A new class of distances on complex projective spaces

Abstract

The complex projective space $\mathbb{P}(\mathbb{C}^n)$ can be interpreted as the space of all quantum pure states of size $n$. A distance on this space, interesting from the perspective of quantum physics, can be induced from a classical distance defined on the $n$-point probability simplex by the `earth mover problem'. We show that this construction leads to a quantity satisfying the triangle inequality, which yields a true distance on complex projective space belonging to the family of quantum $2$-Wasserstein distances.