The detection power of real entanglement witnesses under local unitary equivalence

Since the birth of quantum theory, it has been controversial that whether real numbers are adequate to describe its formalism. Recently, the imaginary unit i has been experimentally proven to be indispensable for quantum mechanics. It motivates us to study the differences in detection power between real and complex entanglement witnesses (EWs), and analyze the detection power of real EWs under local equivalences. We show that a real EW must detect a real entangled state, and conversely a real entangled state must be detected by a real EW. We present a necessary and sufficient condition for the entangled states detected by real EWs, and give a specific example which implies the detection limitations of real EWs. Then, we conjecture that all entangled states are detected by the EWs locally equivalent to real ones. We prove the conjecture for all states with non-positive partial transpose. We also derive a necessary and sufficient condition for the complex PPT (positive-partial-transpose) entangled states detected by the EWs locally equivalent to real ones. We further prove the conjecture for a family of two-quqart PPT entangled states. Another way to figure out the conjecture is to check whether a counterexample exists. We propose an equivalent method to examine the existence of a counterexample from a set-theoretic perspective, and provide some supporting evidence of non-existence. Finally, we derive some results on local projections of EWs with product projectors.