Instantaneous indirect measurement principle in quantum mechanics

Abstract: In quantum systems, the measurement of operators and the measurement of the quantum states of the system are very challenging tasks. In this Letter, we propose a method to obtain the average value of one operator in a certain state by measuring the instantaneous change of the average value of another operator with the assistance of a known reference state. We refer to this measurement method as the instantaneous indirect measurement method. By studying the application of this method to some typical models, we find that this measurement can be applied to the measurement of an arbitrary state of a quantum system. Furthermore, for the system to be measured, we find that such measurement neither significantly affects the wave function of the system nor causes wave function collapse of the system. Also, our study shows that when two independent systems are coupled, the information mapping between them is done instantaneously. Finally, we discuss applying this measurement method to the measurement of quantum Fisher information, which quantizes the limited accuracy of estimating a parameter from a quantum state.