We investigate spectral resource contention between two entangled photon sources sharing the same wavelength, demonstrating measurable fidelity impact and providing insights that enable more efficient spectral management in flex-grid quantum networks.
The rising demand for transmission capacity in optical networks has motivated steady interest in expansion beyond the standard C-band (1530-1565 nm) into the adjacent L-band (1565-1625 nm) for an approximate doubling of capacity in a single stroke. However, in the context of quantum networking, the L-band has yet to be fully leveraged with the suite of advanced tools for characterization and management available from classical lightwave communications. In this work, we demonstrate an ultrabroadband two-photon source integrating both C- and L-band wavelength-selective switches for complete control of spectral routing and allocation across 7.5 THz in a single setup. Polarization state tomography of all 150 pairs of 25-GHz-wide channels reveals an average fidelity of 0.98 and total distillable entanglement greater than 181 kebits/s. This source is explicitly designed for flex-grid optical networks and can facilitate optimal utilization of entanglement resources across the full C+L-band.
Flexible grid wavelength division multiplexing is a powerful tool in lightwave communications to maximize spectral efficiency. In the emerging field of quantum networking, the need for effective resource provisioning is particularly acute, given the generally lower power levels, higher sensitivity to loss, and inapplicability of optical detection and retransmission. In this letter, we leverage flex grid technology to demonstrate reconfigurable distribution of quantum entanglement in a four-user tabletop network. By adaptively partitioning bandwidth with a single wavelength-selective switch, we successfully equalize two-party coincidence rates that initially differ by over two orders of magnitude. Our scalable approach introduces loss that is fixed with the number of users, offering a practical path for the establishment and management of quality-of-service guarantees in large quantum networks.
As practical quantum networks approach large-scale deployment, the need for efficient user-to-user frequency allocation is increasing, yet current approaches only provide partial solutions to the routing and spectrum allocation problem for an arbitrary quantum network. We address this challenge for repeater-less flex-grid quantum networks based on hyperentangled photons using an efficient three-stage pipeline combining leading tools in classical networking with recent advances in numerical optimization. First, double instantiations of Yen's algorithm obtain low-loss route candidates between each pair of users and the entanglement sources. Second, the advanced process optimizer (APOPT) obtains frequency channel allocations that maximize distribution rates under fidelity constraints. Finally, the constraint programming solver using satisfiability methods (CP-SAT) assigns specific frequency bins to each link, ensuring that there is no contention between frequencies from different sources. We numerically demonstrate this approach on a representative ring network and a Manhattan incumbent local exchange carrier topology, realizing significant improvements over prior genetic algorithm approaches in speed, accuracy, and scalability. Overall, this pipeline provides an efficient heuristic workflow for optimizing broadband entanglement distribution, applicable to arbitrarily connected quantum networks integrated within the existing lightwave infrastructure.