Simultaneous two-way classical communication and measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution on oceanic quantum channels

Simultaneous two-way classical and quantum (STCQ) communication combines both continuous classical coherent optical communication and continuous-variable quantum key distribution (CV-QKD), which eliminates all detection-related imperfections by being measurement-device-independent (MDI). In this paper, we propose a protocol relying on STCQ communication on the oceanic quantum channel, in which the superposition-modulation-based coherent states depend on the information bits of both the secret key and the classical communication ciphertext. We analyse the encoding combination in classical communication and consider the probability distribution transmittance under seawater turbulence with various interference factors. Our numerical simulations of various practical scenarios demonstrate that the proposed protocol can simultaneously enable two-way classical communication and CV-MDI QKD with just a slight performance degradation transmission distance compared to the original CV-MDI QKD scheme. Moreover, the asymmetric situation outperforms the symmetric case in terms of transmission distance and optical modulation variance. We further take into consideration the impact of finite-size effects to illustrate the applicability of the proposed scheme in practical scenarios. The results show the feasibility of the underwater STCQ scheme, which contributes toward developing a global quantum communication network in free space.     

Security of the Decoy State Two-Way Quantum Key Distribution with Finite Resources

The quantum key distribution(QKD) allows two parties to share a secret key by typically making use of a one-way quantum channel However,the two-way QKD has its own unique advantages,which means the two-way QKD has become a focus recently.To improve the practical performance of the two-way QKD,we present a security analysis of a two-way QKD protocol based on the decoy method with heralded single-photon sources(HSPSs).We make use of two approaches to calculate the yield and the quantum bit error rate of single-photon and two-photon pulses.Then we present the secret key generation rate based on the GLLP formula.The numerical simulation shows that the protocol with HSPSs has an advantage in the secure distance compared with weak coherent state sources.In addition,we present the final secret key generation rate of the LM05 protocol with finite resources by considering the statistical fluctuation of the yield and the error rate.     

Unital Quantum Channels – Convex Structure and Revivals of Birkhoff’s Theorem

The set of doubly-stochastic quantum channels and its subset of mixtures of unitaries are investigated. We provide a detailed analysis of their structure together with computable criteria for the separation of the two sets. When applied to O(d)-covariant channels this leads to a complete characterization and reveals a remarkable feature: instances of channels which are not in the convex hull of unitaries can become elements of this set by either taking two copies of them or supplementing with a completely depolarizing channel. These scenarios imply that a channel whose noise initially resists any environment-assisted attempt of correction can become perfectly correctable.     

单光子探测器性能对量子密钥分发系统的影响

根据量子密钥分发协议的原理和单光子探测器的工作模式系统分析了单光子探测器性能对量子密钥分发系统影响的物理模型,给出了单光子探测器暗计数和量子效率对系统筛选码率和量子误码率等指标产生影响的计算公式,并通过对各类量子密钥分发系统的比较,推导出了适用于一般量子密钥分发系统的普适结果。结果表明,在同等条件下采用较少的探测时间门可以提高量子密钥分发系统的性能。     

基于六光子量子避错码的量子密钥分发方案

量子信道中不可避免存在的噪声将扭曲被传输的信息,对通信造成危害。目前克服量子信道噪声的较好方案是量子避错码（QEAC）。将量子避错码思想用于量子密钥分发,能有效克服信道中的噪声,且无需复杂的系统。用六光子构造了量子避错码,提出了一种丛于六光子避错码的量子密钥分发（QDK）方案。以提高量子密钥分发的量子比特效率和安全性为前提,对六光子避错码的所有可能态进行组合,得到一种六光子避错码的最优组合方法,可将两比特信息编码在一个态中,根据测肇结果和分组信息进行解码,得到正确信息的平均概率为7／16。与最近的基于四光子避错码的克服量子信道噪声的量子密钥分发方案相比,该方案的量子比特效率提高了16．67％,密钥分发安全性足它的3．5倍。     

Experimental Study on Practical Quantum Key Distribution Scheme with Time-Multiplexed Technique

We present a scheme that is capable of detecting photon numbers during the quantum key distribution (QKD) based on an improved differential phase shift (DPS) system without Trojan horse attack. A time-multiplexed detector (TMD) is set in for the photon-number resolution. Two fibre loops are used for detecting photon numbers as well as distributing keys. The long-term stabilization is guaranteed by two Faraday mirrors (FM) at Bob's site to automatically compensate for polarization defect. Our experimental study (90km QKD is completed) indicates that such a system is stable and secure which nearly reaches the performance of a single photon scheme.     

Performance optimization for quantum key distribution in lossy channel using entangled photons

In quantum key distribution(QKD), the times of arrival of single photons are important for the keys extraction and time synchronization. The time-of-arrival(TOA) accuracy can affect the quantum bit error rate(QBER) and the final key rate. To achieve a higher accuracy and a better QKD performance, different from designing more complicated hardware circuits, we present a scheme that uses the mean TOA of M frequency-entangled photons to replace the TOA of a single photon. Moreover, to address the problem that the entanglement property is usually sensitive to the photon loss in practice,we further propose two schemes, which adopt partially entangled photons and grouping-entangled photons, respectively.In addition, we compare the effects of these three alternative schemes on the QKD performance and discuss the selection strategy for the optimal scheme in detail. The simulation results show that the proposed schemes can improve the QKD performance compared to the conventional single-photon scheme obviously, which demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed schemes.     

Self-referenced continuous-variable measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution

We propose a scheme to remove the demand of transmitting a high-brightness local oscillator (LO) in continuous-variable measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution (CV-MDI QKD) protocol, which we call as the self-referenced (SR) CV-MDI QKD. We show that our scheme is immune to the side-channel attacks, such as the calibration attacks, the wavelength attacks and the LO fluctuation attacks, which are all exploiting the security loopholes introduced by transmitting the LO. Besides, the proposed scheme waives the necessity of complex multiplexer and demultiplexer, which can greatly simplify the QKD processes and improve the transmission efficiency. The numerical simulations under collective attacks show that all the improvements brought about by our scheme are only at the expense of slight transmission distance shortening. This scheme shows an available method to mend the security loopholes incurred by transmitting LO in CV-MDI QKD.     

Quantum cryptography using partially entangled states

We show that non-maximally entangled states can be used to build a quantum key distribution (QKD) scheme where the key is probabilistically teleported from Alice to Bob. This probabilistic aspect of the protocol ensures the security of the key without the need of non-orthogonal states to encode it, in contrast to other QKD schemes. Also, the security and key transmission rate of the present protocol is nearly equivalent to those of standard QKD schemes and these aspects can be controlled by properly harnessing the new free parameter in the present proposal, namely, the degree of partial entanglement. Furthermore, we discuss how to build a controlled QKD scheme, also based on partially entangled states, where a third party can decide whether or not Alice and Bob are allowed to share a key.     

联合调制量子密钥分配系统

本文提出了一种对每一个单光子信号进行相位和偏振两种 编码调制的联合调制量子密钥分配(QKD)系统. 结合复合QKD系统的双速协议, 本文给出了在理想情形下可以通过一个信号光子生成两比特密钥的QKD协议, 明显提高了QKD协议的内禀光子利用率. 在稳定性方面, 本文发展了联合调制的Michelson型QKD系统, 从而在原理上解决了联合调制QKD系统的稳定性问题. 关键词： 量子密钥分配 双速协议 联合调制 量子密钥分配系统的稳定性     

Finite-key analysis of practical time-bin high-dimensional quantum key distribution with afterpulse effect

High-dimensional quantum resources provide the ability to encode several bits of information on a single photon, which can particularly increase the secret key rate rate of quantum key distribution (QKD) systems. Recently, a practical four-dimensional QKD scheme based on time-bin quantum photonic state, only with two single-photon avalanche detectors as measurement setup, has been proven to have a superior performance than the qubit-based one. In this paper, we extend the results to our proposed eight-dimensional scheme. Then, we consider two main practical factors to improve its secret key bound. Concretely, we take the afterpulse effect into account and apply a finite-key analysis with the intensity fluctuations. Our secret bounds give consideration to both the intensity fluctuations and the afterpulse effect for the high-dimensional QKD systems. Numerical simulations show the bound of eight-dimensional QKD scheme is more robust to the intensity fluctuations but more sensitive to the afterpulse effect than the four-dimensional one.     

Upper bound on key generation rate of quantum key distribution with two-way or two-step quantum channels

We present an asymptotic security proof of deterministic quantum key distribution (DQKD) with a two-way quantum channel. The security proof of DQKD with a two-way quantum channel is different from that of BB84, because Eve can attack the travel qubits twice, both in line Bob to Alice and in line Alice to Bob. With the no-signaling principle and the property of mutual information, we obtain an upper bound of the final key generation of entanglement-based DQKD and hence single-photon four-state DQKD. Our results can be applied to the protocol of QKD with two-step quantum channels.     

A generalized complexity measure based on Rényi entropy

Phase drift is an inherent problem in one-way phase-encoded quantum key distribution (QKD) systems. Although combining passive with active phase compensation (APC) processes can effectively compensate for the phase drift, the security problems brought about by these processes are rarely considered. In this paper, we point out a security hole in the APC process and put forward a corresponding attack scheme. Under our proposed attack, the quantum bit error rate (QBER) of the QKD can be close to zero for some conditions. However, under the same conditions the ratio r of the key “0” and the key “1” which Bob (the legal communicators Alice and Bob) gets is no longer 1:1 but 2:1, which may expose Eve (the eavesdropper). In order to solve this problem, we modify the resend strategy of the attack scheme, which can force r to reach 1 and the QBER to be lower than the tolerable QBER.     

Performance of passive decoy-state quantum key distribution with mismatched local detectors

In quantum key distribution(QKD),the passive decoy-state method can simplify the intensity modulation and reduce some of side-channel information leakage and modulation errors.It is usually implemented with a heralded single-photon source.In Wang et al 2016(Phys.Rev.A 96032312),a novel passive decoy-state method is proposed by Wang et al,which uses two local detectors to generate more detection events for tightly estimating channel parameters.However,in the original scheme,the two local detectors are assumed to be identical,including the same detection efficiency and dark count rate,which is often not satisfied in the realistic experiment.In this paper,we construct a model for this passive decoy-state QKD scheme with two mismatched detectors and explore the effect on QKD performance with certain parameters.We also take the finite-size effect into consideration,showing the performance with statistical fluctuations.The results show that the efficiencies of local detectors affect the key rate more obviously than dark count rates.     

Expandable quantum key distribution networks based on secret bits comparison

A scheme of quantum network based on multiuser differential phase shift quantum key distribution system (DPS-QKD) is proposed. In this quantum network, arbitrary two users can achieve secret bits sharing by point-to-multipoint quantum key distribution and secret bits comparison. A protocol of secret bits sharing between arbitrary two users is presented. This network can implement secret bits distribution over 200 km with higher key generation rate by today's technologies. In theory, the capacity of user numbers in this network is unlimited. Hence, our proposed quantum network can serve for a metropolitan QKD network. A wide area QKD network can be constructed with this metropolitan QKD network.     

基于相位调制偏振态QKD系统的量子信道校正发送方案

提出了一种基于相位调制偏振态QKD系统的量子信道校正发送的新方案—采用波导型相位调制器研制成电控连续可调光学相移器,它可随相位调制器输入电压的连续改变而产生连续的相移,从而控制输出的偏振态;在其前放置一个半波片,即可校正接收端偏振态量子态在信道中所发生的改变,从而保证信道传送密钥的可用性.通过理论推导和实验研究验证了基于相位调制偏振态QKD系统的量子信道校正发送方案的核心部件的可行性.由于本方案能实现高速调制（GHz）,为解决光纤传输的偏振编码QKD系统中偏振态漂移问题提供了一种新的途径.     

基于差分相移键控协议的双向量子密钥分配系统研究

采用差分相移键控(DPSK)协议分析了双向量子密钥分配(QKD)系统的性能,比较了BB84协议、BBM92协议和DPSK协议的安全通信速率与距离的关系,并对协议对抗一些攻击的安全性进行了分析,结果表明DPSK协议对长距离QKD系统非常实用,具有超过200 km的通信距离和较高的通信速率. 关键词： 差分相移键控协议 量子效率 通信速率     

基于两种光源的诱发态量子密钥分配性能分析

单光子的衰减特性及其易受干扰的缺点限制了纯单光子量子系统的传输码率及距离.弱相干光脉冲(WCP)光源和准单光子源(HSPS)则具有更高的实用价值.本文将这两种光源和诱发态方案相结合并采用Lütkenhaus和Gottesman-Lo- Lütkenhaus-Preskill (GLLP)两种数据后处理方法进行性能分析.仿真结果表明:HSPS在传输距离上要优于WCP,对应相同传输距离时系统量子误码率(QBER)要小些,但相对密钥生成率低. 关键词： 量子密钥分配 诱发态 WCP光源 HSPS光源     

基于差分相移键控协议的双向量子密钥分配系统研究

采用差分相移键控(DPSK)协议分析了双向量子密钥分配(QKD)系统的性能，比较了BB84协议、BBM92协议和DPSK协议的安全通信速率与距离的关系，并对协议对抗一些攻击的安全性进行了分析，结果表明DPSK协议对长距离QKD系统非常实用，具有超过200 km的通信距离和较高的通信速率.     

Effect of excess noise on continuous variable entanglement sudden death and Gaussian quantum discord

A symmetric two-mode Gaussian entangled state is used to investigate the effect of excess noise on entanglement sudden death and Gaussian quantum discord with continuous variables. The results show that the excess noise in the channel can lead to entanglement sudden death of a symmetric two-mode Gaussian entangled state, while Gaussian quantum discord never vanishes. As a practical application, the security of a quantum key distribution （QKD） scheme based on a symmetric two-mode Gaussian entangled state against collective Gaussian attacks is analyzed. The calculation results show that the secret key cannot be distilled when entanglement vanishes and only quantum discord exists in such a QKD scheme.