Parametrization and distillability of three-qubit entanglement

There is an ongoing effort to quantify entanglement of quantum pure states for systems with more than two subsystems. We consider three approaches to this problem for three-qubit states: choosing a basis which puts the state into a standard form, enumerating ``local invariants,'' and using operational quantities such as the number of maximally entangled states which can be distilled. In this paper we evaluate a particular standard form, the {\it Schmidt form}, which is a generalization of the Schmidt decomposition for bipartite pure states. We show how the coefficients in this case can be parametrized in terms of five physically meaningful local invariants; we use this form to prove the efficacy of a particular distillation technique for GHZ triplets; and we relate the yield of GHZs to classes of states with unusual entanglement properties, showing that these states represent extremes of distillability as functions of two local invariants.