Semi-Device-Independent Certification of Causal Nonseparability with Trusted Quantum Inputs.

While the standard formulation of quantum theory assumes a fixed background causal structure, one can relax this assumption within the so-called process matrix framework. Remarkably, some processes, termed causally nonseparable, are incompatible with a definite causal order. We explore a form of certification of causal nonseparability in a semi-device-independent scenario where the involved parties receive trusted quantum inputs, but whose operations are otherwise uncharacterized. Defining the notion of causally nonseparable distributed measurements, we show that certain causally nonseparable processes that cannot violate any causal inequality, including the canonical example of the quantum switch, can generate noncausal correlations in such a scenario. Moreover, by imposing some further natural structure to the untrusted operations, we show that all bipartite causally nonseparable process matrices can be certified with trusted quantum inputs.

Network Quantum Steering.

The development of large-scale quantum networks promises to bring a multitude of technological applications as well as shed light on foundational topics, such as quantum nonlocality. It is particularly interesting to consider scenarios where sources within the network are statistically independent, which leads to so-called network nonlocality, even when parties perform fixed measurements. Here we promote certain parties to be trusted and introduce the notion of network steering and network local hidden state (NLHS) models within this paradigm of independent sources. In one direction, we show how the results from Bell nonlocality and quantum steering can be used to demonstrate network steering. We further show that it is a genuinely novel effect by exhibiting unsteerable states that nevertheless demonstrate network steering based upon entanglement swapping yielding a form of activation. On the other hand, we provide no-go results for network steering in a large class of scenarios by explicitly constructing NLHS models.

Device-Independent Certification of Genuinely Entangled Subspaces.

Self-testing is a procedure for characterizing quantum resources with the minimal level of trust. Up to now it has been used as a device-independent certification tool for particular quantum measurements, channels, and pure entangled states. In this work we introduce the concept of self-testing more general entanglement structures. More precisely, we present the first self-tests of an entangled subspace-the five-qubit code and the toric code. We show that all quantum states maximally violating a suitably chosen Bell inequality must belong to the corresponding code subspace, which remarkably includes also mixed states.

Quantum Nonlocality in Networks Can Be Demonstrated with an Arbitrarily Small Level of Independence between the Sources.

Quantum nonlocality can be observed in networks even in the case where every party can only perform a single measurement, i.e., does not receive any input. So far, this effect has been demonstrated under the assumption that all sources in the network are fully independent from each other. Here we investigate to what extent this independence assumption can be relaxed. After formalizing the question, we show that, in the triangle network without inputs, quantum nonlocality can be observed, even when assuming only an arbitrarily small level of independence between the sources. This means that quantum predictions cannot be reproduced by a local model unless the three sources can be perfectly correlated.

All Sets of Incompatible Measurements give an Advantage in Quantum State Discrimination.

Some quantum measurements cannot be performed simultaneously; i.e., they are incompatible. Here we show that every set of incompatible measurements provides an advantage over compatible ones in a suitably chosen quantum state discrimination task. This is proven by showing that the robustness of incompatibility, a quantifier of how much noise a set of measurements tolerates before becoming compatible, has an operational interpretation as the advantage in an optimally chosen discrimination task. We also show that if we take a resource-theory perspective of measurement incompatibility, then the guessing probability in discrimination tasks of this type forms a complete set of monotones that completely characterize the partial order in the resource theory. Finally, we make use of previously known relations between measurement incompatibility and Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering to also relate the latter with quantum state discrimination.

Device-Independent Entanglement Certification of All Entangled States.

We present a method to certify the entanglement of all entangled quantum states in a device-independent way. This is achieved by placing the state in a quantum network and constructing a correlation inequality based on an entanglement witness for the state. Our method is device independent, in the sense that entanglement can be certified from the observed statistics alone, under minimal assumptions on the underlying physics. Conceptually, our results borrow ideas from the field of self-testing to bring the recently introduced measurement-device-independent entanglement witnesses into the fully device-independent regime.

Experimental Study of Nonclassical Teleportation Beyond Average Fidelity.

Quantum teleportation establishes a correspondence between an entangled state shared by two separate parties that can communicate classically and the presence of a quantum channel connecting the two parties. The standard benchmark for quantum teleportation, based on the average fidelity between the input and output states, indicates that some entangled states do not lead to channels which can be certified to be quantum. It was recently shown that if one considers a finer-grained witness, then all entangled states can be certified to produce a nonclassical teleportation channel. Here we experimentally demonstrate a complete characterization of a new family of such witnesses, of the type proposed in Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 110501 (2017)PRLTAO0031-900710.1103/PhysRevLett.119.110501 under different conditions of noise. We report nonclassical teleportation using quantum states that cannot achieve average fidelity of teleportation above the classical limit. We further use the violation of these witnesses to estimate the negativity of the shared state. Our results have fundamental implications in quantum information protocols and may also lead to new applications and quality certification of quantum technologies.

Erratum: All Entangled States Can Demonstrate Nonclassical Teleportation [Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 110501 (2017)].

This corrects the article DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.119.110501.

All Entangled States can Demonstrate Nonclassical Teleportation.

Quantum teleportation, the process by which Alice can transfer an unknown quantum state to Bob by using preshared entanglement and classical communication, is one of the cornerstones of quantum information. The standard benchmark for certifying quantum teleportation consists in surpassing the maximum average fidelity between the teleported and the target states that can be achieved classically. According to this figure of merit, not all entangled states are useful for teleportation. Here we propose a new benchmark that uses the full information available in a teleportation experiment and prove that all entangled states can implement a quantum channel which cannot be reproduced classically. We introduce the idea of nonclassical teleportation witness to certify if a teleportation experiment is genuinely quantum and discuss how to quantify this phenomenon. Our work provides new techniques for studying teleportation that can be immediately applied to certify the quality of quantum technologies.