A Virtual Quantum Network Prototype for Open Access

TL;DR

This paper presents a cloud-based quantum network virtualization platform that enables scalable, remote access to quantum hardware, addressing current limitations in size, accessibility, and cost of quantum networks.

Contribution

It introduces an open-access software platform that virtualizes quantum hardware components, facilitating scalable and fair remote interaction with quantum networks.

Findings

Demonstrated effective virtualization of quantum hardware components.

Showed fair resource allocation using the Hungarian Algorithm.

Validated system performance through implementation and analysis.

Abstract

The rise of quantum networks has revolutionized domains such as communication, sensing, and cybersecurity. Despite this progress, current quantum network systems remain limited in scale, are highly application-specific (e.g., for quantum key distribution), and lack a clear road map for global expansion. These limitations are largely driven by a shortage of skilled professionals, limited accessibility to quantum infrastructure, and the high complexity and cost associated with building and operating quantum hardware. To address these challenges, this paper proposes an open-access software-based quantum network virtualization platform designed to facilitate scalable and remote interaction with quantum hardware. The system is built around a cloud application that virtualizes the core hardware components of a lab-scale quantum network testbed, including the time tagger and optical switch, enabling users to perform coincidence counts of the photon entanglements while ensuring fair resource allocation. The fairness is ensured by employing the Hungarian Algorithm to allocate nearly equal effective entanglement rates among users. We provide implementation details and performance analysis from the perspectives of hardware, software, and cloud platform, which demonstrates the functionality and efficiency of the developed prototype.