Published papers

In spontaneous parametric down conversion (SPDC) based quantum information processing (QIP) experiments, there is a tradeoff between the coincidence count rates (i.e. the pumping power of the SPDC), which limits the rate of the protocol, and the visibility of the quantum interference, which limits the quality of the protocol. This tradeoff is mainly caused by the multi-photon pair emissions from the SPDCs. In theory, the problem is how to model the experiments without truncating these multi-photon emissions while including practical imperfections. In this paper, we establish a method to theoretically simulate SPDC-based QIPs which fully incorporates the effect of multi-photon emissions and various practical imperfections. The key ingredient in our method is the application of the characteristic function formalism which has been used in continuous variable QIPs. We apply our method to three examples, the Hong-Ou-Mandel interference and the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen interference experiments, and the concatenated entanglement swapping protocol. For the first two examples, we show that our theoretical results quantitatively agree with the recent experimental results. Also we provide the closed expressions for these interference visibilities with the full multi-photon components and various imperfections. For the last example, we provide the general theoretical form of the concatenated entanglement swapping protocol in our method and show the numerical results up to five concatenations. Our method requires only a small computational resource (a few minutes by a commercially available computer), which was not possible in the previous theoretical approach. Our method will have applications in a wide range of SPDC-based QIP protocols with high accuracy and a reasonable computational resource.

In the lore of quantum metrology, one often hears (or reads) the following no-go theorem: If you put a vacuum into one input port of a balanced Mach-Zehnder interferometer, then no matter what you put into the other input port, and no matter what your detection scheme, the sensitivity can never be better than the shot-noise limit (SNL). Often the proof of this theorem is cited to be in C. Caves, Phys. Rev. D 23, 1693 (1981)0556-282110.1103/PhysRevD.23.1693, but upon further inspection, no such claim is made there. Quantum-Fisher-information-based arguments suggestive of this no-go theorem appear elsewhere in the literature, but are not stated in their full generality. Here we thoroughly explore this no-go theorem and give a rigorous statement: the no-go theorem holds whenever the unknown phase shift is split between both of the arms of the interferometer, but remarkably does not hold when only one arm has the unknown phase shift. In the latter scenario, we provide an explicit measurement strategy that beats the SNL. We also point out that these two scenarios are physically different and correspond to different types of sensing applications.

Since 1984, various optical quantum key distribution (QKD) protocols have been proposed and examined. In all of them, the rate of secret key generation decays exponentially with distance. A natural and fundamental question is then whether there are yet-to-be discovered optical QKD protocols (without quantum repeaters) that could circumvent this rate-distance tradeoff. This paper provides a major step towards answering this question. Here we show that the secret key agreement capacity of a lossy and noisy optical channel assisted by unlimited two-way public classical communication is limited by an upper bound that is solely a function of the channel loss, regardless of how much optical power the protocol may use. Our result has major implications for understanding the secret key agreement capacity of optical channels - a long-standing open problem in optical quantum information theory - and strongly suggests a real need for quantum repeaters to perform QKD at high rates over long distances.

We demonstrate a novel scheme to generate frequency-entangled qudits with dimension number higher than 10 and to distribute them over optical fibers of 15 km in total length. This scheme combines the technique of spectral engineering of biphotons generated by spontaneous parametric down-conversion and the technique of spectrally resolved Hong-Ou-Mandel interference. We characterized the comb-like spectral correlation structures of the qudits by time of arrival measurement and correlated spectral intensity measurement. The generation and distribution of the distinct entangled frequency modes may be useful for quantum cryptography, quantum metrology, quantum remote synchronization, as well as fundamental test of stronger violation of local realism.

A novel fiber-based scheme for generating quadrature entanglement between a specific pair of frequency bands is proposed. The scheme is based on use of a nonlinear fiber, a spectral pulse shaper, and an adaptive feedback loop. It is numerically predicted that at least -5 dB of the quadrature entanglement will be created by preparation of an appropriate initial phase spectrum. Optimal control of the four-wave mixing terms of the Kerr Hamiltonian is crucial for improvement of the entanglement. © 2003 Optical Society of America.

A novel fiber-based scheme for generating quadrature entanglement between a desired pair of frequency bands is proposed. The scheme is based on a nonlinear fiber, a spectral pulse shaper, and an adaptive feedback loop.

We propose and demonstrate a novel method to generate a large-amplitude coherent-state superposition (CSS) via ancilla-assisted photon subtraction. The ancillary mode induces quantum interference of indistinguishable processes in an extended space, widening the controllability of quantum superposition at the conditional output. We demonstrate this by a simple time-separated two-photon subtraction from continuous wave squeezed light. We observe the largest CSS of traveling light ever reported without correcting any imperfections, which will enable various quantum information applications with CSS states. © 2008 The American Physical Society.

Numerical studies of the dynamic transfer of one chaotic oscillation appeared in a laser diode, which is subject to weak optical feedback, to a variety of periodic oscillations by modulating the injection current of the laser diode, are described. We evaluate also the response of periodic attractors in the stabilized oscillations by calculating statistic distributions of the transient time among those attractors. The average transient time is approximately 21 ns, which is longer than the full round time in the controlled periodic attractors. ©2003 Copyright SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering.

Strong quantum correlation is generated among frequency modes of a broadband pulse propagating in nonlinear fibers. We theoretically studied the evolution of quantum correlation and squeezing for intra- and inter-pulses by a numerical model.

We introduce a geometric framework for studying Bell nonlocality in Hilbert space, where, for a given quantum state, nonlocality is quantified by the distance between the state and the set of local states. This approach applies to any Bell inequality and any measurement scenario. Whenever the local set is characterized, the proposed nonlocality measure can be computed explicitly. As a general result, we prove that for any scenario in arbitrary dimension the closest local state to a Werner state is itself a Werner state, and analogously, the closest local state to an isotropic state is again isotropic. In the two-qubit case, we further show that the closest local state to a Bell-diagonal state is Bell-diagonal as well. These structural results are independent of the specific Bell inequality considered, thus revealing intrinsic geometric features of these families of states and providing significant simplifications for computing the proposed measures. For the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality in two-qubit systems and the Collins-Gisin-Linden-Massar-Popescu (CGLMP) inequality for two qudits of arbitrary finite dimension, we derive explicit geometric measures of nonlocality for Bell-diagonal, Werner, and isotropic states using various distance metrics, including the trace, Hellinger, Hilbert-Schmidt distances, and relative entropy. Furthermore, we prove in all generality that for all scenarios in which the local set is not fully characterized, the geometric measures provide rigorous lower bounds on nonlocality

Free-space optical (FSO) communications can offer secure connectivity thanks to the high directionality of the laser beam and the line-of-sight configuration. These security advantages are employed to realize high-speed key establishment between two distant parties, which is provably secure against an eavesdropper with unlimited computational resources. Besides, a well-maintained laser beam divergence allows group key agreement (GKA) among multiple parties. Here, we propose a novel method of GKA over FSO link—FSO-GKA. After numerically characterizing fundamental behaviors, we present a proof-of-concept demonstration of FSO-GKA using a 7.8-km terrestrial link. We achieve a group key rate of roughly 8 Mbps over a 58dB-loss channel based on 10-MHz on-off keying. We also investigate information leakage risks under several atmospheric conditions, which provides the basis for security certification of FSO-GKA. Our proposed scheme shows a new way to construct high-speed key exchange platforms.

We investigate the excess noise induced by crosstalk in a trench-assisted homogeneous 19-core fiber for a continuous variable quantum key distribution (CV-QKD) receiver. Crosstalk is studied for both 30 wavelength division multiplexing channels of 24.5-Gbaud PM-16QAM with 100-GHz channel spacing and for an amplified spontaneous emission signal with 37.5-GHz bandwidth. We show that in-band crosstalk from neighboring cores prohibits secret key generation. However, it is possible to place CV-QKD channels at wavelengths not used by the classical channels even though wideband amplified spontaneous emission noise is present. The excess noise induced by crosstalk from a neighboring core is shown to be time-dependent.

In a single qubit system, a universal quantum classifier can be realized using the data reuploading technique. In this study, we propose a new quantum classifier applying this technique to bosonic systems and successfully demonstrate it using a silicon-based photonic integrated circuit. We established a theory of quantum machine learning algorithm applicable to bosonic systems and implemented a programmable optical circuit combined with an interferometer. Learning and classification using part of the implemented optical quantum circuit with uncorrelated two photons resulted in a classification with a success probability of 94±0.8% in the proof of principle experiment. As this method can be applied to an arbitrary two-mode N-photon system, further development of optical quantum classifiers, such as extensions to quantum entangled and multiphoton states, is expected in the future.

We analyze the generation of entanglement in a multipartite optical network. We generalize the twin-field strategy to the multipartite case and show that our protocol has advantageous rate-loss scalings of distributing Formula Presented states and Dicke states over the star networks. We provide precise theoretical formulas and quantitative performance analyses. Also, analysis of the same protocol using Gaussian states as resources, which is a typical setup in many experimental tests, is provided. We numerically study the feasibility of the protocol in realistic experimental conditions with imperfect detectors. We observe that the advantage depends on the chosen fidelity and is affected by the dark counts of the detector.

Quantum communication with binary nonorthogonal pure states and single-shot measurements are discussed in terms of reliability function and cut-off rate. It is shown that some of different measurement strategies simultaneously attain the maximum single-shot cut-off rate. We also apply these measurements to the BPSK optical coherent states and compare them with the homodyne detection. Numerical results show that even including realistic imperfections, it is possible to exceed the homodyne limited cut-off rate.