Optimal entanglement criterion for mixed quantum states.

We develop a strong and computationally simple entanglement criterion. The criterion is based on an elementary positive map Phi which operates on state spaces with even dimension N > or = 4. It is shown that Phi detects many entangled states with a positive partial transposition (PPT) and that it leads to a class of optimal entanglement witnesses. This implies that there are no other witnesses which can detect more entangled PPT states. The map Phi yields a systematic method for the explicit construction of high-dimensional manifolds of bound entangled states.