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Separable States Violate the Complementary-Quantum Correlation Conjecture

Quantum Physics 2026-08-04 v1

Abstract

Correlations measured in complementary local bases provide an experimentally accessible probe of the total correlations in a bipartite quantum state. The complementary-quantum correlation conjecture asserts that the sum of two such classical mutual informations never exceeds the premeasurement quantum mutual information. We disprove this conjecture in every local dimension d3d\geq3 with an explicit rank-two separable state. One of the two complementary measurements recovers the complete one-bit branch label, while the other retains additional classical correlation. For qutrits the excess is exactly 13log2(3456/3125)=0.0484156759\frac13\log_2(3456/3125)=0.0484156759\ldots bits. Continuity yields full-rank separable violations. The effect therefore requires neither entanglement nor quantum discord; it arises from two complementary readouts of the same classical latent variable.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2608.03828,
  title  = {Separable States Violate the Complementary-Quantum Correlation Conjecture},
  author = {Jinbo Wang and Qihang Wang and Kun Chen},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2608.03828},
  year   = {2026}
}

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2 pages