Quantum information theory

Information theory itself is a very broad topic and occupies many, many, many volumes. Our goal here is to give you just enough information theory that you have a general understanding of how it applies to quantum networking. So let's take a step back and get a few definitions. The term quantum information just refers to the information that's stored in the state of some quantum system, for example, in the polarization of a qubit. Now usually quantum states are described by something called a density matrix. If you don't have a background in linear algebra, I strongly recommend you at least get up to speed on the basics, because using matrices is the language of quantum mechanics and quantum computing. matrix is a specific type of matrix used in quantum information. Let's begin with classical information theory. Classical information theory began with Claude Shannon. His idea was to understand information as it related to telecommunications back when phone lines were first getting…