English

Joint measurability meets Birkhoff-von Neumann's theorem

Quantum Physics 2023-05-11 v5

Abstract

Quantum measurements can be interpreted as a generalisation of probability vectors, in which non-negative real numbers are replaced by positive semi-definite operators. We extrapolate this analogy to define a generalisation of doubly stochastic matrices that we call doubly normalised tensors (DNTs), and formulate a corresponding version of Birkhoff-von Neumann's theorem, which states that permutations are the extremal points of the set of doubly stochastic matrices. We prove that joint measurability arises as a mathematical feature of DNTs in this context, needed to establish a characterisation similar to Birkhoff-von Neumann's. Conversely, we also show that DNTs emerge naturally from a particular instance of a joint measurability problem, remarking its relevance in general operator theory.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1809.07366,
  title  = {Joint measurability meets Birkhoff-von Neumann's theorem},
  author = {Leonardo Guerini and Alexandre Baraviera},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1809.07366},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

We found an error in the proof our previous Theorem 3; therefore we are reverting to the previous version, in which all results remain correct

R2 v1 2026-06-23T04:12:03.119Z