skip to main content


Title: Entanglement generation in a quantum network with finite quantum memory lifetime
We simulate entanglement sharing between two end-nodes of a linear chain quantum network using SeQUeNCe, an open-source simulation package for quantum networks. Our focus is on the rate of entanglement generation between the end-nodes with many repeaters with a finite quantum memory lifetime. Numerical and analytical simulations show limits of connection performance for a given number of repeaters involved, memory lifetimes, the distance between the end-nodes, and an entanglement management protocol. Our findings demonstrate that the performance of quantum connection depends highly on the entanglement management protocol, which schedules entanglement generation and swapping, resulting in the final end-to-end entanglement.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1936948 1707919
NSF-PAR ID:
10323172
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
AVS Quantum Science
Volume:
4
Issue:
1
ISSN:
2639-0213
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. In a quantum network that successfully creates links—shared Bell states between neighboring repeater nodes—with probability p in each time slot, and performs Bell State Measurements at nodes with success probability q < 1, the end-to-end entanglement generation rate drops exponentially with the distance between consumers, despite multi-path routing. If repeaters can perform multi-qubit projective measurements in the GHZ basis that succeed with probability q, the rate does not change with distance in a certain (p,q) region, but decays exponentially outside. This region where the distance-independent rate occurs is the super-critical region of a new percolation problem. We extend this GHZ protocol to incorporate a time-multiplexing blocklength k, the number of time slots over which a repeater can mix-and-match successful links to perform fusion on. As k increases, the super-critical region expands. For a given (p,q), the entanglement rate initially increases with k, and once inside the super-critical region for a high enough k, it decays as 1/k GHZ states per time slot. When memory coherence time exponentially distributed with mean μ is incorporated, it is seen that increasing k does not indefinitely increase the super-critical region; it has a hard μ-dependent limit. Finally, we find that incorporating space-division multiplexing, i.e., running the above protocol independently in up to d disconnected network regions, where d is the network’s node degree, one can go beyond the 1 GHZ state per time slot rate that the above randomized local-link-state protocol cannot surpass. As (p,q) increases, one can approach the ultimate min-cut entanglement-generation capacity of d GHZ states per slot. 
    more » « less
  2. Quantum repeaters are nodes in a quantum communication network that allow reliable transmission of entanglement over large distances. It was recently shown that highly entangled photons in so-called graph states can be used for all-photonic quantum repeaters, which require substantially fewer resources compared to atomic-memory-based repeaters. However, standard approaches to building multiphoton entangled states through pairwise probabilistic entanglement generation severely limit the size of the state that can be created. Here, we present a protocol for the deterministic generation of large photonic repeater states using quantum emitters such as semiconductor quantum dots and defect centers in solids. We show that arbitrarily large repeater states can be generated using only one emitter coupled to a single qubit, potentially reducing the necessary number of photon sources by many orders of magnitude. Our protocol includes a built-in redundancy, which makes it resilient to photon loss. 
    more » « less
  3. Abstract

    We develop a protocol for entanglement generation in the quantum internet that allows a repeater node to usen-qubit Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) projective measurements that can fusensuccessfully entangledlinks, i.e., two-qubit entangled Bell pairs shared acrossnnetwork edges, incident at that node. Implementingn-fusion, forn ≥ 3, is in principle not much harder than 2-fusions (Bell-basis measurements) in solid-state qubit memories. If we allow even 3-fusions at the nodes, we find—by developing a connection to a modified version of the site-bond percolation problem—that despite lossy (hence probabilistic) link-level entanglement generation, and probabilistic success of the fusion measurements at nodes, one can generate entanglement between end parties Alice and Bob at a rate that stays constant as the distance between them increases. We prove that this powerful network property is not possible to attain with any quantum networking protocol built with Bell measurements and multiplexing alone. We also design a two-party quantum key distribution protocol that converts the entangled states shared between two nodes into a shared secret, at a key generation rate that is independent of the distance between the two parties.

     
    more » « less
  4. Abstract

    We examine the viability of quantum repeaters based on two-species trapped ion modules for long-distance quantum key distribution. Repeater nodes comprised of ion-trap modules of co-trapped ions of distinct species are considered. The species used for communication qubits has excellent optical properties while the other longer lived species serves as a memory qubit in the modules. Each module interacts with the network only via single photons emitted by the communication ions. Coherent Coulomb interaction between ions is utilized to transfer quantum information between the communication and memory ions and to achieve entanglement swapping between two memory ions. We describe simple modular quantum repeater architectures realizable with the ion-trap modules and numerically study the dependence of the quantum key distribution rate on various experimental parameters, including coupling efficiency, gate infidelity, operation time and length of the elementary links. Our analysis suggests crucial improvements necessary in a physical implementation for co-trapped two-species ions to be a competitive platform in long-distance quantum communication.

     
    more » « less
  5. By encoding logical qubits into specific types of photonic graph states, one can realize quantum repeaters that enable fast entanglement distribution rates approaching classical communication. However, the generation of these photonic graph states requires a formidable resource overhead using traditional approaches based on linear optics. Overcoming this challenge, a number of new schemes have been proposed that employ quantum emitters to deterministically generate photonic graph states. Although these schemes have the potential to significantly reduce the resource cost, a systematic comparison of the repeater performance among different encodings and different generation schemes is lacking. Here, we quantitatively analyze the performance of quantum repeaters based on two different graph states, i.e. the tree graph states and the repeater graph states. For both states, we compare the performance between two generation schemes, one based on a single quantum emitter coupled to ancillary matter qubits, and one based on a single quantum emitter coupled to a delayed feedback. We identify the numerically optimal scheme at different system parameters. Our analysis provides a clear guideline on the selection of the generation scheme for graph-state-based quantum repeaters, and lays out the parameter requirements for future experimental realizations of different schemes. 
    more » « less