Self-testing of quantum systems: a review

Self-testing has been a rich area of study in quantum information theory. It allows an experimenter to interact classically with a black box quantum system and to test that a specific entangled state was present and a specific set of measurements were performed. Recently, self-testing has been central to high-profile results in complexity theory as seen in the work on entangled games PCP of Natarajan and Vidick \cite{low-degree}, iterated compression by Fitzsimons et al. \cite{iterated-compression}, and NEEXP in MIP* due to Natarajan and Wright \cite{neexp}. The most studied self-test is the CHSH game which features a bipartite system with two isolated devices. This game certifies the presence of a single EPR entangled state and the use of anti-commuting Pauli measurements. Most of the self-testing literature has focused on extending these results to self-test for tensor products of EPR states and tensor products of Pauli measurements.In this work, we introduce an algebraic generalization of CHSH by viewing it as a linear constraint system (LCS) game, exhibiting self-testing properties that are qualitatively different. These provide the first example of LCS games that self-test non-Pauli operators resolving an open questions posed by Coladangelo and Stark \cite{RobustRigidityLCS}. Our games also provide a self-test for states other than the maximally entangled state, and hence resolves the open question posed by Cleve and Mittal \cite{BCSTensor}. Additionally, our games have 1 bit question and log⁡n bit answer lengths making them suitable candidates for complexity theoretic application. This work is the first step towards a general theory of self-testing arbitrary groups. In order to obtain our results, we exploit connections between sum of squares proofs, non-commutative ring theory, and the Gowers-Hatami theorem from approximate representation theory. A crucial part of our analysis is to introduce a sum of squares framework that generalizes the solution group of Cleve, Liu, and Slofstra \cite{BCSCommuting} to the non-pseudo-telepathic regime. Finally, we give the first example of a game that is not a self-test. Our results suggest a richer landscape of self-testing phenomena than previously considered.

Section: Further Worksupporting

confidence: 70%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A generalization of CHSH and the algebraic structure of optimal strategies

Cui

Mehta

Mousavi³

et al. 2020

“…The paradigm of self-testing was first introduced in the context of quantum cryptography [8], with the aim to obtain trust in cryptographic devices (see [9] for a recent review).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A universal scheme for robust self-testing in the prepare-and-measure scenario

Miklin

Oszmaniec

2021

We consider the problem of certification of arbitrary ensembles of pure states and projective measurements solely from the experimental statistics in the prepare-and-measure scenario assuming the upper bound on the dimension of the Hilbert space. To this aim, we propose a universal and intuitive scheme based on establishing perfect correlations between target states and suitably-chosen projective measurements. The method works in all finite dimensions and allows for robust certification of the overlaps between arbitrary preparation states and between the corresponding measurement operators. Finally, we prove that for qubits, our technique can be used to robustly self-test arbitrary configurations of pure quantum states and projective measurements. These results pave the way towards the practical application of the prepare-and-measure paradigm to certification of quantum devices.

“…Interest in self-testing however only started growing significantly after Mayers and Yao rediscovered it and showed that it provides security for quantum key distribution [26,27]. Since then, it has been understood that self-testing guarantees the security of many quantum information tasks, including randomness generation [28][29][30] and delegated quantum computing [31]; see [32] for more details. Therefore, self-testing a state guarantees its direct applicability for a wide range of applications.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Self-testing with finite statistics enabling the certification of a quantum network link

Bancal

Redeker

Sekatski

et al. 2021

Self-testing is a method to certify devices from the result of a Bell test. Although examples of noise tolerant self-testing are known, it is not clear how to deal efficiently with a finite number of experimental trials to certify the average quality of a device without assuming that it behaves identically at each run. As a result, existing self-testing results with finite statistics have been limited to guarantee the proper working of a device in just one of all experimental trials, thereby limiting their practical applicability. We here derive a method to certify through self-testing that a device produces states on average close to a Bell state without assumption on the actual state at each run. Thus the method is free of the I.I.D. (independent and identically distributed) assumption. Applying this new analysis on the data from a recent loophole-free Bell experiment, we demonstrate the successful distribution of Bell states over 398 meters with an average fidelity of ≥55.50% at a confidence level of 99%. Being based on a Bell test free of detection and locality loopholes, our certification is evidently device-independent, that is, it does not rely on trust in the devices or knowledge of how the devices work. This guarantees that our link can be integrated in a quantum network for performing long-distance quantum communications with security guarantees that are independent of the details of the actual implementation.