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Cluster state

Entangled state of qubits

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Formally, cluster states |ϕ{κ}⟩C are states which obey the set eigenvalue equations:

K(a)|ϕ{κ}⟩C=(−1)κa|ϕ{κ}⟩C

where K(a) are the correlation operators

K(a)=σx(a)⨂b∈N(a)σz(b)

with σx and σz being Pauli matrices, N(a) denoting the neighbourhood of a and {κa∈{0,1}|a∈C} being a set of binary parameters specifying the particular instance of a cluster state.

Examples with qubits

Here are some examples of one-dimensional cluster states (d=1), for n=2,3,4, where n is the number of qubits. We take κa=0 for all a, which means the cluster state is the unique simultaneous eigenstate that has corresponding eigenvalue 1 under all correlation operators. In each example the set of correlation operators {K(a)}aand the corresponding cluster state is listed.

  • n=2
    {σxσz,σzσx}
|ϕ⟩=12(|0+⟩+|1−⟩)
This is an EPR-pair (up to local transformations).
  • n=3
{σxσzI,σzσxσz,Iσzσx}
|ϕ⟩=12(|+0+⟩+|−1−⟩)
This is the GHZ-state (up to local transformations).
  • n=4
{σxσzII,σzσxσzI,Iσzσxσz,IIσzσx}
|ϕ⟩=12(|+0+0⟩+|+0−1⟩+|−1+0⟩−|−1−1⟩).
This is not a GHZ-state and can not be converted to a GHZ-state with local operations.

In all examples I is the identity operator, and tensor products are omitted. The states above can be obtained from the all zero state |0…0⟩ by first applying a Hadamard gate to every qubit, and then a controlled-Z gate between all qubits that are adjacent to each other.

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