Basics of observational entropy

Abstract

These notes provide a brief primer on the basic aspects of "observational entropy" (also known as "quantum coarse-grained entropy"), a general framework for applying the concept of coarse-graining to quantum systems. We review the basic formalism, survey applications to thermodynamics, make a connection to quantum correlations and entanglement entropy, compare to the corresponding classical theory, and discuss a generalization based on POVM measurements.