Memoryless quantum repeaters based on cavity-QED and coherent states

TL;DR

This paper proposes a memoryless quantum repeater scheme using cavity-QED and bosonic codes, achieving high-fidelity long-distance entanglement distribution suitable for quantum key distribution with high clock rates.

Contribution

It introduces a novel cavity-QED based quantum repeater scheme utilizing rotation-symmetric bosonic codes, enabling high-rate, memoryless entanglement distribution over long distances.

Findings

Fidelity and success probability approach unity over 1000km with small station spacing and low losses.

Secret key rates can surpass the repeaterless bound per channel use and per second.

The scheme can operate at room temperature and optical frequencies.

Abstract

A quantum repeater scheme based on cavity-QED and quantum error correction of channel loss via rotation-symmetric bosonic codes (RSBC) is proposed to distribute atomic entangled states over long distances without memories and at high clock rates. In this scheme, controlled rotation gates, i.e., phase shifts of the propagating light modes conditioned upon the state of an atom placed in a cavity, provide a mechanism both for the entangled-state preparations and for the error syndrome identifications. The distributed entangled pairs can then be used for quantum key distribution (QKD). In order to assess the performance of this repeater protocol, an explicit instance of RSBC--multi-component cat codes are studied quantitatively. A numerical simulation shows that the total fidelity and the success probability for quantum communication over a long distance (such as 1000km) both can almost approach unity provided a small enough elementary distance between stations (smaller than 0.1km or 0.01km) and rather low local losses (up to 0.1%) are considered. Secret key rates can become correspondingly high, both per channel use, beating the repeaterless bound, and per second thanks to the relatively high clock rates of the memoryless scheme. It is predicted from these results that a larger elementary distance might also keep both the fidelity and the success probability close to unity if higher-loss codes are employed. Based upon the cavity-QED setting, this scheme can be realized at room temperature and at optical frequencies.