Characterizing quantum states via sector lengths

Abstract

Correlations in multiparticle systems are constrained by restrictions from quantum mechanics. A prominent example for these restrictions are monogamy relations, limiting the amount of entanglement between pairs of particles in a three-particle system. A powerful tool to study correlation constraints is the notion of sector lengths. These quantify, for different $k$, the amount of $k$-partite correlations in a quantum state in a basis-independent manner. We derive tight bounds on the sector lengths in multi-qubit states and highlight applications of these bounds to entanglement detection, monogamy relations and the $n$-representability problem. For the case of two- and three qubits we characterize the possible sector lengths completely and prove a symmetrized version of strong subadditivity for the linear entropy.