Does Symmetry Imply PPT Property?

Abstract

Recently, in [1], the author proved that many results that are true for PPT matrices also hold for another class of matrices with a certain symmetry in their Hermitian Schmidt decompositions. These matrices were called SPC in [1] (definition 1.1). Before that, in [9], T\'oth and G\"uhne proved that if a state is symmetric then it is PPT if and only if it is SPC. A natural question appeared: What is the connection between SPC matrices and PPT matrices? Is every SPC matrix PPT? Here we show that every SPC matrix is PPT in $M_2\otimes M_2$ (theorem 4.3). This theorem is a consequence of the fact that every density matrix in $M_2\otimes M_m$, with tensor rank smaller or equal to 3, is separable (theorem 3.2). This theorem is a generalization of the same result found in [1] for tensor rank 2 matrices in $M_k\otimes M_m$. Although, in $M_3\otimes M_3$, there exists a SPC matrix with tensor rank 3 that is not PPT (proposition 5.2). We shall also provide a non trivial example of a family of matrices in $M_k\otimes M_k$, in which both, the SPC and PPT properties, are equivalent (proposition 6.2). Within this family, there exists a non trivial subfamily in which the SPC property is equivalent to separability (proposition 6.4).