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arXiv:1408.2330 · IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics

Field Test of Measurement-Device-Independent Quantum Key Distribution

Yan-Lin Tang, Hua‐Lei Yin, Sijing Chen, Yang Liu, Weijun Zhang, Xiao Qiang Jiang, Lu Zhang, Jian Wang, Lixing You, Jian-Yu Guan, Dong-Xu Yang, Zhen Wang, Hao Liang, Zhen Zhang, Nan Zhou, Xiongfeng Ma, Teng‐Yun Chen, Qiang Zhang, Jian-Wei Pan

Published Dec 6, 2014• 60 citations

Abstract

The main type of obstacles of practical applications of quantum key distribution (QKD) network are various attacks on detection. Measurement-device-independent QKD (MDIQKD) protocol is immune to all these attacks, and thus, a strong candidate for network security. Recently, several proof-of-principle demonstrations of MDIQKD have been performed. Although novel, those experiments are implemented in the laboratory with secure key rates less than 0.1 b/s. Besides, they need manual calibration frequently to maintain the system performance. These aspects render these demonstrations far from practicability. Thus, justification is extremely crucial for practical deployment into the field environment. Here, by developing an automatic feedback MDIQKD system operated at a high clock rate, we perform a field test via deployed fiber network of 30 km total length achieving a 16.9 b/s secure key rate. The result lays the foundation for a global quantum network, which can shield from all the detection-side attacks.

DOI: 10.1109/jstqe.2014.2361796

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