha `$. Thus,

$$\phi _\alpha (a)=(a_1,a_2,\mathrm{},a_m)\text{ .}$$

For each $`j`$ ($`j=1,2,\mathrm{},m`$) consider the smooth curve

$$\gamma _j(t)=\phi _\alpha ^1(a_1,a_2,\mathrm{},a_j+t,\mathrm{},a_m)$$

in $`U_\alpha `$ which passes through the point $`a`$ at time $`t=0`$. Then for each such $`j`$, let

$$\frac{}{x_j}|_aT_aM$$

denote the tangent vector to the curve $`\gamma _j`$ at $`a`$. It can be shown that

$$\frac{}{x_1}|_a\text{}\frac{}{x_2}|_a\text{}\mathrm{}\text{}\frac{}{x_m}|_a$$

is a vector space basis of the tangent space $`T_aM`$.

Moreover, since this construction is respect to an arbitrary point $`a`$ in $`W_\alpha `$, it can be shown that we have actually constructed for each $`j`$ a smooth vector field

$$\frac{}{x_j}\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(TW_\alpha )\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(TM)$$

In fact, it can be shown that

$$\frac{}{x_1}\text{}\frac{}{x_2}\text{}\mathrm{}\text{}\frac{}{x_m}$$

is a basis of $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(TW_\alpha )`$, and hence a local basis of $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(TM)`$.

We can now express each chart $`(\phi _\alpha \pi ,\pi ^1W_\alpha )`$ explicitly as:

$$\pi ^1W_\alpha \stackrel{\phi _\alpha \pi }{}^{2m}$$

$$(x,\mu _1\frac{}{x_1}+\mu _2\frac{}{x_2}+\mathrm{}+\mu _m\frac{}{x_m})(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m,\mu _1,\mu _2,\mathrm{},\mu _m)$$

where $`\mu _j`$’s on the left denote functions of $`xM`$, and where $`\mu _j`$’s on the right denote functions of $`(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m)^m`$.

###### Definition 17.

Let $`M`$ and $`N`$ be smooth manifolds, and let $`f:MN`$ be a smooth map, and let$`a`$ be an arbitrary point of $`M`$. We define a vector space morphism

$$df|_a:T_aMT_{f(a)}N$$

as follows:

For each $`vT_aM`$, there is a representative smooth curve $`\gamma _v(t)`$ in $`M`$ which passes through the point $`a`$ and which has $`v`$ as its tangent vector at the point $`a`$. It follows that $`f\gamma _v(t)`$ is a smooth curve in $`N`$ passing through the point $`f(a)`$. We define

$$df|_a(v)T_{f(a)}N$$

as the tangent vector to $`f\gamma _v(t)`$ at the point $`f(a)`$. It is then a simple exercise to show that $`df|_a`$ is a vector space morphism.

Since $`a`$ was an arbitrary point of $`M`$, this leads to the definition of a smooth map $`df:TMTN`$, called the differential of $`f`$, such that the following diagram is commutative:

$$\begin{array}{cccc}TM& \stackrel{df}{}& TN& \\ & & & \\ M& \stackrel{𝑓}{}& N& \text{.}\end{array}$$

###### Remark 6.

In local coordinates, $`df`$ maps the tangent vector

$$v|_x=\underset{i=1}{\overset{m}{}}\mu _i\frac{}{x_i}$$

to the tangent vector

$$df(v|_x)=\underset{j=1}{\overset{n}{}}\left(\underset{i=1}{\overset{m}{}}\mu _i\frac{f_j}{x_i}\right)\frac{}{y_j}\text{ .}$$

Thus, the matrix expression of the linear transformation $`df`$ is just the Jacobian matrix

$$\left(\frac{f_j}{x_i}(x)\right)_{m\times n}\text{ .}$$

### 18.2. Exponentiation of vector fields

###### Definition 18.

Let $`M`$ be a smooth manifold, and let $`v\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M)`$ be a smooth vector field on $`M`$. A curve $`\gamma (t)`$ in $`M`$ is said to be an integral curve of $`v`$ if $`v|_{\gamma (t)}`$ is the tangent vector to $`\gamma (t)`$ for each $`t`$ for which $`\gamma (t)`$ is defined.

In terms of local coordinates, an integral curve $`\gamma (t)`$ of a smooth vector field

$$v(x)=\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}\mu _i(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m)\frac{}{x_i}$$

is a solution to the system of ordinary differential equations

$$\frac{dx_i}{dt}=\mu _i(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m)\text{ , }i=1,2,\mathrm{},m$$

Since $`v`$ is smooth, its coefficients $`\mu ^i(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_m)`$ are smooth functions. Consequently, it follows from the standard existence and uniqueness theorems for systems of ordinary differential equations that there exists a unique solution for each set of initial conditions.

Thus, for each $`x`$ in $`M`$, there exists a unique maximal integral curve $`\gamma _v(t,x)`$ passing through $`x`$ at time $`t=0`$, and call $`\gamma _v(t,x)`$ the flow generated by the vector field $`v`$. We call $`v`$ the infinitesimal generator of the flow. It can be easily shown that

$$\gamma _v(t,\gamma _v(s,x))=\gamma _v(t+s,x)\text{ .}$$

Hence, we are justified in adopting the following suggestive notation:

$$e^{tv}x$$

for the flow $`\gamma _v(t,x)`$.

In terms of our new notation, the properties of the flow can be expressed as

* $`e^{sv}e^{tv}x=e^{(s+t)v}x`$
* $`e^{0v}x=x`$
* $`\frac{d}{dt}\left(e^{tv}x\right)=v|_{e^{tv}x}`$ .

### 18.3. Vector fields viewed as directional derivatives

We now show how vector fields can be viewed as partial differential operators.

###### Definition 19.

A derivation $`D`$ on an algebra $`𝒜`$ is a map

$$D:𝒜𝒜$$

such that

* (Linearity) $`D\left(\alpha f+\beta g\right)=\alpha Df+\beta Dg`$
* (Leibnitz Rule) $`D\left(fg\right)=\left(Df\right)g+f\left(Dg\right)`$

###### Definition 20.

A Lie algebra $`𝔸`$ is a vector space together with a binary operation

$$[,]:𝔸\times 𝔸𝔸\text{ ,}$$

called a Lie bracket for $`𝔸`$, such that

* (Bilinearity)

$$\begin{array}{ccc}[\lambda _1a_1+\lambda _2a_2,b]& =& \lambda _1[a_1,b]+\lambda _2[a_2,b]\\ & & \\ [a,\lambda _1b_1+\lambda _2b_2]& =& \lambda _1[a,b_1]+\lambda _2[a,b_2]\end{array}$$
* (Skew-Symmetry)

$$[a,b]=[b,a]$$
* (Jacobi Identity)

$$[a,[b,c]]+[c,[a,b]]+[b,[c,a]]=0$$

###### Proposition 3.

The set of derivations $`Der(𝒜)`$ on an algebra $`𝒜`$ is a Lie algebra with Lie bracket given by:

$$[D_1,D_2]=D_1D_2D_2D_1$$

Let $`𝐂^{\mathrm{}}(M)`$ denote the algebra of real valued functions on the smooth manifold $`M`$. Then, it follows that $`\mathrm{𝐃𝐞𝐫}(𝐂^{\mathrm{}}(M))`$ is a Lie algebra.

We will now show how to identify the elements of $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M)`$ with derivations in $`\mathrm{𝐃𝐞𝐫}(𝐂^{\mathrm{}}(M))`$, and thereby show that $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M)`$ is more than a vector space. It is actually a Lie algebra.

Each smooth vector field $`v`$ on $`M`$ can be thought of as a directional derivative in the direction $`v`$ as follows: Let $`v\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M)`$ and let $`f𝐂^{\mathrm{}}(M)`$. Define $`v(f)`$ as:

$$v(f)|_x=\frac{d}{dt}f\left(e^{tv}x\right)|_{t=0}$$

Thus, we have:

###### Proposition 4.

$`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M)`$ is a Lie algebra of derivations on the algebra $`𝐂^{\mathrm{}}(M)`$.

It is enlightening, to view the above in terms of local coordinates. From this perspective,

$$v=\underset{i=1}{\overset{m}{}}\mu _i(x)\frac{}{x_i}\text{ .}$$

Thus, if we use the chain rule and the fact that

$$\frac{d}{dt}\left(e^{tv}x\right)=v|_{e^{tv}x}\text{ ,}$$

we have

$$\frac{d}{dt}f\left(e^{tv}x\right)=\underset{i1}{\overset{m}{}}\xi ^i\left(e^{tv}x\right)\frac{f}{x^i}\left(e^{tv}x\right)=\left(\underset{i=1}{\overset{m}{}}\xi ^i\frac{}{x^i}\right)\left(f\right)|_{e^{tv}x}\text{ .}$$

Hence,

$$v=\underset{i=1}{\overset{m}{}}\mu _i\frac{}{x_i}Vec(U_\alpha )Vec(M)$$

acts as a first order partial differential operator, thereby justifying the notation.

So viewing $`v`$ as a first order partial differential operator, we can write

$$\frac{d}{dt}f\left(e^{tv}x\right)=v(f)|_{e^{tv}x}\text{ ,}$$

and, in particular,

$$\frac{d}{dt}f\left(e^{tv}x\right)|_{t=0}=v(f)(x)\text{ ,}$$

where $`v(f)(x)`$ now denotes (locally) $`\left(_{i=1}^m\mu _i\frac{}{x_i}\right)f`$ evaluated at $`x`$.

## 19. Appendix B. Some Fundamental Concepts from the Theory of Lie Groups

### 19.1. Lie groups

###### Definition 21.

A Lie group $`𝔾`$ is a group which is a smooth manifold whose differential structure is compatible with the group operations, i.e., such that

* The multiplication map of $`𝔾`$

$$𝔾\times 𝔾𝔾$$

$$(g_1,g_2)g_1g_2$$

and,
* The inverse map of $`G`$

$$𝔾𝔾$$

$$gg^1$$

are smooth functions.

A closed subgroup $``$ of $`𝔾`$ can be shown to be a subgroup, and hence is called a Lie subgroup of $`𝔾`$.

###### Definition 22.

A one parameter subgroup of a Lie group $`𝔾`$ is a smooth morphism from the additive Lie group of reals $`,+`$ to the group $`𝔾`$.

### 19.2. Some examples of Lie groups

Let $`V`$ denote an $`n`$-dimensional vector space over the real numbers $``$ with the standard vector inner product which we denote by $`,`$.

* $`𝔾𝕃(n,)`$ The real general linear group of all automorphisms of the vector space $`V`$. This can be identified with the group of all nonsingular $`n\times n`$ matrices over the reals.
* $`𝕆(n)`$ The real orthogonal group is the group of all automorphisms which preserve the inner product $`,`$. This can be identified with the group of orthogonal matrices , i.e., matrices $`A`$ of the form

$$A^T=A^1$$

where the superscript $`\mathrm{`}\mathrm{`}T\mathrm{"}`$ denotes the matrix transpose.
* $`𝕊𝕃(n,)`$ The real special linear group is the group of all real $`n\times n`$ matrices of determinant $`1.`$ $`SL(n,)`$ is the group of all rigid motions in hyperbolic $`n`$-space.
* $`𝕊𝕆(n)=𝕆(n)𝕊𝕃(n,)`$ The special orthogonal group is the group of all orthogonal real $`n\times n`$ matrices of determinant $`1`$. This group can be identified with the group of all rotations in $`^n`$ about a fixed point such as the origin.

Let $`W`$ denote an $`n`$-dimensional vector space over the complex numbers $``$ with the standard sesquilinear inner product which we also denote by $`,`$.

* $`𝔾𝕃(n,)`$ The complex general linear group of all automorphisms of the vector space $`W`$. This can be identified with the group of all nonsingular $`n\times n`$ matrices over the complexes.
* $`𝕊𝕃(n,)`$ The complex special linear group is the group of all complex $`n\times n`$ matrices of determinant $`1.`$
* $`𝕌(n)`$ The unitary group is the group of all $`n\times n`$ unitary matrices over the complex numbers $``$, i.e., all $`n\times n`$ complex matrices $`A`$ such that

$$A^{}=A^1$$

where $`A^{}`$ denotes the conjugate transpose.
* $`𝕊𝕌(n)=𝕌(n)𝕊𝕃(n,)`$ The special unitary group is the group of all unitary matrices of determinant 1.

### 19.3. The Lie algebra of a Lie group

###### Definition 23.

Let $`𝔾`$ be a Lie group. For each element $`h𝔾`$, we define the right multiplication map, written $`R_h`$, as

$$𝔾\stackrel{R_h}{}𝔾$$

$$ggh$$

The map $`R_h`$ is an autodiffeomorphism of $`𝔾`$. We let

$$dR_h:T𝔾T𝔾$$

denote the corresponding differential of this diffeomorphism.

Finally, a vector field $`v\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(𝔾)`$ is said to be right invariant if

$$\left(dR_h\right)\left(v|_g\right)=v|_{gh}$$

###### Definition 24.

Let $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$ denote the set of right invariant vector fields on $`𝔾`$. Then $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$ as a subset of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}\left(𝔾\right)`$ inherits the structure of a Lie algebra. We call $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$ the Lie algebra of the Lie group $`𝔾`$.

Let $`I`$ denote the identity element of the Lie group $`𝔾`$. Since a right invariant vector field $`v\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$ is completely determined by its restriction to the tangent space $`T_I𝔾`$ via

$$v|_g=\left(dR_g\right)\left(v|_I\right)\text{ ,}$$

we can, and do, identify the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$ with the tangent space $`T_I𝔾`$, i.e.,

$$\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)=T_I𝔾\text{ .}$$

The tangent bundle $`T𝔾`$ of a Lie group $`𝔾`$ is trivial. For it can be shown that $`T𝔾`$ is bundle isomorphic to $`𝔾\times T_I𝔾`$. However, there is some additional and useful structure induced on the Lie algebra $`Vec_R\left(𝔾\right)=T_I𝔾`$ by the Lie group structure of $`𝔾`$, i.e., the exponential map.

###### Definition 25.

We define the exponential map $`\mathrm{exp}`$ from the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$ to the Lie group $`G`$ as

$$\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)\stackrel{exp}{}𝔾$$

$$v\left(e^{vt}\right)I|_{t=1}$$

In other words, we simply follow the flow $`\gamma _v(t,g)=e^{vt}g`$ from the identity $`I`$ to the point $`e^vI`$ in $`𝔾`$.

It can be shown that the exponential map

$$\mathrm{exp}:\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)𝔾$$

is a local diffeomorphism. It also follows that, for each $`v\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)`$, $`\mathrm{exp}\left(tv\right)`$ is a one parameter subgroup of $`G`$. In fact, all one parameter subgroups are of this form.

### 19.4. Some examples of Lie algebras

#### 19.4.1. Example: The Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ of the unitary group $`𝕌\left(N\right)`$.

In this case, $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ is the Lie algebra of all $`N\times N`$ skew Hermitian151515A square matrix $`M`$ is skew Hermitian if $`\overline{M}^T=M`$. matrices of $``$. This can be seen as follows:

The Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ is the tangent space $`T^I𝕌\left(N\right)`$ to $`𝕌\left(N\right)`$ at the $`N\times N`$ identity matrix $`I`$. Hence, $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ consists of all tangent vectors $`\stackrel{}{U}\left(0\right)=\frac{d}{dt}U\left(t\right)|_{t=0}`$ of all curves $`U\left(t\right)`$ in $`𝕌\left(N\right)`$ which pass through $`I`$ at $`t=0`$, i.e., which satisfy $`U\left(0\right)=I`$.

Since $`U(t)`$ is unitary, i.e., since

$$U\left(t\right)\overline{U}\left(t\right)^T=I\text{}$$

we find by differentiating the above formula that

$$\stackrel{}{U}\left(t\right)\overline{U}\left(t\right)^T+U\left(t\right)\overline{\stackrel{}{U}}\left(t\right)^T=0\text{ .}$$

Setting $`t=0`$, we have

$$\overline{\stackrel{}{U}}\left(0\right)^T=\stackrel{}{U}\left(0\right)\text{ .}$$

Thus all matrices in $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ are skew Hermitian.

Let $`M`$ be an arbitrary skew $`N\times N`$ Hermitian matrix. Then

$$U\left(t\right)=\mathrm{exp}\left(tM\right)$$

is a curve in $`𝕌\left(N\right)`$ which passes through $`I`$ at $`t=0`$ for which $`\stackrel{}{U}\left(0\right)=M`$. Hence, $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ is the Lie algebra of all $`N\times N`$ skew Hermitian matrices over $``$.

Let

$$\sigma _1=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right)\text{}\sigma _2=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& i\\ i& 0\end{array}\right)\text{}\sigma _3=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right)$$

denote the Pauli spin matrices, and let

$$\sigma _0=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right)$$

denote the $`2\times 2`$ identity matrix. Then the following is a basis of the Lie algebra $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$

$$\{\xi _{j_1j_2\mathrm{}j_n}j_1,j_2,\mathrm{},j_n=0,1,2,3\}\text{ ,}$$

where

$$\xi _{j_1j_2\mathrm{}j_n}=\frac{i}{2}\sigma _{j_1}\sigma _{j_2}\mathrm{}\sigma _{j_n}\text{ .}$$

###### Remark 7.

Please note that, although $`𝐮\left(N\right)`$ is a Lie algebra of complex matrices, it is nonetheless a real Lie algebra. Thus, the above basis $`\left\{\xi _{j_1j_2\mathrm{}j_n}\right\}`$ of $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ is a basis of $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ over the reals $``$. But the matrices in $`𝐮\left(2^n\right)`$ are still matrices of complex numbers!

#### 19.4.2. Example: The Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(N\right)`$ of the special unitary group $`𝕊𝕌\left(N\right)`$.

The Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(N\right)`$ for the special unitary group is the same as the Lie algebra of all $`N\times N`$ traceless skew Hermitian matrices, i.e., of all $`N\times N`$ skew Hermitian matrices $`M`$ such that $`trace\left(M\right)=0`$. A basis of the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐮}\left(2^n\right)`$ is

$$\{\xi _{j_1j_2\mathrm{}j_n}j_1,j_2,\mathrm{},j_n=0,1,2,3\}\left\{\xi _{00\mathrm{}0}\right\}\text{ .}$$

#### 19.4.3. Example: The Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐨}\left(3\right)`$ of the special unitary group $`𝕊𝕆\left(3\right)`$.

Finally, we should mention that the Lie algebra $`\mathrm{𝐬𝐨}\left(3\right)`$ of the special orthogonal group $`𝕊𝕆\left(3\right)`$ is the Lie algebra of all $`3\times 3`$ skew symmetric matrices over the reals $``$. The following three matrices form a basis for $`so\left(3\right)`$

$$L_1=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 1& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}L_2=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 1\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{}L_3=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 0& \hfill 1& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 1& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\\ \hfill 0& \hfill 0& \hfill 0\end{array}\right)\text{ .}$$

### 19.5. Lie groups as transformation groups on manifolds

###### Definition 26.

Let $`M`$ be a smooth manifold. Then a group of transformations acting on $`M`$ is a Lie group $`𝔾`$ together with a smooth map

$$𝔾\times MM$$

$$(g,x)gx$$

such that

* For all $`xM`$, and for all $`g_1,g_2𝔾`$

$$g_1(g_2x)=(g_1g_2)x$$
* For all $`M`$,

$$ex=x\text{ ,}$$

where $`e`$ denotes the identity of $`𝔾`$.

$`𝔾`$ is called a transformation group of $`M`$.

###### Definition 27.

Let $`M`$ be a smooth manifold, and let $`𝔾`$ be a Lie group acting on $`M`$. Then the action

$$𝔾\times MM$$

induces an infinitesimal action

$$\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}_R\left(𝔾\right)\stackrel{\mathrm{\Psi }_G}{}\mathrm{𝐕𝐞𝐜}(M)\text{ , }$$

where $`\mathrm{\Psi }_𝔾\left(v\right)|_x`$ is the tangent vector to the curve

$$\gamma _v(t,x)=e^{tv}x$$

in $`M`$ at $`x`$, i.e.,

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_𝔾\left(v\right)|_x=\frac{d}{dt}\left(e^{tv}x\right)|_{t=0}\text{ .}$$

### 19.6. The big and little adjoint representations

Let $`𝔾`$ be a Lie algebra, and let $`𝔤`$ denote the corresponding Lie algebra.

For each element $`h𝔾`$, consider the inner automorphism:

$$𝔾\stackrel{_h}{}𝔾$$

$$ghgh^1$$

and let

$$T𝔾\stackrel{d_h}{}T𝔾$$

denote the corresponding differential. We can now define the big adjoint representation

$$Ad:𝔾Aut(𝔤)$$

by

$$Ad_h=\left(d_h\right)|_I$$

where $`I`$ denotes the identity of $`G`$, and where $`Aut(𝔤)`$ denotes the group of automorphisms of the Lie algebra $`𝔤`$.

We can now in turn define the little adjoint representation

$$ad:𝔤End\left(𝔤\right)$$

of the Lie algebra $`𝔤`$ by

$$ad_v\left(u\right)=[u,v]\text{ ,}$$

where $`[,]`$ denotes the Lie bracket, and where $`End\left(𝔤\right)`$ denotes the ring of endomorphisms of the Lie algebra $`𝔤`$.

As the story goes, $`End\left(𝔤\right)`$ is actually the Lie algebra of the Lie group $`Aut(𝔤)`$, and we have the following commutative diagram

$$\begin{array}{ccc}𝔤& \stackrel{ad}{}& End\left(𝔤\right)\\ \mathrm{exp}& & \mathrm{exp}\\ G& \stackrel{Ad}{}& Aut(𝔤)\end{array}$$

which relates the big and little adjoints. Little adjoint $`ad`$ is actually the differential $`d\left(Ad\right)`$ restricted to the identity $`I`$ of the big adjoint $`Ad`$.

Perhaps the following example would be of help:

###### Example 2.

Let $`𝔾`$ be the special unitary group $`𝕊𝕌(2)`$. Let $`su(2)`$ denote its Lie algebra. Then $`Aut\left(𝔾\right)`$ is the special orthogonal group $`𝕊𝕆(3)`$ and $`End\left(𝔤\right)`$ is the Lie algebra $`so(3)`$ of $`𝕊𝕆(3)`$. Thus, we have the familiar commutative diagram

$$\begin{array}{ccc}su(2)& \stackrel{ad}{}& so(3)\\ \mathrm{exp}& & \mathrm{exp}\\ 𝕊𝕌(2)& \stackrel{Ad}{}& 𝕊𝕆(3)\end{array}$$

used in quantum mechanics and in quantum computation.

###### Remark 8.

The reader should verify that

$$ad_{\xi _j}=L_j$$

### 19.7. The orbits of transformation Lie group actions

Finally, we should remark that the entanglement classes defined previously in this paper are nothing more than the orbits of a group action. For completeness, we give the definition below:

###### Definition 28.

A subset $`𝒪`$ of the smooth manifold $`M`$ is an orbit of the action of the group $`𝔾`$ on $`M`$ provided

* $`x𝒪gx𝒪`$ for all $`g𝔾`$, and
* If $`S`$ is a non-empty subset of $`𝒪`$ which satisfies condition 1) above, then $`S=𝒪`$.

In other words, an orbit is a minimal nonempty invariant subset of $`M`$.