English

Coherent control of the causal order of entanglement distillation

Quantum Physics 2023-12-08 v3

Abstract

Indefinite causal order is an evolving field with potential involvement in quantum technologies. Here we propose and study one possible scenario of practical application in quantum communication: a compound entanglement distillation protocol that features two steps of a basic distillation protocol applied in a coherent superposition of two causal orders. This is achieved by using one faulty entangled pair to control-swap two others before a fourth pair is combined with the two swapped ones consecutively. As a result, the protocol distills the four faulty entangled states into one of a higher fidelity. Our protocol has a higher fidelity of distillation and probability of success for some input faulty pairs than conventional concatenations of the basic protocol that follow a definite distillation order. Our proposal shows the advantage of indefinite causal order in an application setting consistent with the requirements of quantum communication.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2302.13990,
  title  = {Coherent control of the causal order of entanglement distillation},
  author = {Zai Zuo and Michael Hanks and M. S. Kim},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2302.13990},
  year   = {2023}
}