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Phys. Rev. A 80, 010102(R) (2009) [4 pages]

Quantum de Finetti theorem in phase-space representation

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Anthony Leverrier
Institut Telecom/Telecom ParisTech, CNRS LTCI, 46 rue Barrault, 75634 Paris Cedex 13, France

Nicolas J. Cerf
Quantum Information and Communication, Ecole Polytechnique, Université Libre de Bruxelles, CP 165/59, 50 Av. F. D. Roosevelt, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium and MIT, Research Laboratory of Electronics, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA

Received 30 April 2009; published 28 July 2009

The quantum versions of de Finetti’s theorem derived so far express the convergence of n-partite symmetric states, i.e., states that are invariant under permutations of their n parties, toward probabilistic mixtures of independent and identically distributed (IID) states of the form σn. Unfortunately, these theorems only hold in finite-dimensional Hilbert spaces, and their direct generalization to infinite-dimensional Hilbert spaces is known to fail. Here, we address this problem by considering invariance under orthogonal transformations in phase space instead of permutations in state space, which leads to a quantum de Finetti theorem particularly relevant to continuous-variable systems. Specifically, an n-mode bosonic state that is invariant with respect to this continuous symmetry in phase space is proven to converge toward a probabilistic mixture of IID Gaussian states (actually, n identical thermal states).

© 2009 The American Physical Society

URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevA.80.010102
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevA.80.010102
PACS:
03.65.Ca, 03.70.+k, 42.50.−p