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PUBLICATIONS

Photon-efficient high-dimensional quantum key distribution

Published

Author(s)

Tian Zhong, Hongchao Zhou, Rob Horansky, Catherine Lee, Varun Verma, Adriana Lita, Alessandro Restelli, Joshua Bienfang, Richard Mirin, Thomas Gerrits, Sae Woo Nam, Francesco Marsili, Zhenshen Zhang, Ligong Wang, Dirk Englund, Gregory Wornell, Jeffrey Shapiro, Franco N. Wong

Abstract

Quantum key distribution (QKD) is a secure communication technology whose security is guaranteed by the laws of physics. However, its widespread use has been hindered in part by low secure-key throughput due to the inherent loss and de-coherence of photons during transmission. Most existing protocols use binary key encoding, with photon information efficiency (PIE) of at most 1 bit per photon and a key rate limited by the photon flux reaching the receiver. High dimensional QKD (HDQKD) promises to significantly improve photon efficiency and key throughput, but its implementation within a framework of proven security for multiple bits per photon has remained a long-standing challenge. Here,we report the first complete implementation of HDQKD protocols, yielding high PIE up to 8.8 secure bits per photon at telecom wavelength, with 7.0 bits per photon maintained after 20 km of fibre transmission. With its throughput of as much as 7.1 Mb/s, our work represents a viable approach to real-world high rate QKD by efficiently utilizing available photonic entanglement and detection resources.
Citation
Nature Photonics
Pub Type
Journals

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DOI Link

Keywords

Quantum Communications, Single-photon detection, Quantum cryptography, Entanglement, Optical encoding, Quantum interference
Quantum information science and Quantum communications

Citation

Zhong, T. , Zhou, H. , Horansky, R. , Lee, C. , Verma, V. , Lita, A. , Restelli, A. , Bienfang, J. , Mirin, R. , Gerrits, T. , Nam, S. , Marsili, F. , Zhang, Z. , Wang, L. , Englund, D. , Wornell, G. , Shapiro, J. and Wong, F. (2015), Photon-efficient high-dimensional quantum key distribution, Nature Photonics, [online], https://doi.org/10.1088/1367-2630/17/2/022002 (Accessed October 10, 2025)

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Created February 3, 2015, Updated October 12, 2021
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