Distributing entanglement between two or more systems enables a variety of quantum information applications. Surprisingly, entanglement can be distributed using a carrier which is always separable from the rest of the systems involved. Up to now, this effect has predominantly been analyzed in the case where the carrier-system interactions take the form of ideal unitary operations, thus leaving untested its robustness against either non-unitary or unitary errors. We address this issue by considering the effect of incoherent dynamics acting alongside imperfect unitary interactions. In particular, we determine the restrictions that need to be placed on the interaction time, as well as the strength of the incoherent dynamics. We have shown that entanglement distribution is still possible, even though the amount of entanglement gained between the systems is not maximal. Therefore, even in experimental settings where unitary operations cannot be carried out without imperfections, it is still possible to generate entanglement between two systems using a separable carrier.
Distributing entanglement between two or more systems enables a variety of quantum information applications. Surprisingly, entanglement can be distributed using a carrier which is always separable from the rest of the systems involved. Up to now, this effect has predominantly been analyzed in the case where the carrier-system interactions take the form of ideal unitary operations, thus leaving untested its robustness against either non-unitary or unitary errors. We address this issue by considering the effect of incoherent dynamics acting alongside imperfect unitary interactions. In particular, we determine the restrictions that need to be placed on the interaction time, as well as the strength of the incoherent dynamics. We have shown that entanglement distribution is still possible, even though the amount of entanglement gained between the systems is not maximal. Therefore, even in experimental settings where unitary operations cannot be carried out without imperfections, it is still possible to generate entanglement between two systems using a separable carrier.
Abstract Entanglement can be distributed using a carrier which is always separable from the rest of the systems involved. Up to now, this effect has predominantly been analyzed in the case where the carrier-system interactions take the form of ideal unitary operations, thus leaving untested its robustness against either non-unitary or unitary errors. We address this issue by considering the effect of incoherent dynamics acting alongside imperfect unitary interactions. In particular, we determine the restrictions that need to be placed on the interaction time, as well as the strength of the incoherent dynamics. We find that with non-unitary errors, we can still successfully distribute entanglement, provided we measure the carrier in a suitable basis. Introducing imperfections in the unitary dynamics, we show that entanglement gain is possible even with substantial unitary errors. Moreover, certain variations in the strength of the unitary dynamics can allow for greater robustness against non-unitary errors. Therefore, even in experimental settings where unitary operations cannot be carried out without imperfections, it is still possible to generate entanglement between two systems using a separable carrier.
The key requirement for quantum networking is the distribution of entanglement between nodes. Surprisingly, entanglement can be generated across a network without direct transfer-or communication-of entanglement. In contrast to information gain, which cannot exceed the communicated information, the entanglement gain is bounded by the communicated quantum discord, a more general measure of quantum correlation that includes but is not limited to entanglement. Here, we experimentally entangle two communicating parties sharing three initially separable photonic qubits by exchange of a carrier photon that is unentangled with either party at all times. We show that distributing entanglement with separable carriers is resilient to noise and in some cases becomes the only way of distributing entanglement through noisy environments.
The main focus of this thesis is quantum entanglement and, more specifically, pro- tocols that allow its distribution between distant places. In the last decades, with the rise of attention on quantum technologies, entangle- ment is mostly seen as a resource, that could be exchanged, measured, and ideally stored and used when convenient. However, entanglement is not as stable and cheap as the classical resources. One reason for this is that entanglement between two quantum systems is easily disrupted by the interaction with the environment that surrounds them. The presence of noise is even more significant when we wish to entangle two systems that are very far away, a task that is essential for quantum communication technologies. In this case, what can disrupt the entanglement is not only the noise that the particles experience locally, but also the noise in the quantum channel during the communication process, which can be significant over long distances. For this reason, it is important to design distribution protocols that work well in such conditions. In 2003, Cubitt et al. showed the existence of a very curious class of protocols, often called entanglement distribution with separable states (EDSS). They proved that a non-entangled (separable) carrier can be used to increase, or even gener- ate entanglement between two already distant parties. From this, some questions arise. First, what limits or allows an entanglement distribution protocol, if not the entanglement that is sent. Quantum discord was shown to be a necessary, but not sufficient, resource for entanglement distribution. Another natural question is whether these protocols can beat others, for technological purposes, especially in noisy conditions. I will describe some work I have done in an attempt to partially 9 address both of these questions. After introducing various tools and concepts that are useful to understand this topic (chapter 1) and motivate the necessity of entanglement distribution in quantum communication (chapter 2), I will describe a proof-of-principle experiment demon- strating EDSS schemes (chapter 3). Later (chapter 4), I will introduce a more general classification of distribution protocols (excessive or non-excessive protocols), based on whether the entanglement gain is larger than the one that is communicated, describing specific examples and general properties of such protocols. I will then partially address the problem regarding the robustness to the noise of communica- tion protocols (chapter 5). Finally, in chapter 6, I will describe how entanglement of a bipartite state can grow with a quantum measurement with unknown results. I discuss the properties of the measurement and of the initial state that make this process effective.
We study the entanglement dynamics of a two-qubit system, each of which is embedded into its local reservoir, and the entanglement distribution among all the bipartite subsystems including qubit-qubit, qubit-reservoir, and reservoir-reservoir. It is found that the entanglement can be stably distributed among all components and particularly it also satisfies an identity firstly given by Yonac, Yu and Eberly (J. Phys. B 40, S45 (2007)) for a double J-C model without decoherence. While the explicit distribution of the entanglement is dependent of the detail of the model, even the approximation used, the identity remains unchanged. Our unified treatment includes the previous results in the literature as special cases. The result reveals the profound nature of the entanglement and should have significant implications for quantum information processing. below) has been satisfied at any time. This may be not surprising since the double J-C model has no decoherence and any initial information can be preserved in the time evolution. However, it would be surprising if the identity is still valid in the presence of the decoherence, in which a non-equilibrium relaxation process is involved. In this paper, we show that it is indeed true for such a system consisted of two qubits locally interacting with two reser- voirs. We find that the distribution of the entanglement among the bipartite subsystems is dependent of the ex- plicit property of the environment and its coupling with the qubit. The rich dynamical behaviors obtained pre- viously in the literature can be regarded as the special cases of our present result or Markovian approximation. Particularly, we find that the entanglement can stably distribute among all the bipartite subsystems if the qubit and its environment can form a bound state and the non- Markovian effect is important. Irrespective of how dis- tributes the entanglement, it is found that the identity about the entanglement in the whole system can be sat- isfied at any time, which reveals the profound physics of the entanglement dynamics. We consider two qubits interacting with two uncorre- lated vacuum reservoirs. Due to the dynamical indepen- dence between the two local subsystems, we can firstly solve the single subsystem, then apply the result obtained to the double-qubit case. The Hamiltonian of each local subsystem is (16)
We recently proposed an entanglement distillation protocol based on local operations and classical communication that probabilistically and universally distills a maximally entangled Bell pair from multiple copies of an unknown two-qubit state [Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 260202 (2025)]. Here, we investigate the robustness of this protocol against imperfections in its implementation. We consider several incoherent and coherent gate-error models, as well as measurement readout errors, and determine the regimes in which distillation enhances the fidelity with the target Bell state. We find that the protocol remains effective over substantial error ranges, although its robustness depends strongly on the type of error. We further analyze asymmetric errors between the two parties and identify conditions under which complementary postselection outcomes yield identical distillation dynamics, allowing the success probability to be enhanced.
Abstract The ability to reliably distribute entanglement among the nodes of a network is an essential requirement for the development of effective quantum communication protocols and the realization of useful quantum networks. It has been demonstrated, in different contexts, that two remote systems can be entangled via local interactions with a carrier system that always remains in a separable state with respect to such distant particles. We develop a strategy for entanglement distribution via separable carriers that can be applied to any number of network nodes to achieve various entanglement distribution patterns. We show that our protocol results in multipartite entanglement, while the carrier mediating the process is always in a separable state with respect to the network. We provide examples showcasing the flexibility of our approach and propose a scheme of principle for the experimental demonstration of the protocol.