Entanglement or separability: The choice of how to factorize the algebra of a density matrix

Walter Thirring, Reinhold A. Bertlmann, Philipp Köhler, Heide Narnhofer

Published 2011-06-15, updated 2011-08-19Version 2

We discuss the concept of how entanglement changes with respect to different factorizations of the total algebra which describes the quantum states. Depending on the considered factorization a quantum state appears either entangled or separable. For pure states we always can switch unitarily between separability and entanglement, however, for mixed states a minimal amount of mixedness is needed. We discuss our general statements in detail for the familiar case of qubits, the GHZ states, Werner states and Gisin states, emphasizing their geometric features. As theorists we use and play with this free choice of factorization, which is naturally fixed for an experimentalist. For theorists it offers an extension of the interpretations and is adequate to generalizations, as we point out in the examples of quantum teleportation and entanglement swapping.