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arXiv:1111.0829 · Nature Communications

Conclusive quantum steering with superconducting transition-edge sensors

Devin H. Smith, Geoff Gillett, Marcelo Pereira de Almeida, Cyril Branciard, Alessandro Fedrizzi, Till J. Weinhold, Adriana E. Lita, Brice Calkins, Thomas Gerrits, Howard M. Wiseman, Sae Woo Nam, Andrew G. White

Published Jan 10, 2012• 237 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Quantum steering allows two parties to verify shared entanglement even if one measurement device is untrusted. A conclusive demonstration of steering through the violation of a steering inequality is of considerable fundamental interest and opens up applications in quantum communication. To date, all experimental tests with single-photon states have relied on post selection, allowing untrusted devices to cheat by hiding unfavourable events in losses. Here we close this 'detection loophole' by combining a highly efficient source of entangled photon pairs with superconducting transition-edge sensors. We achieve an unprecedented ∼62% conditional detection efficiency of entangled photons and violate a steering inequality with the minimal number of measurement settings by 48 s.d.s. Our results provide a clear path to practical applications of steering and to a photonic loophole-free Bell test. Untrustworthy sources or detectors mean that quantum entanglement cannot always be ensured, but quantum steering inequalities can verify its presence. Using a highly efficient system, Smithet al. are able to close the detection loophole and clearly demonstrate steering between two parties.

DOI
10.1038/ncomms1628

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Quantum steering allows two parties to verify shared entanglement even if one measurement device is untrusted. A conclusive demonstration of steering through the violation of a steering inequality is of considerable fundamental interest and opens up applications in quantum communication. To date, all experimental tests with single-photon states have relied on post selection, allowing untrusted devices to cheat by hiding unfavourable events in losses. Here we close this 'detection loophole' by combining a highly efficient source of entangled photon pairs with superconducting transition-edge sensors. We achieve an unprecedented ∼62% conditional detection efficiency of entangled photons and violate a steering inequality with the minimal number of measurement settings by 48 s.d.s. Our results provide a clear path to practical applications of steering and to a photonic loophole-free Bell test. Untrustworthy sources or detectors mean that quantum entanglement cannot always be ensured, but quantum steering inequalities can verify its presence. Using a highly efficient system, Smithet al. are able to close the detection loophole and clearly demonstrate steering between two parties.
Quantum steering allows two parties to verify shared entanglement even if one measurement device is untrusted. A conclusive demonstration of steering through the violation of a steering inequality is of considerable fundamental interest and opens up applications in quantum communication. To date, all experimental tests with single-photon states have relied on post selection, allowing untrusted devices to cheat by hiding unfavourable events in losses. Here we close this 'detection loophole' by combining a highly efficient source of entangled photon pairs with superconducting transition-edge sensors. We achieve an unprecedented ~62% conditional detection efficiency of entangled photons and violate a steering inequality with the minimal number of measurement settings by 48 s.d.s. our results provide a clear path to practical applications of steering and to a photonic loophole-free Bell test.
Quantum nonlocality and its asymmetric counterpart, quantum steering, are among the most intriguing manifestations of quantum mechanics. From a theoretical perspective, they are not only of fundamental significance but also hold promise for a wide range of applications. However, the stringent technological requirements for their experimental observation in a loophole-free way have largely restricted their realization to foundational demonstrations. A major challenge in these setups is the limited detection efficiency of current detectors as to observe nonlocality or steering in the standard scenarios, one requires detectors above a certain critical efficiency which can only be achieved with superconducting detectors. Considering the simplest quantum network, we demonstrate here that quantum steering between two parties, can be demonstrated for any non-zero detection efficiency, if the sources in the network generate states above a critical visibility well-within the current practical limits. This form of quantum steering in networks, is termed swap-steering. Moreover, when the sources are perfect, swap-steering can be observed using any entangled measurement on the untrusted side, even with arbitrarily low detection efficiency. Consequently, two major loopholes, the detection-loophole as well as free-will loophole can be closed easily in quantum steering experiments, when implemented using networks.
We demonstrate the violation of an Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering inequality developed for single-photon path entanglement with displacement-based detection. We use a high-rate source of heralded single-photon path-entangled states, combined with high-efficiency superconducting-based detectors, in a scheme that is free of any postselection and thus immune to the detection loophole. This result conclusively demonstrates single-photon entanglement in a one-sided device-independent scenario, and opens the way towards implementations of device-independent quantum technologies within the paradigm of path entanglement.
Loophole-free quantum nonlocality often demands experiments with high complexity (defined by all parties' settings and outcomes) and multiple efficient detectors. Here, we identify the fundamental efficiency and complexity thresholds for quantum steering using two-qubit entangled states. Remarkably, it requires only one photon detector on the untrusted side, with efficiency ε>1/Xε> 1/Xε>1/X, where X≥2X \geq 2X≥2 is the number of settings on that side. This threshold applies to all pure entangled states, in contrast to analogous Bell-nonlocality tests, which require almost unentangled states to be loss-tolerant. We confirm these predictions in a minimal-complexity (X=2X = 2X=2 for the untrusted party and a single three-outcome measurement for the trusted party), detection-loophole-free photonic experiment with $ε= (51.6 \pm 0.4)\% $.
A primary requirement for a robust and unconditionally secure quantum network is the establishment of quantum nonlocal correlations over a realistic channel.While loophole-free tests of Bell nonlocality allow for entanglement certification in such a device-independent setting, they are extremely sensitive to loss and noise, which naturally arise in any practical communication scenario.Quantum steering relaxes the strict technological constraints of Bell nonlocality by reframing it in an asymmetric manner, with a trusted party only on one side.However, tests of quantum steering still require either extremely high-quality entanglement or very low loss.Here we introduce a test of quantum steering that harnesses the advantages of high-dimensional entanglement to be simultaneously noise robust and loss tolerant.Despite being constructed for qudits, our steering test is designed for single-detector measurements and is able to close the fair-sampling loophole in a time-efficient manner.We showcase the improvements over qubit-based systems by experimentally demonstrating quantum steering in up to 53 dimensions, free of the fairsampling loophole, through simultaneous loss and noise conditions corresponding to 14.2-dB loss equivalent to 79 km of telecommunication fiber, and 36% of white noise.We go on to show how the use of high dimensions counterintuitively leads to a dramatic reduction in total measurement time, enabling a quantum steering violation almost 2 orders of magnitude faster obtained by simply doubling the Hilbert space dimension.Our work conclusively demonstrates the significant resource advantages that highdimensional entanglement provides for quantum steering in terms of loss, noise, and measurement time, and opens the door toward practical quantum networks with the ultimate form of security.