Hardware for a quantum network

Shahrooz Pouryousef, Hassan Shapourian, Alireza Shabani +1 more

Enabling quantum capabilities in future generations of networks requires integrating quantum hardware into existing network infrastructure and developing new protocols for quantum communications. However, the cost and inherent noise associated with quantum hardware necessitate an efficient deployment strategy with a minimal number of quantum repeaters and memories. In this paper, we introduce a comprehensive network planning framework for distributing quantum hardware across existing infrastructure, with the objective of maximizing quantum network utility within an entanglement distribution network. We showcase the results of our framework using a dumbbell network topology as a preliminary example and the SURFnet network as a real-world case study. We explore the impact of quantum memory multiplexing within quantum repeaters, as well as the influence of memory coherence time on quantum network utility. We further examine the effects of different fairness assumptions on network planning, unveiling their ramifications on real-time network performance.

Chuck Easttom

Ansh Singal, Sundaraja Sitharama Iyengar, Latesh Kumar +1 more

Abstract Quantum communication networks pose immense potential for revolutionising secure communications for several applications such as banking, defence, etc. The majority literature on quantum networks deals with the problems of networking and resource allocation using Software Defined Networks (SDNs). SDNs, however, introduce several issues, such as app manipulation attacks and scalability issues. We propose a novel scheme of implementing quantum communication networks that are hardware routed rather than software defined by labelling qubit photons using laser communications. We provide a comprehensive implementation of the new scheme and propose two novel algorithms—Bandwidth sharing and Equitable bandwidth sharing to implement the hardware routed quantum network. The algorithms result in a key rate increase of 118% and improved network resource utilization of 147% as compared to the First Come First Serve algorithm.

Xiaoliang Wu, Alexander Kolar, Joaquín Chung +4 more

Recent advances in quantum information science enabled the development of quantum communication network prototypes and created an opportunity to study full-stack quantum network architectures. This work develops SeQUeNCe, a comprehensive, customizable quantum network simulator. Our simulator consists of five modules: hardware models, entanglement management protocols, resource management, network management, and application. This framework is suitable for simulation of quantum network prototypes that capture the breadth of current and future hardware technologies and protocols. We implement a comprehensive suite of network protocols and demonstrate the use of SeQUeNCe by simulating a photonic quantum network with nine routers equipped with quantum memories. The simulation capabilities are illustrated in three use cases. We show the dependence of quantum network throughput on several key hardware parameters and study the impact of classical control message latency. We also investigate quantum memory usage efficiency in routers and demonstrate that redistributing memory according to anticipated load increases network capacity by 69.1% and throughput by 6.8%. We design SeQUeNCe to enable comparisons of alternative quantum network technologies, experiment planning, and validation and to aid with new protocol design. We are releasing SeQUeNCe as an open source tool and aim to generate community interest in extending it.