Cabello, Adán

Date: Friday, June 3, 2016
Time: 11:00
Place: ETH Zurich, Hönggerberg, HPF G 6
Host: Joseba Alonso / Jonathan Home

Thermodynamical cost of simulating quantum contextuality: A novel way for "device-independent" quantum information

Adán Cabello
University of Seville, Spain

The Kochen-Specker theorem precludes a simple hidden-variable explanation of quantum theory. However, the physical reason why this explanation is impossible is a subject of controversy. There are essentially two options: Either quantum observables do not have predetermined values and the outcomes are created by the measurements, or quantum observables have predetermined values but these values may be different in different measurement contexts. We argue that thermodynamics may seed some light on this controversy by showing that quantum contextuality is fundamentally different from contextuality simulated with classical systems with finite memory. Specifically, classical simulations can be experimentally distinguished from truly quantum contextuality by simply measuring whether or not the system under observation releases some extra heat due to Landauer's erasure principle. This observation opens the door to a new way for "device-independent" quantum information in which, instead of checking spacelike separation and assuming nosignaling, we assume that the system under observation has finite memory and we check the absence of Landauer's heat.