Configurations in Quantum Information

• Main Author: Blanchfield, Kate
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Stockholms universitet, Fysikum 2012
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-82921

Measurements play a central role in quantum information. This thesis looksat two types: contextual measurements and symmetric measurements. Contextualityoriginates from the Kochen-Specker theorem about hidden variablemodels and has recently undergone a subtle shift in its manifestation. Symmetricmeasurements are characterised by the regular polytopes they formin Bloch space (the vector space containing all density matrices) and are thesubject of several investigations into their existence in all dimensions.We often describe measurements by the vectors in Hilbert space ontowhich our operators project. In this sense, both contextual and symmetricmeasurements are connected to special sets of vectors. These vectors areoften special for another reason: they form congurations in a given incidencegeometry.In this thesis, we aim to show various connections between congurationsand measurements in quantum information. The congurations discussedhere would have been well-known to 19th and 20th century geometers andwe show they are relevant for advances in quantum theory today. Specically,the Hesse and Reye congurations provide proofs of measurement contextuality,both in its original form and its newer guise. The Hesse congurationalso ties together dierent types of symmetric measurements in dimension3called SICs and MUBswhile giving insights into the group theoreticalproperties of higher dimensional symmetric measurements.