Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235

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Optics Communications
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/optcom

Classical and quantum correlations for two-mode coherent-state superposition

K. Berrada ⁎
The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy
Laboratoire de Physique Théorique, Faculté des Sciences, Université Mohammed V-Agdal, Av. Ibn Battouta, B.P. 1014, Agdal Rabat, Morocco

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Quantum discord, a kind of quantum correlation, is defined as the mismatch between two quantum analogues of
Received 5 September 2011 classically equivalent expressions of the mutual information. Distinguish classical and quantum correlations in
Received in revised form 7 November 2011 quantum systems is therefore of both fundamental and practical importance. We investigate here the dynamics
Accepted 10 December 2011
of classical and quantum correlations for two-mode coherent-state superposition in vacuum environment,
Available online 24 December 2011
which are known to be particularly useful for quantum information processing. By analytical and numerical
Keywords:
analyzes we find that, contrary to what is usually stated in the literature, quantum discord under decoherence
Total correlation may exhibit sudden death and sudden birth phenomena, and we show also that the classical and quantum
Quantum discord correlations vanish at infinite time. Moreover, the quantum discord may be less or more robust than entangle-
Sudden death ment against environment depending on different strength regimes of the optical fields of the two-mode
Sudden birth coherent-state superposition.
© 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction essential future of quantum mechanics, it is relevant to investigate

Much work has recently been performed in order to investigate
how correlations can be understood, quantified, characterized and
classified as either classical or quantum [1–4]. Even if such distinction
may not be possible in clear-cut terms, understanding to some extent
the quantumness of correlations is not only relevant from a funda-
mental point of view but also in order to make more clear the origin
of the quantum advantage in quantum information processing (QIP)
[5]. Many efforts have been invested in subdividing quantum states
into separable and entangled states [6–8]. Indeed, entanglement is a
kind of quantum correlations that has been playing a central role in
quantum information and communication theory. This correlation
cannot be prepared with the help of local operations and classical
communication (LOCC). In other words, These states are nonclassical
in the sense that they cannot be prepared using classical operations
on classical bits. However, there are other nonclassical correlations
apart from entanglement [9–17] that can be of great importance to
quantum information field and some of these correlations have
been verified experimentally [18,19]. Indeed, entanglement is a nec-
essary prerequisite for a task as quantum key distribution, but its
role in quantum computation is less clear, as there are cases where
quantum correlations that are weaker than entanglement seem to
be sufficient to boost performance with respect to classical computa-
tion [20]. Therefore, while entanglement may be considered the
⁎ Corresponding author at: The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical
Physics, Trieste, Italy.
E-mail address: berradakamal2006@gmail.com.
how and in what sense even correlations present in separable states
may exhibit a certain quantum character. In addition, it is shown
that separable states (which are mixtures of locally indistinguishable
states and they can prepared via LOCC) are not at all negligible, which
has direct implications for some implementations of quantum com-
puting [21] and on the definition of entanglement quantifiers [22].
There is thus a need for a measure that can quantify the quantum
correlations in quantum systems. Indeed, recent measures of nonclas-
sical correlations are motivated by different notions of classicality and
operational means to quantify non-classicality [2,23,24]. Quantum
discord has received much attention in studies involving thermody-
namics and correlations [25,26], positivity of dynamics [27], quantum
computation [28], broadcasting of quantum states and volume of dis-
cord [29]. Quantum discord was initially introduced in the context of
the analysis of quantum measurements and afterwards interpreta-
tions in terms of the difference in performance of quantum and clas-
sical Maxwell demons [30]. Recently, it has been proposed as the key
resource presented in certain quantum communication tasks and
quantum computational models without containing much entangle-
ment. Interestingly, it has been proven both theoretically and
experimentally that such states provide computational speedup com-
pared to classical states in some quantum computational models [12].
The quantum discord quantifies nonclassical correlations of more
general and more fundamental type than entanglement because sep-
arable mixed states (without entanglement) can have nonzero quan-
tum discord. An example of two-qubit separable state with non zero
discord Q = (3/4)log2(4/3) ≃ 0.311 and for spin-cluster materials are
given in Ref. [31] respectively. This indicates that classical communi-
cation can give rise to quantum correlations due to the existence of

0030-4018/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.optcom.2011.12.054
2228 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235
nonorthogonal quantum states. For pure states, there is a special
situation where the quantum correlation is equal to the entropy of
entanglement and also to the classical correlation. Surprisingly, for a
mixture of Bell states, quantum discord is exactly equal to
quantum entanglement whereas classical correlation attains its
maximum value 1. However, for two-qubit mixed states, the relation
between the classical and quantum correlations is complicated and
not yet clear. This could be understood as that entanglement only
presents a special kind, but not all, of quantum correlation in those
systems.
Realistic quantum systems are not closed, which causes the rapid
destruction of crucial quantum properties. Therefore, it is important
to study the behavior of various correlations when the system loses
its coherence due to interactions with the environment. Every natural
object is in contact with its environment, so its dynamics is that of an
open system, thus, the interaction between a composite quantum
system and its environment and understanding the dynamics for dif-
ferent kinds of correlations have attracted more interest. The quan-
tum entanglement dynamics in open quantum systems was broadly
investigated in the literature. However, few works dealt with the
effect of the environment on quantum discord; some studies have
focused on the comparison between the dynamics of quantum dis-
cord and entanglement of two-qubit system under both Markovian
[32–34] and non-Markovian [35] environments. Their behaviors
have been shown to be very different and the quantum discord
is more resistant against decoherence than entanglement in the
Markovian dynamics. Recently, various peculiar properties in the dy-
namics of different kinds of classical and quantum correlations have
also been shown with the presence of Markovian noise [33], in
which the decay rates of correlation may present sudden changes
in behavior [35] and the quantum correlation may completely disap-
pear without being transferred to the environment.
The quantification of quantum discord contained in a bipartite
quantum state is based on the one-side measurement on the system.
In general case, these measurements may be asymmetric with respect
to the choice of subsystem to be measured. An important point about
these quantum measures is related to their derivation. Indeed, the
main difficulty is the quantification of quantum discord which has
to be defined and an optimization problem can be obtained only for
very simple systems. These measures are based on extremization pro-
cedures over all possible measurements that can be performed on
the subsystems and constitute a difficult problem even numerically.
Even for the simplest case of two-qubits, the maximum knowledge
of quantification of quantum discord is only restricted for a certain
class of highly symmetrical states, but remains unsolved for more
general states. For this reason, the dynamics of quantum discord has
until investigated and known only for limited set of systems. Recent-
ly, an analytic method [36] has been developed to evaluate both clas-
sical correlation and quantum discord for the complete set of two-
qubit X states depending on seven real-valued parameters in order
to deepen the understanding of the relation between different kinds
of correlations. Using this result, we present a detailed analysis
of the time evolution of classical and quantum correlations for two-
mode coherent-state superposition (CSS) in the case of a Born
Markovian type master equation. This dynamics exhibits a rich man-
ifold of states that may be more or less classical and quantum corre-
lated with respect to different strength regimes of the optical fields
of the two-mode CSS. Analytical expressions are calculated and nu-
merically represented, which give the dependence of the classical
correlation and quantum discord on states. We find that classical
and quantum correlations dynamics exhibit a different order during
the time evolution and vanishing at infinite times. Moreover, the
quantum discord dynamics present peculiar aspects “sudden death
and sudden birth” phenomena, and may be less or more robust than
entanglement against environment depending on different strength
regimes of the optical fields. Our observations may have important
implications in exploiting these correlations in quantum information
processing and transmission.
The article is structured as follows. In Section 2 we introduce some
measures of non-classicality and, in particular, nonclassical correla-
tions: quantum mutual information, entanglement and quantum
discord. Section 3 investigates the dynamics of classical and quantum
correlations of two-mode CSS for certain classes of continuous vari-
able states of practical significance in Markovian regime. An analytical
derivation of the expression of different kinds of correlations is
presented. In Section 4 we apply this result for different strength
regimes of the optical fields of the two-mode CSS studying the rela-
tion between the dynamics of different kinds of correlations. We
summarize our conclusion and some possible avenues for future re-
search in Section 5.
2. Quantum discord
In the last decades there has been a growing interest in the issue of
characterizing and quantifying the classical and quantum correlations
of states of a given physical system. One of the reasons in that states
processing quantum features could be useful for certain quantum
and computation protocols, or in the field of precision measurements,
enhancing computation and measurements efficiencies. For under-
standing and distinguishing classical from quantum correlations, it
is important to assume that the total correlation is a direct sum of
the both correlations, but an outstanding question is how to distin-
guish between the quantum and the classical aspects of the total
correlation? For a bipartite system ρab, it is largely accepted that
quantum information mutual measures its total correlation (classical
and quantum correlation) defined as
Iðρab Þ ¼ Sðρa Þ þ Sðρb Þ−Sðρab Þ; ð1Þ
where ρa and ρb are the reduced density matrices of the bipartite
state ρab and S(ρ) = − tr(ρlog2ρ) is the von Neumann entropy. More-
over, Schumacher and Westmoreland have shown that, if A(lice) and
B(ob) share a correlated composite quantum system that is used as
the key for a one-time pad cryptographic system, the maximum
amount of information that A(lice) can send securely to B(ob) is the
quantum mutual information of the shared correlated state [37]. In
this way, the mutual quantum information may be written as a sum
of classical correlation C(ρab) and quantum correlation, that is quan-
tum discord C(ρab) as
Iðρab Þ ¼ C ðρab Þ þ Q ðρab Þ: ð2Þ
The next step is to quantify purely classical correlation in terms of
information from measurements. To this end, Ollivier and Zurek [23]
suggested the use of von Neumann-type measurements which con-
sist of a set of one-dimensional projectors that sum up to the identity
operator. Let the projector operators {bj} describe a von Neumann
measurement only on part b, then the conditional density operator
ρj associated with the measurement result is
1


ρj ¼ I⊗bj ρab I⊗bj ; ð3Þ
Pj
where the probability pj equals tr[(I ⊗ bj)ρab(I ⊗ bj)]. However, the
density matrix ρj is considered as a conditional density operator and
we can define the quantum conditional entropy with respect to this
measurement as [38]
 n o


S ρab  bj ¼ ∑ pj S ρj ; ð4Þ
k
 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235 2229

and the related quantum mutual information of this measurement is Fock number state. On the other hand, these states are the simplest
defined as continuous-variables states which are the closest analogues to clas-

n o
n o sical light fields and exhibit a Poisson photon number distribution,
  and have many applications such as quantum optics, statistical me-
I ρab  bj ¼ Sðρa Þ−S ρab  bj : ð5Þ
chanics and condensed matter physics [43–46]. They possess well
defined amplitude and phase, whose uncertainties are the minimum
To derive classical correlation, since I(ρab|{bj}) depends on the
permitted by the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.
projector operators {bj}, we take the maximum of I(ρab|bj), taking
The initial two-mode CSS considered in this paper are in the form
into the all possible projectors. In other words, the classical part is
of
defined as the maximal information about subsystem a that can

be obtained by performing a measurement on the subsystem b. The   
ψ 〉 ¼ N ðjα〉1 j−α〉2  j−α〉1 jα〉2 Þ ð8Þ
classical correlation between the two subsystems a and b is defined as
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
 
n o h
n oi where N ¼ 1= 2  2exp −4α 2 is the normalization factor and |α〉
 
C ðρab Þ :¼ sup I ρab  bj ¼ Sðρa Þ− min S ρab  bj : ð6Þ 2
is a coherent state containing α photons on average. The complex
fbj g f jg
b
amplitude α is assumed to be real throughout the paper for simplicity
without losing generality and we call |ψ +〉 (|ψ −〉) even (odd) two-
Therefore, the quantum discord that measures the quantum com- mode CSS as it contains only even (odd) numbers of photons.
ponent of the nonclassical correlations between two subsystems can When the two-mode CSS are disposed to a vacuum environment,
be introduced as a difference between the original quantum mutual the states decohere and become mixed states ρ ±(t), where t stands
information in Eq. (1) and the classical correlation in Eq. (6) as for the decoherence time. The time evolution of the density operator
under the Born–Markov approximation is given by the master equa-
Q ðρab Þ ¼ Iðρab Þ−C ðρab Þ; ð7Þ tion [47]

which is always non-negative quantity by expressing mutual infor- ∂ρ ðt Þ ^ 

¼ Lρ ðt Þ þ ^J ρ ðt Þ;

mation in terms of quantum relative entropy and invoking the mono- ð9Þ
∂t
tonicity property of the latter. As a remark, when the measurements

are made on subsystem a, the quantum discord can be defined simi- where Lρ ^  ðt Þ ¼ −∑2 γ a^ † a^ ρ ðt Þ þ ρ ðt Þa^ † a^ , ^J ρ ðt Þ ¼ ∑2
i¼1 2 i i i i i¼1
larly and it is in general different from Q(ρab). It is well known that γa^ i ρ ðt Þa^ †i , γ is the energy decay rate, and a^ i is the annihilation opera-
the different measures of quantum correlation are not identical and tor of the mode i. The formal solution of the master equation is written
h
i
as ρ ðt Þ ¼ exp L^ þ ^J t ρ ð0Þ, where ρ±(0) is the initial density oper-
conceptually different. For example, the discord does not coincide  

with entanglement and a direct comparison of two notions is rather

ator. Although there are different manners to treat open quantum
meaningless. Therefore, a unified classification of correlations is in de-
systems, the master equation approach is widely used and more appro-
mand. The zero-discord states are relatively well studied: Q(ρab) = 0
priate in quantum optics areas. Assuming a zero-temperature bath, the
if and only if there exists a complete orthonormal basis {|k〉} for the
evolution of the density operator ρ± in the vacuum environment is
subsystem a and some density operator ρbk for the subsystem b such
obtained as
that ρab = ∑k pk|k〉〈k| ⊗ ρbk, where |k〉 is an orthonormal set, {pi} is a

2
probability distribution and ρbk are quantum states. Recently various ρ ðt Þ ¼ N fjα ðt Þ〉1 j−α ðt Þ〉2 〈α ðt Þj〈−α ðt Þj
methods to detect zero-discord [39] have been proposed for a given
state as well as for an unknown state [40]. Moreover, it is found þj−α ðt Þ〉1 jα ðt Þ〉2 〈−α ðt Þj〈α ðt Þj ð10Þ
that vanishing quantum discord is related to the complete positivity −4α 2 r 2
e ðjα ðt Þ〉1 j−α ðt Þ〉2 〈−α ðt Þj〈α ðt Þj þ h:c:Þg
of a map and the local broadcasting of quantum correlations. Unfortu-
 
nately zero-discord states are of zero measure and nonzero values of   −γt
where α ðt Þ〉i ¼ αe 2 〉i (i = 1, 2) and the superscript +(−) corre-
the quantum discord are notoriously difficult to compute because of
the minimization over all the possible measurements. sponds to the even (odd) two-mode CSS. Here we introduce a
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
normalized time r which is related to t: r ¼ 1−e−γt . The density
3. Dynamics of the classical correlation, quantum discord and matrix ρ±(t) can be expressed in the orthogonal basis set | ± 〉i
entanglement = n ±(|α(t)〉i ± | − α(t)〉i) as

0 1
More recently, D. Cavalcanti et al. [41] have introduced operational A 0 0 D
interpretations of quantum discord by given its information-theoretic  B 0 B

−B

0 C
ρ ðt Þ− ¼ B
@ 0
C ð11Þ
operational meaning in terms of entanglement consumption in an −B B 0 A
extended quantum-state-merging protocol and they relate the asym- D 0 0 C
metry of quantum discord with the performance imbalance in quantum
state merging and dense coding. In fact, nonclassical correlation de- where
scribed by the quantum discord can be considered as a more universal
2 "
2 2#
quantum resource than quantum entanglement in some sense, and N 1  e−4α r

the quantum discord offers new prospects for QIP. A ¼
8 ðnþ Þ4
The systems we are going to analyze has an immediate important
2 " #
 −4α 2 r 2
and application in various tasks of QIP. Their richer structure pro- N 1∓e
B ¼
vides significant advantages for quantum teleportation, universal 8 ðnþ n− Þ2

2 " ð12Þ
2 2#
quantum computation, high-precision measurements and funda-
N 1  e−4α r
mental tests of quantum physics [42]. For instance, many QIP tasks 
C ¼
require two-mode CSS. Theoretically,
pffiffiffi pffiffiffi they can be obtained by split- 8 ðn− Þ4
 
2 "
ting a single-mode cat  2α〉 2α〉 on a 50:50 beam splitter  2 2#
N 1  e−4α r
and 2sending the twopffiffiffiffiffi output modes to distant sites, where j  α〉 ¼ D ¼ − :
jαj
e− 2 ∑∞n¼0 ðα Þn = n! are the coherent state with α ∈ C and |n〉 the 8 ðnþ n− Þ2
2230 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235

The classical correlation between the bipartite systems is given as the amount of entanglement of specific mixed states are distinct for


 h
 different measures. Here, we compare the discord dynamics with
  
C ρ ðt Þ ¼ S ρa ðt Þ − min S ρ ðt Þ jfbk g ð13Þ the concurrence one. Due to the X structure of the density matrix
fbk g
Eq. (11), we have that
where the marginal entropy S(ρa±(t)) reads as

 n o



   
c ρ ðt Þ ¼ 2 max 0; Θ1 ðt Þ; Θ2 ðt Þ ð22Þ
S ρ 
a ðt Þ ¼ − A þ B

log2 A þ B


 ð14Þ
   
− B þ C log2 B þ C :
 
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
where Θ1 ðt Þ ¼ B − A C  et Θ2±(t) = B ± − D ±. Concurrence varies
Let us derive the quantum discord for this family of quantum from C(ρ (t)) = 0 for an unentangled state to C(ρ ±(t)) = 1 for maxi-
±

states. It is known that any von Neumann measurement for subsys- mally entangled state as for the case well known EPR states.
tem b can be written as

†
bj ¼ V∏j V j ¼ 0; 1; ð15Þ 4. Sudden death and sudden birth for quantum discord

where Πj = | j〉〈j| is the projector for subsystem b along the computa- In this section, we will investigate the correlation dynamics of the
tional base | j〉 and V ∈ SU(2)) is an unitary operator with unit deter- two-mode CSS under the action of environment. One wants to inquire
minant. After the measurement, the bipartite state ρ ±(t) will the relation between the dynamics of the classical and quantum cor-
change to the ensemble {ρj±(t), pj±(t)}, that is 2 × 2 density matrices, relations and, in particular, understand the changes in behavior in the
where dynamics of different kinds of correlations.
In order to observe the influence of the photon number on the
1

 classical and quantum correlations for different strength regimes of
 
ρj ðt Þ ¼ I⊗bj ρ ðt Þ I⊗bj ð16Þ the optical fields, we display the classical correlation, quantum
p
j ðt Þ
discord and concurrence for even state, ρ +(0), for various values of
and pj±(t) = tr((I ⊗ bj)ρ ±(t)(I ⊗ bj)). The operator V can be written, up α in Fig. 1. The solid line presents classical correlation and quantum
to a constant phase, as discord and the dashed line is for concurrence. From Fig. 1, it can be
seen that for this initial state, the correlations have the same behavior
→→ and they increase with increasing of the photon number. Moreover, the
V ¼ tI þ i y: σ ð17Þ
state ρ+(0) approaches the maximal correlation with C(ρ+(0)) = Q
with t, y1, y2, y3 ∈ R and t 2 + y1 + y2 + y3 = 1. This implies that these (ρ+(0)) = C(ρ+(0)) ≈ 1 for the strong field regime. This implies that
parameters, three among them independent, assuming their values the photon number enhances the amount of correlations between
in the interval [− 1, 1], that is, t, yi ∈ [− 1, 1]. two-mode (CSS). However, for weak field regime, the even tow-mode
In order to obtain the evolution of classical correlation, we need to CSS is approximately uncorrelated with zero classical and quantum
evaluate ρj±(t) and pj±(t). For this propose, we write correlations. These results can be confirmed analytically. In fact, in the




 weak field regime of the optical field, from Eqs. (21) and (22), we can
  †  † obtain an approximate analytic expression of the classical and quantum
pj ðt Þρj ðt Þ ¼ I⊗ V∏j V ρ ðt Þ I⊗ V∏j V ð18Þ
correlations
and the minimization over von Neumann measurements min{bj}[S
(ρ ±(t))|{bj}] is straight forwardly derived analytically and is given as


 2 1−α 2 α 2
þ

n oi 1−θ1 ðt Þ 1−θ1 ðt Þ C ρ ð0Þ ≈   ð23Þ

fbj g
½  
min S ρ ðt Þ  bj ¼ −
2
log2
2
ð19Þ 1−2α 2
1 þ θ1 ðt Þ 1 þ θ1 ðt Þ
− log2
2 2  
C ρþ ð0Þ ≈−Aþ log2 Aþ −C þ log2 C þ
where θ1 is obtained through the procedure over von Neumann mea- ð1 þ θ1 Þ ð1 þ θ1 Þ
þ log 2 ð24Þ
surements 2 2
ð1−θ1 Þ ð1−θ1 Þ
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi þ log 2
  ffi 2 2
θ1 ðt Þ ¼ A −C  2 þ 4 D −B 2 : ð20Þ

1.0
Finally, from Eqs. (1) and (6), we obtain the quantum discord




Q ρ ðt Þ ¼ I ρ ðt Þ −C ρ ðt Þ 0.8


n oi X 3
ð21Þ

½
Correlation

 
¼ S ρa ðt Þ þ min S ρ ðt Þ  bj þ λi log2 λi 0.6
fbj g i¼0

where λi are the eigenvalues of the state ρ ±(t). It is easy to see that 0.4
for this density matrix expression, the condition S(ρa±(t)) = S(ρb±(t))
is satisfied and therefore the von Neumann measurements quantify- 0.2
ing the classical correlations assumes equal values, irrespective of
whether the measurement is performed on the mode a or b. 0.0
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5
In order to study the relation between the dynamics of quantum
α
discord and entanglement, we choose a measure of quantum entan-
glement. Although numerous measures of quantum entanglement Fig. 1. Classical and quantum correlations for the initial even state as a function of α.
give the same result for separable and maximal entangled states, Quantum discord and classical correlation (solid line), and concurrence (dashed line).
 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235 2231

and the dotted line is for classical correlation. During the time evolution,
  the initial even and odd two-mode CSS go into a mixed state with
Q ρþ ð0Þ ≈1−Aþ log2 Aþ −C þ log2 C þ zero classical and quantum correlations. In other words, all the corre-
ð1 þ θ1 Þ lations vanish at r = 1 (t → ∞). The advantage of using normalized
− log2 ð1 þ θ1 Þ ð25Þ
2 time instead of the ordinary one is the possibility of describing a
ð1−θ1 Þ
− log 2 ð1−θ1 Þ þ θ1 log 2 θ1 wide range of two-mode CSS classical and quantum correlations
2
under the decoherence process. Thus, an investigation of quantum
where discord of a quantum system in the presence of decoherence in the
limit tightarrow∞ is highly desired. This question is also addressed


2α 2 2−α 2 in the present work.
θ1 ≈1−   ð26Þ To see what happens in the mixed states, we begin analyzing the
1−2α 2 þ 4α 4 dynamics of classical and quantum correlation as well as the entan-

 glement within the two-mode CSS for weak field regime case. In
2 4 2
þ
1−α þ α Fig. 2(a) we display the different kinds of classical and quantum cor-
A ≈  ð27Þ relations for odd two-mode CSS, with α 2 = 0.0025. The analytical
1−2α 2 þ 4α 4
solution of the classical and quantum discord, given by Eq. (21), are

2 represented by the dotted and solid lines respectively, and the dashed
þ
1−α 2 α 4 line for concurrence. The plots clearly show that the dynamics of cor-
C ≈ : ð28Þ
1−2α 2 þ 4α 4 relations exhibit the same behavior during the time evolution. In this
considered case, one can see that the amount of quantum discord, en-
Whereas for strong field regime, we find that tanglement and classical correlation decrease with increasing of the
normalized time r. However, this is not a general result since quan-

2

2


 1 þ e−2α 1−e−2α tum discord, classical correlation and entanglement are three differ-
þ
C ρ ð0Þ ≈
 ð29Þ ent and independent measures of correlations with no simple
1 þ e−4α
2
relative ordering between them. Interestingly, for this initial state, it
can be seen that under the decoherence, the quantum discord is
 þ  þ þ þ 2 þ always less than concurrence expect for r = 0 and r = 1. Moreover,
C ρ ð0Þ ≈−A log2 A −C log C
ð1 þ θ1 Þ ð1 þ θ1 Þ quantum discord is always greater than the classical correlation. In
þ log2 ð30Þ the case of even two-mode CSS, the different kinds of correlations
2 2
ð1−θ1 Þ ð1−θ1 Þ vanish since the Markovian environment has to destroy the correla-
þ log2
2 2 tions between the two-mode system in this regime.
In the intermediate field regime case, the correlations character of
and the odd and even two-mode CSS is more complex than that in the
 þ  þ þ þ þ other regimes. This behavior is illustrated in Figs. 2(b), 2(c), 3(a),
Q ρ ð0Þ ≈1−A log2 A −C log2 C
3(b) and 3(c) where we observe that the different kinds of correla-
ð1 þ θ1 Þ
− log2 ð1 þ θ1 Þ ð31Þ tions have a different order as function of the normalized time r,
2
ð1−θ1 Þ with quantum discord initially smaller than concurrence and the clas-
− log2 ð1−θ1 Þ þ θ1 log2 θ1
2 sical correlation for long time interval and thereafter the concurrence
becomes smaller than quantum discord; such a behavior is different
where from the previous regime. It is also interesting to note that the de-
þ þ
crease of quantum entanglement in Figs. 2(c) and 3(c) is accompa-
θ1 ≈A þ C ð32Þ nied by the increase of quantum discord in some time intervals. In

 this sense, the quantum discord may be more resistant to the action
−2α 2
þ 1 1−2e of the environment, contrary to what happens to entanglement,
A ≈
 ð33Þ which can disappear in this considered regime at finite times. This em-
2 1 þ 2e−4α2
phasizes that the quantum discord Markovian dynamics of two-mode

 CSS may be very peculiar exhibiting a different change behavior.
−2α 2
1 1−2e In the strong filed regime, as we can see in Figs. 2(d) and 3(d),
þ
C ≈
: ð34Þ under decoherence, the quantum correlation Q vanishes at finite
2 1 þ e−4α2
times, such a system suffers a sudden death (i.e., the complete loss
of quantum discord after a finite time). On the other hand, a system
In the case of odd two-mode CSS, the different kinds of correla- exhibits a sudden birth of quantum discord. In this way, the discord
tions coincide and are equal to the maximal value of the correlation dynamics may be very particular for such systems, exhibiting sudden
between two-mode CSS. death and sudden birth change in behavior like entanglement corre-
To explore the influence of decoherence on the dynamical behav- lation. This point does not agree with the previous results presented
ior of the classical and quantum correlations for different strength re- in [48–51], where the authors claim that the quantum correlations
gimes of the optical fields, we have plotted the time evolution of Q, C, measured by the quantum discord, in the Markovian case, decay ex-
and C as a function of the normalized time r for several values of the ponentially in time and vanish only at asymptotic time, contrarily to
photon number α 2 for the even (odd) two-mode CSS, which is what happens to quantum entanglement dynamics where sudden
entangled (maximally entangled) in the 2 ⊗ 2 Hilbert space at time death and sudden birth may occur. It is not yet known whether
r = 0. The dissipative time evolution shows that the correlations such phenomena can be observed for various density matrix forms
have a different order in terms of the photon number average. for Markovian environment. Therefore, the dissipative of the environ-
Figs. 2 and 3 display the dynamics of the classical correlation, quan- ment may play a constructive role in the generation of quantum dis-
tum discord and concurrence for the two-mode CSS for different cord. This is the first evidence of the existence of quantum properties
strength regimes of the optical fields. The solid line presents the dy- behind the Markovian dynamics, in this quantum correlation, that are
namics of quantum discord, the dashed line is for concurrence and responsible for these phenomena. Moreover, we find that for these
2232 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235

(a) (b)
1.0 1.0
0.8 0.8

Correlation
Correlation
0.6 0.6
0.4 0.4
0.2 0.2
0.0 0.0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
r r
(c) (d)
1.0 1.0
0.8 0.8
Correlation

Correlation
0.6 0.6
0.4 0.4
0.2 0.2
0.0 0.0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
r r
Fig. 2. Classical and quantum correlations for the initial odd state with (a) α = 0.05, (b) α = 0.8, (c) α = 1.2, and (d) α = 3. Quantum discord (solid line), classical correlation (dotted
line), and concurrence (dashed line).

two-mode CSS, the classical correlation increases with increasing
photon number and it resists against environment for long time inter-
val in this considered regime. During the time evolution, the classical
correlation is always greater than both entanglement and quantum
discord expect r = 0 and r = 1. Furthermore, we have observed that
for strong field regime of the large α 2, the amount of the classical cor-
relation for the both states indicated by the dotted line in Figs. 2(d)
and 3(d) remains unchanged in time under the decoherence for
long time interval, exhibiting one of the important properties of
classical correlation, that is completely unaffected for certain deco-
herence area by the environment effect for long times, which will
have an important role in distinguishing correlations [50] in this
dynamical region.
It is worth mentioning that this peculiar changes in behavior of
quantum correlations shows that the discord may be more or less resis-
tant to the action of environment than the entanglement. This is not
easy to make a general statement whether or not quantum discord is
more resistant to the action of the environment than the entanglement
in each strength regime of the optical fields of the two-mode CSS.
Intuitively, quantum discord is a different kind of correlation than
entanglement and it is difficult to make a general conclusion about
the relative ordering between them under the decoherence. Our obser-
vations may have important roles in exploration the different kinds of
correlations for this continuous-variable system type in thrmQIP.
Our results for the Markovian dynamics have been shown very
different from the previous ones. For further understanding of the

(a) (b)
1.0 1.0
0.8 0.8
Correlation

Correlation

0.6 0.6
0.4 0.4
0.2 0.2
0.0 0.0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
r r
(c) (d)
1.0 1.0
0.8 0.8
Correlation
Correlation

0.6 0.6
0.4 0.4
0.2 0.2
0.0 0.0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
r r
Fig. 3. Classical and quantum correlations for the initial even state with (a) α = 0.6, (b) α = 0.8, (c) α = 1.2, and (d) α = 3. Quantum discord (solid line), classical correlation (dotted
line), and concurrence (dashed line).
 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235 2233

decoherence effect on classical and quantum correlations for strong
regime field, we plot the dynamics of the quantum mutual informa-
tion, marginal state and quantum conditional entropy in Fig. 4.
Although the mechanism behind the sudden death and sudden
birth of quantum discord needs further clarification. From Fig. 4,
some points seem clear to us: the zero discord is due to the minimi-
zation process of the amount of classical correlation between two-
mode system (of course it depends on the density matrix form of
the two-mode CSS). Remarkably, the von Neumann measurement
effect on single mode field results in a vanishing value of the quantum
conditional entropy, min{bk}[S(ρ ±(t))|{bk}] = 0, for long time interval.
Thereafter, the classical correlation coincides with the marginal state
and attains its maximal value, hbfC(ρ ±) = S(ρa±) = 1, and it remains
unaffected by the environmental noise for long time. This means
that the classical correlation is not affected by the decoherence pro-
cess while the quantum correlation is completely destroyed. Thus,
the classical correlation may be given by the quantum mutual infor-
mation at finite times, and therefore, vanishing value of quantum
discord. Besides, the sudden birth in Markovian dynamics happens
in the case where the conditional entropy will appear. In this case,
without the memory stored in the environment, some of the initial
quantum discord that is lost during the dissipative dynamics can be
returned to the two-mode CSS, which is in the light of what has
been said in previous works should present much of a surprise to
us. This fact indicates that these discord phenomena may take place
in this model, which means that for such density matrix and Hamilto-
nian interaction, we can find that the von Neumann measurement
that minimizes the classical correlation would result zero discord
for Markovian dynamics.
5. Conclusion
In this paper, we studied the two-mode CSS dynamics of both clas-
sical and quantum correlations in the decoherence phenomenon for
Markovian environment. Using a definition for the quantum discord
for large class of bipartite states introduced in Ref. [36], we calculated
analytically the dynamics of correlations when the two-mode CSS
decohered in the vacuum environment. Moreover, we compared the
dynamics of the discord with dynamics of the quantum entanglement
and classical correlation.
During the time evolution, the classical and quantum correlations
of two-mode CSS exhibit a different order of correlation depending on
the different strength regimes of the optical fields and vanishing at
infinite time. In the case of weak field regime, the amount of quantum
discord and entanglement of odd two-mode CSS have the same
behavior during the time evolution. Particularly, we have observed
that the degree of correlations decreases with increasing of the nor-
malized time r, whereas for even two-mode CSS the different kinds
of correlations vanish with the time. In the intermediate field regime
2.0
case, the behavior of correlations is more complex that in other re-
gimes. In the case of strong field regime, we find that, contrary to
what is usually stated in the literature, quantum discord under deco-
herence may exhibit sudden death and sudden birth phenomena,
presenting a different results from the previous ones. Our results
show that quantum discord may be more or less robust against deco-
herence for Markovian environment depending on the different
strength regimes of the optical fields.
In comparison with some recent works on the Markovian effect on
the dynamics of different kinds of correlations, our results from
the phenomenological viewpoint might be more practical in the de-
scription of the behavior of the correlations under the effect of the
environment. For further understanding of the total quantum correla-
tions dynamics, it is also interesting to study and compare the quan-
tum dissonance to entanglement, which can give a contribution on
the quantum discord dynamics [15]. In the future, we plan to investi-
gate the effects of finite-temperature environments and the inter-
qubit distance on the evolution of both classical and quantum
correlations. It will be important to study the continuous-variable
multipartite correlations which make a useful contribution for more
understanding the dynamics of correlations in the decoherence
process. Finally, we would like to point out that it is possible to inves-
tigate quantum discord for any dimensional bipartite states from a
geometrical point of view [52,53].
Acknowledgments
K.B. thanks Drs. Joseph Rennes, F. F. Fanchini, and Mazhar Ali for the
useful discussions. K.B. would like to thank Professor Dr. Gernot Alber
for his kind hospitality at the Darmstadt Universität where part of
this work is done. He acknowledges the financial support by the
Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Italy.
Appendix. Calculational details of the classical correlation
In this appendix, we exhibit some details of the calculation leading
to Eqs. (13)-(21). After the measurement {bk}, the bipartite state
ρ ±(t) will change to the ensemble {pk±(t), ρk±(t)}, that is, 2 × 2 density
matrix, where
1


 
ρj ðt Þ ¼ I⊗bj ρ ðt Þ I⊗bj ðA:1Þ
p
j ðt Þ
with




 
pj ðt Þ ¼ tr I⊗bj ρ ðt Þ I⊗bj : ðA:2Þ
In order to obtain the dynamics of the classical correlation, we
need to evaluate ρj±(t) and pj±(t). Using the von Neumann measure-
ment bj = VΠjV †, we write

1.5




 1 †  †
ρj ðt Þ ¼ I⊗ VΠ j V ρ ðt Þ I⊗ VΠ j V : ðA:3Þ
p
j ðt Þ
1.0

Through some calculations, we obtain the density matrices

0.5
h
i
4p  
0 ðt Þρ0 ðt Þ ¼ ð1 þ 3z3 ÞA þ ð1−z3 Þ 1−C

j0〉〈0j
0.0 h
 i
 
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 þ ð1 þ z3 Þ 1−A þ ð1−3z3 ÞC j1〉〈1j
r h i ðA:4Þ
 
þ 2ðz1 −iz2 ÞD −2ðz1 þ iz2 ÞB j1〉〈0j
h i
Fig. 4. Conditional entropy (solid line), quantum mutual information (dotted line), and
þ 2ðz1 þ iz2 ÞD −2ðz1 −iz2 ÞB j0〉〈1j
Marginal state (dashed line) for α = 3.
2234 K. Berrada / Optics Communications 285 (2012) 2227–2235
h
i
4p  
1 ðt Þρ1 ðt Þ ¼ ð1−3z3 ÞA þ ð1 þ z3 Þ 1−C

j0〉〈0j which leads to the classical correlation
h
 i
 
þ ð1−z3 Þ 1−A þ ð1 þ 3z3 ÞC j1〉〈1j

 h

i
     
h i ðA:5Þ C ρ ðt Þ ¼ S ρa ðt Þ − min p0 ðt ÞS ρ0 ðt Þ þ p1 ðt ÞS ρ1 ðt Þ : ðA:15Þ
− 2ðz1 −iz2 ÞD −2ðz1 þ iz2 ÞB j1〉〈0j f jg
b
h i
− 2ðz1 þ iz2 ÞD −2ðz1 −iz2 ÞB j0〉〈1j
The minimal value of f(k, m) = S(ρ ±(t)|{bj}) can be easily obtained
where by appropriate choice of the parameters k and m:
8  
< 1 1
z1 :¼ 2ð−ty2 þ y1 y3 Þ; z2 :¼ 2ðty1 þ y2 y3 Þ; f ðk; mÞ ¼ f ; m for m ¼ 0;
2 4 ðA:16Þ
2 2 2
z3 :¼ t þ y3 −y1 −y2
2
:
f ð1; mÞ for m ¼ 0:

with    
 
We note that min f 12 ; 0 ; f 12 ; 14 ; f ð1; 0Þ ¼ f 12 ; 0 . Therefore, the
evolution of the classical correlation can be expressed as
2 2 2
z1 þ z2 þ z3 ¼ 1:


 1 
 
C ρ ðt Þ ¼ S ρa ðt Þ −f ;0 : ðA:17Þ
According to Eqs. (A.4) and (A.5), it is straightforward to obtain 2
the eigenvalues

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