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arXiv:2204.00578 · Nature Physics

Inverse design of high-dimensional quantum optical circuits in a complex medium

Suraj Goel, Saroch Leedumrongwatthanakun, Natalia Herrera Valencia, Will McCutcheon, Armin Tavakoli, Claudio Conti, Pepijn W. H. Pinkse, Mehul Malik

Published Jan 19, 2024• 72 citations
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Abstract

Abstract Programmable optical circuits are an important tool in developing quantum technologies such as transceivers for quantum communication and integrated photonic chips for quantum information processing. Maintaining precise control over every individual component becomes challenging at large scales, leading to a reduction in the quality of operations performed. In parallel, minor imperfections in circuit fabrication are amplified in this regime, dramatically inhibiting their performance. Here we use inverse design techniques to embed optical circuits in the higher-dimensional space of a large, ambient mode mixer such as a commercial multimode fibre. This approach allows us to forgo control over each individual circuit element, and retain a high degree of programmability. We use our circuits as quantum gates to manipulate high-dimensional spatial-mode entanglement in up to seven dimensions. Their programmability allows us to turn a multimode fibre into a generalized multioutcome measurement device, allowing us to both transport and certify entanglement within the transmission channel. With the support of numerical simulations, we show that our method is a scalable approach to obtaining high circuit fidelity with a low circuit depth by harnessing the resource of a high-dimensional mode mixer.

DOI
10.1038/s41567-023-02319-6

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•Dec 13, 2019•0 citations
Abstract Programmable optical circuits are an important tool in developing quantum technologies such as transceivers for quantum communication and integrated photonic chips for quantum information processing. Maintaining precise control over every individual component becomes challenging at large scales, leading to a reduction in the quality of operations performed. In parallel, minor imperfections in circuit fabrication are amplified in this regime, dramatically inhibiting their performance. Here we use inverse design techniques to embed optical circuits in the higher-dimensional space of a large, ambient mode mixer such as a commercial multimode fibre. This approach allows us to forgo control over each individual circuit element, and retain a high degree of programmability. We use our circuits as quantum gates to manipulate high-dimensional spatial-mode entanglement in up to seven dimensions. Their programmability allows us to turn a multimode fibre into a generalized multioutcome measurement device, allowing us to both transport and certify entanglement within the transmission channel. With the support of numerical simulations, we show that our method is a scalable approach to obtaining high circuit fidelity with a low circuit depth by harnessing the resource of a high-dimensional mode mixer.
Programmable optical circuits form a key part of quantum technologies today. As the size of such circuits is increased, maintaining precise control over every individual component becomes challenging. Here we show how embedding an optical circuit in the higher-dimensional space of a large mode-mixer allows us to forgo control over individual elements, while retaining a high degree of programmability over the circuit. Using this approach, we implement high-dimensional linear optical circuits within a commercial multi-mode fibre placed between controllable phase planes. We employ these circuits to manipulate high-dimensional entanglement in up to seven dimensions, demonstrating their application as fully programmable quantum gates. Furthermore, we show how these circuits turn the multi-mode fibre itself into a generalized multi-outcome measurement device, allowing us to both transport and certify entanglement. Finally, we show how a high circuit fidelity can be achieved with a low circuit depth by harnessing the resource of a high-dimensional mode-mixer. Our work serves as an alternative yet powerful approach for realizing precise control over high-dimensional quantum states of light.
The distribution of entanglement in quantum networks will enable the next generation of technologies in quantum-secured communications, distributed quantum computing and sensing. Future quantum networks will require dense connectivity, allowing multiple users to share entanglement in a reconfigurable and multiplexed manner, while long-distance connections are established through the teleportation of entanglement, or entanglement swapping. Although several recent works have demonstrated fully connected, local multi-user networks based on multiplexing, extending such networks to a global network architecture of interconnected local networks remains an outstanding challenge. Here we demonstrate the next step in the evolution of multiplexed quantum networks-a prototype global reconfigurable network in which entanglement is routed and teleported in a flexible and multiplexed manner between two local four-user networks. At the heart of our network is a programmable 8 × 8-dimensional multi-port circuit that harnesses the natural mode-mixing process inside of a multi-mode fibre to implement on-demand high-dimensional operations on two independent photons carrying eight transverse-spatial modes. Our circuit design allows us to break away from the limited planar geometry and bypass the control and fabrication challenges of conventional integrated photonic platforms. Our demonstration highlights the potential of this architecture for enabling large-scale, global quantum networks that offer versatile connectivity while being fully compatible with an existing communications infrastructure.
Programmable photonic quantum processors face a critical challenge: despite significant advances in quantum state preparation and manipulation, measurements remain limited to projective techniques. Here, we demonstrate a programmable measurement processor that overcomes this limitation by enabling arbitrary quantum measurements within a scalable circuit framework. Our large-scale integrated photonic architecture achieves precise coherent control of ancillary quantum systems, realizing a universal four-dimensional quantum measurement device. We benchmark the processor by performing measurement tomography on 100 randomly selected measurements, achieving an average fidelity of 97.7%. The processor's performance exceeds the theoretical limits of projective measurements in three key quantum information tasks: state discrimination (with 23 times lower error), state estimation (with 10.6% higher fidelity), and randomness generation (with 37% more randomness yield), demonstrating its high operational quality. This work establishes a fully programmable quantum measurement processor, advancing the development of universal quantum operations for photonic quantum information processing by providing the key missing component.
We propose and analyze the design of a programmable photonic integrated circuit for high-fidelity quantum computation and simulation. We demonstrate that the reconfigurability of our design allows us to overcome two major impediments to quantum optics on a chip: it removes the need for a full fabrication cycle for each experiment and allows for compensation of fabrication errors using numerical optimization techniques. Under a pessimistic fabrication model for the silicon-on-insulator process, we demonstrate a dramatic fidelity improvement for the linear optics controlled-not and controlled-phase gates and, showing the scalability of this approach, the iterative phase estimation algorithm built from individually optimized gates. We also propose and simulate an experiment that the programmability of our system would enable: a statistically robust study of the evolution of entangled photons in disordered quantum walks. Overall, our results suggest that existing fabrication processes are sufficient to build a quantum photonic processor capable of high-fidelity operation.
Transport of information through a multimode optical fibre raises challenges when one wants to increase the data traffic using many spatial modes due to modal cross-talk and dispersion. Instead of considering those complex mixing of modes as a detrimental process, in this dissertation, we harness its mode mixing to process quantum optical information. We implement a reconfigurable linear optical network, a fundamental building block for scalable quantum technologies, based on an inverse photonic approach exploiting the technology of wavefront shaping. We experimentally demonstrate manipulation of two-photon quantum interference on various linear optical networks across both spatial and polarization degrees of freedom. In particular, we experimentally show the zero-transmission law in Fourier and Sylvester interferometers, which are used to certificate the degree of indistinguishability of an input state. Moreover, thanks to the ability to implement a non-unitary network, we observe the photon anti-coalescence effect in all output configurations, as well as the realization of a tunable coherent absorption experiment. Therefore, we demonstrate the reconfigurability, accuracy, scalability and robustness of the implemented linear optical networks for quantum information processing. Furthermore, we study the statistical properties of one-and two-photon speckles generated from various ground-truth states of light after propagating through a multimode fibre. These statistical properties of speckles can be used to extract information about the dimensionality, purity, and indistinguishability of an unknown input state of light, therefore allowing for state classification. Our results highlight the potential of complex media combined with wavefront shaping for quantum information processing.