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Keye Martin
Naval Research Laboratory
Center for High Assurance Computer Systems
Washington, DC 20375
keye.martin@nrl.navy.mil
Introduction
The study of measurement was initiated within the context of computation [3].
In [5], it is shown that measurement can be used to prove xed point theorems for
mappings that are not monotone and unique xed point theorems for mappings
that are monotone. Results like these can be used to provide a unied view
of numerical algorithms, for instance. In such applications, we are primarily
concerned with operators f whose iterates f n (x) converge to a xed point p.
The informatic derivative df (p) then measures the rate at which f converges
to p.
The view of computation taken in the study of measurement, that a computation is a process that evolves on a space of informatic objects, and that as it
evolves we can measure the amount of information lost or gained, in retrospect
lends itself very naturally to considerations in other areas, such as physics or the
study of communication. In [2], it was discovered that natural domain theoretic
structure existed in quantum mechanics. And developments such as [7] and [6]
establish the importance of domains and measurements in classical information
theory.
In this paper, we establish the signicance of domain theory and measurement
in quantum information theory. We rst show that a classical binary channel is
Scott continuous and has a Scott closed set of xed points i it is a binary symmetric channel, while a qubit channel is Scott continuous and has a Scott closed
set of xed points i it is unital. The binary symmetric channels are exactly the
entropy increasing binary channels; the unital qubit channels are exactly the entropy increasing qubit channels. One reason such channels are important is that
L. Aceto et al. (Eds.): ICALP 2008, Part II, LNCS 5126, pp. 283297, 2008.
c Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2008
284
K. Martin
We review the basic ideas in the study of domains and measurements, and then
the two examples of domains that are of interest in this paper.
2.1
285
xn = lim xn .
n1
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K. Martin
In this paper, all measurements we work with measure all of D. This implies [5]
that they are strictly monotone:
x y & x = y x = y
This property enables denition of the informatic derivative:
Denition 7. Let (D, ) be a domain with a measurement that measures all
of D. If f : D D is a function and p D is not compact, then
df (p) = lim
xp
f (x) f (p)
x p
(0, 1)
6
x
-
f lip
= ( 12 ,
1
2)
2.3
287
Let H2 denote an two dimensional complex Hilbert space with specied inner
product |.
Denition 9. A quantum state is a density operator : H2 H2 , i.e., a selfadjoint, positive, linear operator with tr() = 1. The quantum states on H2 are
denoted 2 .
Quantum states are also sometimes call density operators or mixed states. The
set of eigenvalues of an operator , called the spectrum of , is denoted spec().
Denition 10. A quantum state on H2 is pure if
spec() {0, 1}.
The set of pure states is denoted 2 . They are in bijective correspondence with
the one dimensional subspaces of H2 .
Classical states are distributions on the set of pure states max(2 ). An analogous
result holds for quantum states: density operators encode distributions on the
set of pure states 2 .
Denition 11. A quantum observable is a self-adjoint linear operator e : H2
H2 .
Now, if we have the operator e representing the energy observable of a system
(for instance), then its spectrum spec(e) consists of the actual energy values a
system may assume. If our knowledge about the state of the system is represented
by density operator , then quantum mechanics predicts the probability that a
measurement of observable e yields the value spec(e). It is
pr( e ) := tr(pe ),
where pe is the projection corresponding to eigenvalue and e is its associated
eigenspace in the spectral representation of e.
Denition 12. Let e be an observable on H2 with spec(e) = {1, 2}. For a
quantum state on 2 ,
spec(|e) := (pr( e1 ), pr( e2 )) 2 .
We assume that all observables e have |spec(e)| = 2. Intuitively, then, e is an
experiment on a system which yields one of 2 dierent outcomes; if our a priori
knowledge about the state of the system is , then our knowledge about what
the result of experiment e will be is spec(|e). Thus, spec(|e) determines our
ability to predict the result of the experiment e.
Let [a, b] = ab ba denote the commutator of operators.
288
K. Martin
We review classical binary channels, qubit channels and then a special subclass
of each of them: the entropy increasing channels.
3.1
289
Classical Channels
A binary channel has two inputs (0 and 1) and two outputs (0 and 1).
An input is sent through the channel to a receiver. Because of noise in the
channel, what arrives may not necessarily be what the sender intended. The eect
of noise on input data is modelled by a noise matrix u. If data is sent through
the channel according to the distribution x, then the output is distributed as
y = x u. The noise matrix u is given by
aa
u=
b b
where a = P (0|0) is the probability of receiving 0 when 0 is sent and b = P (0|1)
is the probability of receiving 0 when 1 is sent and x := 1 x for x [0, 1]. Thus,
the noise matrix of a binary channel can be represented by a point (a, b) in the
unit square [0, 1]2 and all points in the unit square represent the noise matrix of
some binary channel.
The noise matrix u of a binary channel denes a function f : 2 2 ,
given by f (x) = x u, which maps an input distribution x 2 to an output
distribution f (x) 2 .
3.2
Quantum Channels
290
K. Martin
(ii)
(iii)
(iv)
(v)
The
The
The
The
291
Our rst result establishes that from the domain theoretic perspective, unital
qubit channels are the quantum analogue of binary symmetric channels in the
classical case.
Theorem 3
A classical channel f : 2 2 is binary symmetric i it is Scott continuous and its set of xed points is Scott closed.
A quantum channel f : 2 2 is unital if and only if it is Scott continuous
and its set of xed points is Scott closed.
Proof. First consider the classical case. If a classical channel f is Scott continuous, then it has a least xed point, and since the set of xed points is Scott closed,
= (1/2, 1/2) must be a xed point. This implies that f is binary symmetric
since
aa
(1/2, 1/2)
= ((a + b)/2, (
a + b)/2) = (1/2, 1/2)
b b
Conversely, suppose that f is binary symmetric. Then it can be written as
f (a, b) = (1 p) (a, b) + p (b, a)
for some p [0, 1]. First we show that f is Scott continuous. For the monotonicity
of f , let x, y 2 with x y. Then we want to show f (x) f (y). Writing
x = (x1 , x2 ) and y = (y1 , y2 ), we have
(y1 x1 1/2)
or
(1/2 x1 y1 )
or
where we have written f (x) = (f1 (x), f2 (x)) and f (y) = (f1 (y), f2 (y)). Notice
that
f1 (x) = (1 2p)x1 + p and f1 (y) = (1 2p)y1 + p.
We consider the cases y1 x1 1/2 and 1/2 x1 y1 separately.
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K. Martin
In the rst case, f1 (y) f1 (x) 1/2 holds when p 1/2, and 1/2 f1 (x)
f1 (y) holds when p 1/2. In the second case, 1/2 f1 (x) f1 (y) holds when
p 1/2, and f1 (y) f1 (x) 1/2 holds for p 1/2. Thus, f (x) f (y),
which proves f is monotone. Its Scott continuity now follows from its Euclidean
continuity and the fact that suprema in the Bayesian order coincide with limits
in the Euclidean topology.
Now we show that the xed points of f form a Scott closed set. If p = 0, then
f is the identity mapping, in which case its set of xed points is Scott closed.
Otherwise, its only xed point is , since for p > 0,
(a, b) = f (a, b) = (a, b) = (b, a) = (a, b) = (1/2, 1/2) = .
Either way, the xed points of f form a Scott closed subset of 2 .
In the quantum case, any channel f that is Scott continuous and has a Scott
closed set of xed points must have as a xed point, and so must be unital. For
the converse, we rst show that any unital f is Scott continuous. Recall that f
can be written in Bloch form as f (r) = M r for some 3 3 real matrix M . Then
f is Euclidean continuous, and since suprema in the spectral order are limits in
the Euclidean topology, f is Scott continuous in the spectral order provided it
is monotone.
For the monotonicity of f , let r s in the spectral order on 2 . Then the
straight line segment s : [0, 1] 2 from to s, given by s (t) = t s
for t [0, 1], must pass through r. To show that f (r) f (s), we must show
that the line from to f (s) passes through f (r). But this much is clear since
f (s (t)) = M (t s) = t f (s) = f (s) (t). Thus, all unital channels are Scott
continuous.
To see that the set of xed points x(f ) is Scott closed, we rst show that it is
a lower set. If s x(f ) and r s, then r lies on the line segment that joins to
s. But any point on this line is a xed point of f since f (s (t)) = f (s) (t) =
s (t). In particular, r x(f ). The set x(f ) is closed under directed suprema
by the Scott continuity of f . Thus, x(f ) is Scott closed.
2
Selfmaps on Hausdor spaces have closed sets of xed points. But the Scott
topology is not Hausdor, so the result above is meaningful. The fact that the set
of xed points is Scott closed also has experimental signicance: in attempting
to prepare |0 during QKD, Alice actually prepares (1 )|00| + |11| for
some small > 0. Then this too is a xed point of the noise operator, provided
|0 is, so the only reduction in capacity is due solely to error in preparation
Alice does not suer more noise simply because she cannot prepare a qubit
exactly.
293
Theorem 4 ([2]). There is a unique partial order on 2 that satises the mixing
law
x y and p [0, 1] x (1 p)x + py y
and has := (1/2, 1/2) as a least element. It is the Bayesian order on classical
two states.
Because of the simplicity of 2 , it then follows that the binary symmetric channels are exactly the classical channels that are Scott continuous and have a Scott
closed set of xed points. In this section, we prove the analogous result for the
spectral order.
The special orthogonal group SO(3) is the set of 33 orthogonal real matrices
M with a positive determinant i.e. those matrices M such that M 1 = M t and
det(M ) = +1. Such matrices are called rotations.
Lemma 1
(i) Every rotation f SO(3) is the Bloch representation of a unital channel,
(ii) For any x max( 2 ), there is a rotation f SO(3) such that f (x) =
(0, 0, 1).
Proof. (i) This is a folklore result, see [8] for instance.
(ii) This follows from the fact that SO(3) is a transitive group action on S 2 .
However, we want to write a self-contained paper, so let us give a simpler proof.
Every unit vector x appears as the third column M (0, 0, 1) of some orthogonal
matrix M since by the Gram-Schmidt process we can always nd an orthonormal
basis {v1 , v2 , v3 } whose rst vector is v1 = x. Given such an orthonormal basis,
we construct an orthogonal matrix f whose column vectors are the vectors in
the orthonormal basis with the third column being x.
So let us take an orthogonal matrix M such that M (0, 0, 1) = x. Then M 1
is an orthgonal matrix with M 1 (x) = (0, 0, 1). If det(M 1 ) = 1, we set
1 0 0
f = 0 1 0 M 1
0 01
then f is a rotation with f (x) = (0, 0, 1). Otherwise, det(M 1 ) = +1, in which
case we set f = M 1 .
2
Theorem 5. There is a unique partial order on 2 with the following three
properties:
(i) It has least element = I/2,
(ii) It satises the mixing law: if r s, then r tr + (1 t)s s, for all
t [0, 1],
(iii) Every unital channel f : 2 2 is monotone and has a lower set of xed
points.
It is the spectral order, and gives 2 the structure of a Scott domain on which all
unital channels are Scott continuous and have a Scott closed set of xed points.
294
K. Martin
Proof. In this proof, we work with Bloch representations. By the mixing law,
the depolarization channel dt (x) = tx + (1 t) = tx is deationary, so tx x
for each t [0, 1]. Thus, contains the spectral order.
Now suppose r s. We want to show that r precedes s on the line that travels
from to s and on to a pure state. Draw the line a from to r until it hits
the boundary of the Bloch sphere at a point a. Similarly, let b denote the line
from to s and on to a pure state b. Since r s and s b, we have r b by
transitivity and thus r a, b.
Let f be a rotation such that f (b) = (0, 0, 1). Then f (b) = (0, 0, 1). Let
p be the Bloch representation of a projective measurement in the basis whose
Bloch vectors are {f (b), f (b)}. Then
Im(p) = {(0, 0, t) : t [1, 1]}
Since r b, f (r) f (b) and thus p(f (r)) p(f (b)). But, p(f (b)) = f (b), so
f (r) is also a xed point, since the xed points of p are Scott closed. Then
f (r), f (b) Im(p). This means f (r) and f (b) lie on a line that joins a pure state
to its antipode. Because f is a rotation, the same is true of r and b. However, by
the mixing law, the line from r to b, which increases with respect to , does not
pass through since is the least element (otherwise, r = and the proof is
nished). Then a = b, which means r and s lie on a line that joins to a pure
state a.
So let us write r = xa and s = ya for x, y [0, 1]. If x y, the proof is done.
If x > y, then s = (y/x)r r using the depolarization operator dy/x . But since
r s, we have r = s by antisymmetry of .
2
Notice that the discrete order on 2 \ {0} with 0 adjoined as the least element
gives a domain that makes all unital channels Scott continuous with a Scott
closed set of xed points, so requiring the mixing law is essential in uniquely
characterizing the spectral order.
C(f ) = sup S f
{xi ,i }
where the supremum is taken over all ensembles {xi , i } of possible input states
i to the channel.
295
The possible inputstates i to the channel are in general mixed and the xi are
probabilities with i xi = 1. If f is the Bloch representation of a qubit channel,
the Holevo capacity of f is given by
1 + |f ( i xi ri ) |
1 + |f (ri )|
xi H
C(f ) = sup H
2
2
{xi ,ri }
i
where ri are Bloch vectors for density operators in an ensemble, and we recall
that eigenvalues of a density operator with Bloch vector r are (1 |r|)/2.
Theorem 6. Let (x) = 1 |x| denote the standard measurement on 2 . For
any unital channel f and any p 2 dierent from ,
df (p) =
|f (p)|
|p|
Thus, the Holevo capacity of f is determined by the largest value of its informatic
derivative. Explicitly,
1 1
+
sup df (x)
C(f ) = 1 H
2 2 x ker()
Proof. Since x p i x = tp for some t [0, 1], x p in the topology i
t 1 , so
df (p) = lim
xp
f (x) f (p)
f (tp) f (p)
= lim
x p
(tp) p
t1
= lim
|f (p)| |f (tp)|
|p| |tp|
= lim
|f (p)|(1 |t|)
|p|(1 |t|)
t1
t1
(Linearity of f )
|f (p)|
|p|
Now we show that the Holevo capacity is determined by the largest value of its
informatic derivative. By the Euclidean continuity of |f |, there is a pure state
r 2 for which
|f (r)| = max |f (x)| = m+
|x|=1
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K. Martin
so we have
H
1 + |f (ri )|
2
H
1 + m+
2
Thus, we see that C(f ) = 1 for any rotation f since df = 1. Notice that df 1
i f is a rotation. For each p [0, 1], the unique channel f 1 with df = p is the
depolarization channel f = dp , so that C(dp ) = 1H((1+p)/2). In fact, the map
(p, 1 p) d12p denes an isomorphism from the nonnegative classical binary
symmetric channels onto the depolarization channels that preserves capacity.
The only unital qubit channel with capacity zero is 0 itself.
Example 5. The two Pauli channel in Bloch form is
1p
1p
(r) = p r +
sx (r) +
sy (r)
2
2
where sx and sy are the Bloch representations of the unitary channels x and
y . This simplies to
(rx , ry , rz ) = (prx , pry , (1 p)rz )
The matrix associated to is diagonal, so the diagonal element (eigenvalue) that
has largest magnitude also yields the largest value of its informatic derivative.
The capacity of the two Pauli channel is then
1 + max{p, 1 p}
1H
2
where p [0, 1].
The set of unital channels U is compact hence closed and thus forms a dcpo as
a subset of the domain [ 2 2 ].
Corollary 1. The Holevo capacity C : U [0, 1] is Scott continuous.
Closing
The set of unital qubit channels U is a convex monoid and a dcpo with respect
to which the Holevo capacity is monotone. In a similar way, the interval domain
I[0, 1], which models classical binary channels, is a convex monoid and a dcpo
with respect to which the Shannon capacity is monotone [7].
297
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