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Imaging and Applied Optics

Free-Space Quantum Communications based on Orbital Angular Momentum

Giuseppe Vallone, Vincenzo D’Ambrosio, Giorgio Zarantonello, Anna Sponselli, Lorenzo Marrucci, Fabio Sciarrino, Paolo Villoresi

Published Jan 1, 2015• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The propagation of beams with |l|=1 is experimentally studied for Quantum Communications in turbulent propagation. Hybrid quantum states combining OAM and spin provide rotation invariance between terminals. The propagation in urban scale links is investigated.
DOI
10.1364/pcdvtap.2015.pm2c.1

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The orbital angular momentum (OAM) state of light can potentially be used to implement higher dimensional entangled systems for quantum communication. Unfortunately, optical fibers in use today support only modes with zero OAM values. Free-space quantum communication is an alternative to traditional way of communicating through optical fibers. However the refractive index fluctuation of the atmosphere gives rise to random phase aberrations on a propagating optical beam. To transmit quantum information successfully through a free-space optical channel, one needs to understand how atmospheric turbulence influences quantum entanglement. Here, we present a numerical study of the evolution of quantum entanglement between a pair of qubits. The qubits consist of photons entangled in the OAM basis. The photons propagate in a turbulent atmosphere modeled by a series of consecutive phase screens based on the Kolmogorov theory of turbulence. Maximally entangled initial states are considered, and the concurrence is used as a measure of entanglement. We show how the evolution of entanglement is influenced by various parameters such as the beam waist, the strength of the turbulence and the wavelength of the beam. We restricted our analysis to the OAM values l = ±1 and we compared our results to previous work.
The well defined spin and orbital angular momentum states of photons offers a practical realization of quantum digits and a means of secure single-photon optical communication. The orbital angular momentum is associated with the spatial distribution of the wavefunction and the number of orbital angular momentum eigenstates is unlimited, giving the possibility of arbitrary base-N digits. In this paper, free-space optical communications using angular momentum states of single photons is investigated and in particular the effect of atmospheric turbulence on the angular momentum of the photons is modelled. The refractive index fluctuations in the atmosphere perturb the complex amplitude of a propagating beam so that the photons that were launched in an eigenstate of orbital angular momentum are no longer guaranteed to be in the original eigenstate after propagation. By considering the resulting wave as a superposition of angular momentum states, the probability of obtaining correct or incorrect measurements of the transmitted digit is calculated. The effect on a free-space optical communication using orbital angular momentum and the use of adaptive optics is discussed. The information capacity per photon is quantified and compared to that using polarization states for binary digits.
Orbital angular momentum (OAM) entangled bi-photons are a resource for the higher dimensional implementation of quantum cryptography, which allows secure communication over various channels. In the case where free-space is used as communication channel the initial OAM entangled bi-photon loses some or even all of its entanglement because of the scintillation that it experiences while propagating through the turbulence in the atmosphere. This decoherence of OAM entanglement has so far only been studied for the case of weak turbulence. Unfortunately, it is the more challenging strong turbulence scenario that is relevant for the practical implementation of free-space quantum communication through the atmosphere. Using an approach that differs from previous approaches, we derive a master equation for the evolution of an OAM entangled bi-photon during propagation through turbulence. However, in our approach the equation contains a derivative with respect to the propagation distance instead of time. The principle is to consider the propagation over an infinitesimal distance of OAM basis states through a random medium. This approach allows one to include, not only the effect of turbulence of arbitrary strength, but also the effect of the inner and outer scale of the turbulence, as represented by the Tartarskii and von Karman spectra. The resulting expression can predict the rates of decoherence for arbitrary initial OAM entangled states and can be used to calculate the concurrence, which measures the amount of entanglement, as a function of propagation distance for different initial entangled OAM states.