Entanglement distribution with minimal memory requirements using time-bin photonic qudits

Abstract

Generating multiple entangled qubit pairs between distributed nodes is a prerequisite for a future quantum internet. To achieve a practicable generation rate, standard protocols based on photonic qubits require multiple long-term quantum memories, which remains a significant experimental challenge. In this paper, we propose a novel protocol based on $2^m$-dimensional time-bin photonic qudits that allow for the simultaneous generation of multiple ($m$) entangled pairs between two distributed qubit registers and outline a specific implementation of the protocol based on cavity-mediated spin-photon interactions. By adopting the qudit protocol, the required qubit memory time is independent of the transmission loss between the nodes in contrast to standard qubit approaches. As such, our protocol can significantly boost the performance of near-term quantum networks.

13 pages, 7 figures, accepted by PRX Quantum

References in corpus (6)

• Secure Quantum Key Distribution
• Realization of a multi-node quantum network of remote solid-state qubits
• A Quantum Gate between a Flying Optical Photon and a Single Trapped Atom
• Multiplexed Memory-Insensitive Quantum Repeaters
• Rate analysis for a hybrid quantum repeater
• Protocol for generation of high-dimensional entanglement from an array of non-interacting photon emitters