Experimental demonstration of a BDCZ quantum repeater node
Open accessAbstract
Quantum communication is a method that offers efficient and secure ways for the exchange of information in a network. Large-scale quantum communication (of the order of 100 km) has been achieved; however, serious problems occur beyond this distance scale, mainly due to inevitable photon loss in the transmission channel. Quantum communication eventually fails when the probability of a dark count in the photon detectors becomes comparable to the probability that a photon is correctly detected. To overcome this problem, Briegel, Dür, Cirac and Zoller (BDCZ) introduced the concept of quantum repeaters, combining entanglement swapping and quantum memory to efficiently extend the achievable distances. Although entanglement swapping has been experimentally demonstrated, the implementation of BDCZ quantum repeaters has proved challenging owing to the difficulty of integrating a quantum memory. Here we realize entanglement swapping with storage and retrieval of light, a building block of the BDCZ quantum repeater. We follow a scheme that incorporates the strategy of BDCZ with atomic quantum memories. Two atomic ensembles, each originally entangled with a single emitted photon, are projected into an entangled state by performing a joint Bell state measurement on the two single photons after they have passed through a 300-m fibre-based communication channel. The entanglement is stored in the atomic ensembles and later verified by converting the atomic excitations into photons. Our method is intrinsically phase insensitive and establishes the essential element needed to realize quantum repeaters with stationary atomic qubits as quantum memories and flying photonic qubits as quantum messengers.
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Several ingredients of the quantum repeater scheme have already been demonstrated: entanglement swapping, purification, and quantum memory.
“Several ingredients of this scheme have been already demonstrated: entanglement swapping (Pan et al. 1998), purification (Pan et al. 2003), quantum memory (e.g., Yuan et al. 2008), etc.”
From Multiphoton entanglement and interferometry (2012) · cites this paper as Yuan et al. 2008
Interference of indistinguishable photons enables entanglement swapping and teleportation.
“The interference of indistinguishable photons enables a process called entanglement swapping and teleportation (Zukowski et al. 1993, see Section VI.C), which in turns opens up prospects of distributing of entanglement between distant matter qubits such as ions (Moehring et al. 2007) and atoms (Yuan et al. 2008).”
From Multiphoton entanglement and interferometry (2012) · cites this paper as Yuan et al. 2008
Moehring et al. (2007) entangled two trapped atomic ions separated one meter apart using entanglement swapping exploiting interference of photons emitted by the ions, and Yuan et al. (2008) did so in atomic ensembles.
“Proof-of-principle experiments have been performed by Moehring et al. (2007) who entangled two trapped atomic ions separated one meter apart using entanglement swapping exploiting interference of photons emitted by the ions, and by Yuan et al. (2008) in atomic ensembles.”
From Multiphoton entanglement and interferometry (2012) · cites this paper as Yuan et al. (2008)
Entanglement swapping, together with entanglement purification and quantum memory, are essential components of quantum repeaters necessary for quantum networking and long-distance quantum communication.
“A variation of teleportation, entanglement swapping (Pan et al. 1998), which together with entanglement purification (Pan et al. 2003) and quantum memory (e.g.Yuan et al. 2008) are the essential components of quantum repeaters necessary for quantum networking and long distance quantum communication.”
From Multiphoton entanglement and interferometry (2012) · cites this paper as Yuan et al. 2008
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Quantum Repeaters: The Role of Imperfect Local Operations in Quantum Communication
Briegel, H.-J., Dür, W., Cirac, J. I., & Zoller, P. (1998) · Physical Review Letters · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.81.5932 · Cited by 3,481 · see citing works
Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger-state analyzer
Pan, J.-W., & Zeilinger, A. (1998) · Physical Review A · doi:10.1103/physreva.57.2208 · Cited by 213 · see citing works
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Self-citationMultiphoton entanglement and interferometry
Pan, J.-W., Chen, Z.-B., Lu, C.-Y., Weinfurter, H., Zeilinger, A., & Żukowski, M. (2012) · Reviews of Modern Physics · doi:10.1103/revmodphys.84.777 · Cited by 1,410 · see citing works
Self-citationExperimental demonstration of memory-enhanced quantum communication
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- Authors
- Yuan, Z.-S., Chen, Y.-A., Zhao, B., Chen, S., Schmiedmayer, J., & Pan, J.-W.
- Affiliations
- University of Science and Technology of China (CN)
- Heidelberg University (DE)
- TU Wien (AT)
- Corresponding author
- Chen, Yu-Ao
- Pan, Jian-Wei
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2008-08
- Volume
- 454
- Issue
- 7208
- Pages
- 1098-1101
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- OpenAlex
- W2050375707
- Cited by
- 473
- References
- 3
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 22 · 2024: 24 · 2023: 29 · 2022: 28 · 2021: 40 · 2020: 36 · 2019: 24 · 2018: 22 · 2017: 23 · 2016: 22 · 2015: 22 · 2014: 16 · 2013: 23 · 2012: 34
- FWCI
- 51.80
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- arxiv.org
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Funders
- European Commission
- Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Quantum Information and Cryptography
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics › Quantum optics and atomic interactions
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics › Quantum Mechanics and Applications
- Keywords
- entanglement swapping, atomic quantum memory, Bell state measurement, atomic ensembles, quantum memory readout, long-distance quantum communication, photon loss
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