Petz–Rényi relative entropy in QFT from modular theory

Source abstract

Abstract We consider the generalization of the Araki–Uhlmann formula for relative entropy to Petz–Rényi relative entropy. We compute this entropy for a free scalar field in the Minkowski wedge between the vacuum and a coherent state, as well as for the free chiral current in a thermal state. In contrast to the relative entropy which in these cases only depends on the symplectic form and thus reduces to the classical entropy of a wave packet, the Petz–Rényi relative entropy also depends on the symmetric part of the two-point function and is thus genuinely quantum. We also consider the relation with standard subspaces, where we define the Rényi entropy of a vector and show that it admits an upper bound given by the entropy of the vector.