W. Tittel

Violation of Bell inequalities by photons more than 10 km apart

A Franson-type test of Bell inequalities by photons 10.9 km apart is presented. Energy-time entangled photon pairs are measured using two-channel analyzers, leading to a violation of the inequalities by 16 standard deviations without subtracting accidental coincidences. Subtracting them, a two-photon interference visibility of 95.5% is observed, demonstrating that distances up to 10 km have no significant effect on entanglement. This sets quantum cryptography with photon pairs as a practical competitor to the schemes based on weak pulses.

Quantum cryptography using entangled photons in energy-time bell states

We present a setup for quantum cryptography based on photon pairs in energy-time Bell states and show its feasibility in a laboratory experiment. Our scheme combines the advantages of using photon pairs instead of faint laser pulses and the possibility to preserve energy-time entanglement over long distances. Moreover, using four-dimensional energy-time states, no fast random change of bases is required in our setup: Nature itself decides whether to measure in the energy or in the time base, thus rendering eavesdropper attacks based on photon number splitting less efficient.

''Plug and play'' systems for quantum cryptography

We present a time-multiplexed interferometer based on Faraday mirrors, and apply it to quantum key distribution. The interfering pulses follow exactly the same spatial path, ensuring very high stability and self balancing. The use of Faraday mirrors compensates automatically any birefringence effects and polarization dependent losses in the transmitting fiber. First experimental results show a fringe visibility of 0.9984 for a 23-km-long interferometer, based on installed telecom fibers. {copyright} {ital 1997 American Institute of Physics.}We present a time-multiplexed interferometer based on Faraday mirrors, and apply it to quantum key distribution. The interfering pulses follow exactly the same spatial path, ensuring very high stability and self balancing. The use of Faraday mirrors compensates automatically any birefringence effects and polarization dependent losses in the transmitting fiber. First experimental results show a fringe visibility of 0.9984 for a 23-km-long interferometer, based on installed telecom fibers.

PULSED ENERGY-TIME ENTANGLED TWIN-PHOTON SOURCE FOR QUANTUM COMMUNICATION

A pulsed source of energy-time entangled photon pairs pumped by a standard laser diode is proposed and demonstrated. The basic states can be distinguished by their time of arrival. This greatly simplifies the realization of 2-photon quantum cryptography, Bell state analyzers, quantum teleportation, dense coding, entanglement swapping, GHZ-states sources, etc. Moreover, the entanglement is well protected during photon propagation in telecom optical fibers, opening the door to few-photon applications of quantum communication over long distances.

A photonic quantum information interface

Quantum communication requires the transfer of quantum states, or quantum bits of information (qubits), from one place to another. From a fundamental perspective, this allows the distribution of entanglement and the demonstration of quantum non-locality over significant distances. Within the context of applications, quantum cryptography offers a provably secure way to establish a confidential key between distant partners. Photons represent the natural flying qubit carriers for quantum communication, and the presence of telecommunications optical fibres makes the wavelengths of 1,310u2009nm and 1,550u2009nm particularly suitable for distribution over long distances. However, qubits encoded into alkaline atoms that absorb and emit at wavelengths around 800u2009nm have been considered for the storage and processing of quantum information. Hence, future quantum information networks made of telecommunications channels and alkaline memories will require interfaces that enable qubit transfers between these useful wavelengths, while preserving quantum coherence and entanglement. Here we report a demonstration of qubit transfer between photons of wavelength 1,310u2009nm and 710u2009nm. The mechanism is a nonlinear up-conversion process, with a success probability of greater than 5 per cent. In the event of a successful qubit transfer, we observe strong two-photon interference between the 710u2009nm photon and a third photon at 1,550u2009nm, initially entangled with the 1,310u2009nm photon, although they never directly interacted. The corresponding fidelity is higher than 98 per cent.

Quantum cryptography using larger alphabets

Like all of quantum information theory, quantum cryptography is traditionally based on two-level quantum systems. In this paper, a protocol for quantum key distribution based on higher-dimensional systems is presented. An experimental realization using an interferometric setup is also proposed. Analyzing this protocol from the practical side, one finds an increased key creation rate while keeping the initial laser pulse rate constant. Analyzing it for the case of intercept/resend eavesdropping strategy, an increased error rate is found compared to two-dimensional systems, hence an advantage for the legitimate users to detect an eavesdropper.

PPLN waveguide for quantum communication

Abstract:We report on energy-time and time-bin entangled photon-pair sources based on a periodically poled lithium niobate (PPLN) waveguide. Degenerate twin photons at 1 314 nm wavelength are created by spontaneous parametric down-conversion and coupled into standard telecom fibers. Our PPLN waveguide features a very high conversion efficiency of about 10-6, roughly 4 orders of magnitude more than that obtained employing bulk crystals [#!Tanzilli01a!#]. Even if using low power laser diodes, this engenders a significant probability for creating two pairs at a time - an important advantage for some quantum communication protocols. We point out a simple means to characterize the pair creation probability in case of a pulsed pump. To investigate the quality of the entangled states, we perform photon-pair interference experiments, leading to visibilities of 97% for the case of energy-time entanglement and of 84% for the case of time-bin entanglement. Although the last figure must still be improved, these tests demonstrate the high potential of PPLN waveguide based sources to become a key element for future quantum communication schemes.

Distribution of time-bin entangled qubits over 50 km of optical fiber

We report experimental distribution of time-bin entangled qubits over 50 km of optical fibers. Using actively stabilized preparation and measurement devices we demonstrate violation of the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt Bell inequality by more than 15 standard deviations without removing the detector noise. In addition we report a proof-of principle experiment of quantum key distribution over 50 km of optical fibers using entangled photon.

Experimental demonstration of quantum correlations over more than 10 km

Energy and time entangled photons at a wavelength of 1310 nm are produced by parametric down-conversion in a

Real-World Two-Photon Interference and Proof-of-Principle Quantum Key Distribution Immune to Detector Attacks

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