Pathways for Entanglement-Based Quantum Communication in the Face of High Noise

Entanglement-based quantum communication offers an increased level of security in practical secret shared key distribution. One of the fundamental principles enabling this security-the fact that interfering with one photon will destroy entanglement and thus be detectable-is also the greatest obstacl...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physical review letters 2021-09, Vol.127 (11), p.110505-110505, Article 110505
Main Authors: Hu, Xiao-Min, Zhang, Chao, Guo, Yu, Wang, Fang-Xiang, Xing, Wen-Bo, Huang, Cen-Xiao, Liu, Bi-Heng, Huang, Yun-Feng, Li, Chuan-Feng, Guo, Guang-Can, Gao, Xiaoqin, Pivoluska, Matej, Huber, Marcus
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Background noise
Communication
Error correction
Noise
Noise levels
Photons
Quantum cryptography
Quantum entanglement
Qubits (quantum computing)
Security
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Summary:Entanglement-based quantum communication offers an increased level of security in practical secret shared key distribution. One of the fundamental principles enabling this security-the fact that interfering with one photon will destroy entanglement and thus be detectable-is also the greatest obstacle. Random encounters of traveling photons, losses, and technical imperfections make noise an inevitable part of any quantum communication scheme, severely limiting distance, key rate, and environmental conditions in which quantum key distribution can be employed. Using photons entangled in their spatial degree of freedom, we show that the increased noise resistance of high-dimensional entanglement can indeed be harnessed for practical key distribution schemes. We perform quantum key distribution in eight entangled paths at various levels of environmental noise and show key rates that, even after error correction and privacy amplification, still exceed 1 bit per photon pair and furthermore certify a secure key at noise levels that would prohibit comparable qubit based schemes from working.
ISSN:0031-9007
1079-7114
DOI:10.1103/PhysRevLett.127.110505