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Register a new userHow psi-epistemic models fail at explaining the indistinguishability of quantum states
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Cyril Branciard
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We study the extent to which psi-epistemic models for quantum measurement statistics---models where the quantum state does not have a real, ontic status---can explain the indistinguishability of nonorthogonal quantum states. This is done by comparing the overlap of any two quantum states with the overlap of the corresponding classical probability distributions over ontic states in a psi-epistemic model. It is shown that in Hilbert spaces of dimension $d geq 4$, the ratio between the classical and quantum overlaps in any psi-epistemic model must be arbitrarily small for certain nonorthogonal states, suggesting that such models are arbitrarily bad at explaining the indistinguishability of quantum states. For dimensions $d$ = 3 and 4, we construct explicit states and measurements that can be used experimentally to put stringent bounds on the ratio of classical-to-quantum overlaps in psi-epistemic models, allowing one in particular to rule out maximally psi-epistemic models more efficiently than previously proposed.
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The status of the quantum state is perhaps the most controversial issue in the foundations of quantum theory. Is it an epistemic state (state of knowledge) or an ontic state (state of reality)? In realist models of quantum theory, the epistemic view asserts that nonorthogonal quantum states correspond to overlapping probability measures over the true ontic states. This naturally accounts for a large number of otherwise puzzling quantum phenomena. For example, the indistinguishability of nonorthogonal states is explained by the fact that the ontic state sometimes lies in the overlap region, in which case there is nothing in reality that could distinguish the two states. For this to work, the amount of overlap of the probability measures should be comparable to the indistinguishability of the quantum states. In this letter, I exhibit a family of states for which the ratio of these two quantities must be $leq 2de^{-cd}$ in Hilbert spaces of dimension $d$ that are divisible by $4$. This implies that, for large Hilbert space dimension, the epistemic explanation of indistinguishability becomes implausible at an exponential rate as the Hilbert space dimension increases.
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We observe that quantum indistinguishability is a dynamical effect dependent on measurement duration. We propose a quantitative criterion for observing indistinguishability in quantum fluids and its implications including quantum statistics and derive a viscoelastic function capable of describing both long-time and short-time regimes where indistinguishability and its implications are operative and inactive, respectively. On the basis of this discussion, we propose an experiment to observe a transition between two states where the implications of indistinguishability become inoperative, including a transition between statistics-active and statistics-inactive states.
By incorporating the asymmetry of local protocols, i.e., some party has to start with a nontrivial measurement, into an operational method of detecting the local indistinguishability proposed by Horodecki {it et al.} [Phys.Rev.Lett. 90 047902 (2003)], we derive a computable criterion to efficiently detect the local indistinguishability of maximally entangled states. Locally indistinguishable sets of $d$ maximally entangled states in a $dotimes d$ system are systematically constructed for all $dge 4$ as an application. Furthermore, by exploiting the fact that local protocols are necessarily separable, we explicitly construct small sets of $k$ locally indistinguishable maximally entangled states with the ratio $k/d$ approaching 3/4. In particular, in a $dotimes d$ system with even $dge 6$, there always exist $d-1$ maximally entangled states that are locally indistinguishable by separable measurements.
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