Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2015/iii/paper-66/3/v/solution

Write , which is real because is a Hermitian operator. Set
with . This Hermitian operator satisfies . The trace-norm variational principle for Hermitian operators gives the diagonal absolute-sum bound for the trace norm:
For , with , extend to an orthonormal basis . Put . The first diagonal entry is , and all the others are nonnegative. Their sum is , because . The bound therefore yields . Using the definitions of trace distance and quantum fidelity,
This pure-target lower bound on trace distance is attained whenever has no coherence between and its orthogonal complement. The proof used the trace-norm variational principle for Hermitian operators, together with positivity and normalization of a density operator.

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