Analysing the Effect of Asymmetry on the Performance of Atomic Ensemble Based Repeater Protocols

Analysing the Effect of Asymmetry on the Performance of Atomic Ensemble Based Repeater Protocols

Jirovská, Hana (TU Delft Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science)

Maier, D.J. (mentor)
Wehner, S.D.C. (graduation committee)
Gerritsen, B.H.M. (graduation committee)

Delft University of Technology

2021-07-01

There has been a lot of research focused on the next generation of the internet, the so-called quantum networks. This analysis has been so far limited to mostly symmetrical architectures, but any near-term realisations of quantum networks using existing fibre topologies will contain asymmetry. In this thesis, we investigate how midpoint asymmetry affects quantum repeater protocols implemented with atomic ensembles. We extend the existing simulation framework to allow for midpoint asymmetry. By simulating asymmetry in elementary links, we show that the performance of an elementary link executing quantum key distribution decreases with an increasing degree of asymmetry. This effect can be mitigated by individual optimisation of photon sources at both ends of the elementary link. We present a way how to reduce the search space of such optimisations by developing a heuristic. The contributions of this thesis provide a crucial starting point for investigations of asymmetry in quantum repeater chains.

quantum networks
simulation
atomic ensembles
repeater protocols

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:d01066a8-1c44-40bf-81b2-9416aaea7e98

Student theses

bachelor thesis

© 2021 Hana Jirovská