Extreme Points of the Convex set of Stochastic Maps on A C*-Algebra

Abstract

Let [Formula: see text] be a unital C*-subalgebra of the C*-algebra ℬ(ℋ) of all bounded operators on a complex separable Hilbert space ℋ. Let [Formula: see text] denote the convex set of all unital, linear, completely positive and normal maps of [Formula: see text] into itself. Using Stinespring's theorem, we present a criterion for an element [Formula: see text] to be extremal. When [Formula: see text], this criterion leads to an explicit description of the set of all extreme points of [Formula: see text]. We also obtain a quantum probabilistic analogue of the classical Birkhoff's theorem2 that every bistochastic matrix can be expressed as a convex combination of permutation matrices.