Characterizing the geometry of the Kirkwood–Dirac-positive states

Abstract

The Kirkwood–Dirac (KD) quasiprobability distribution can describe any quantum state with respect to the eigenbases of two observables A and B. KD distributions behave similarly to classical joint probability distributions but can assume negative and nonreal values. In recent years, KD distributions have proven instrumental in mapping out nonclassical phenomena and quantum advantages. These quantum features have been connected to nonpositive entries of KD distributions. Consequently, it is important to understand the geometry of the KD-positive and -nonpositive states. Until now, there has been no thorough analysis of the KD positivity of mixed states. Here, we investigate the dependence of the full convex set of states with positive KD distributions on the eigenbases of A and B and on the dimension d of the Hilbert space. In particular, we identify three regimes where convex combinations of the eigenprojectors of A and B constitute the only KD-positive states: (i) any system in dimension 2; (ii) an open and dense probability one set of bases in dimension d = 3; and (iii) the discrete-Fourier-transform bases in prime dimension. Finally, we show that, if for example d = 2m, there exist, for suitable choices of A and B, mixed KD-positive states that cannot be written as convex combinations of pure KD-positive states. We further explicitly construct such states for a spin-1 system.