Cryostat for real-world quantum repeaters

用于现实世界量子中继器的低温恒温器

• 批准号: 472928-2015
• 负责人: Tittel, Wolfgang
• 金额: $ 10.93万
• 依托单位: University of Calgary
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Research Tools and Instruments - Category 1 (<$150,000)
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2014-01-01 至 2015-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=564885
• 关键词: Cryostat; real; world; quantum; repeaters

The economic, political, and social well-being of Canada depends crucially on secure electronic communications, e.g. for e-banking, e-health, e-commerce, and e-government. Yet, current public key cryptosystem rely on unproven assumptions about computational complexity, are susceptible to algorithmic advances and better classical computer technology, and will become obsolete with the advent of the quantum computer. Hence, the secrecy of messages encoded and sent in the past or present, even if still ensured today, is vulnerable to future improvements in code breaking, which may lead to decoding of recorded messages with insufficient protection before they lose importance. Quantum key distribution (QKD), which employs individual photons prepared in specific quantum states as carriers of information, promises the ultimate solution to these problems: security that cannot be compromised by new technology. Yet, as photons get lost during transmission, and amplifiers cannot be used due to a fundamental restriction of quantum mechanics known as the no-cloning theorem, QKD currently faces a distance limit of around 200 km. Interestingly, this limit can be removed through not-yet-existing quantum repeaters.

加拿大的经济、政治和社会福祉在很大程度上取决于安全的电子通信，例如电子银行、电子医疗、电子商务和电子政务。然而，目前的公钥密码系统依赖于未经证实的关于计算复杂性的假设，容易受到算法进步和更好的经典计算机技术的影响，并且随着量子计算机的出现而过时。因此，过去或现在编码和发送的信息的保密性，即使今天仍然得到保证，也容易受到未来密码破译技术的改进的影响，这可能导致在没有足够保护的情况下解码记录的信息，然后才失去重要性。量子密钥分配（QKD）采用特定量子态中制备的单个光子作为信息载体，有望最终解决这些问题：新技术无法损害安全性。然而，由于光子在传输过程中丢失，并且由于量子力学的基本限制（称为不可克隆定理）而无法使用放大器，QKD目前面临着约200公里的距离限制。有趣的是，这种限制可以通过尚未存在的量子中继器来消除。