Aggregating quantum networks
Nicoló Lo Piparo, Michael Hanks, Kae Nemoto, William J. Munro
Abstract
Quantum networking allows the transmission of information in ways unavailable in the classical world. The information encoded in a single qubit can now be split and transmitted in a coherent way over different routes. This aggregation allows information to be transmitted in a fault tolerant way between different parts of the quantum network (or the future internet), even when that is not achievable with a single path approach. It is a quantum phenomenon not available in conventional telecommunication networks either. We show how the multiplexing of independent quantum channels allows a distributed form of quantum error correction to protect the transmission of quantum information between nodes or users of a quantum network. Combined with spatial-temporal single-photon multiplexing, we observe a significant drop in network resources required to transmit that quantum signal, even when only two channels are involved. This work goes far beyond the concepts of channel capacities and shows how quantum networking may operate in the future.