Improvement of two-way continuous-variable quantum key distribution with virtual photon subtraction

  • Yijia Zhao
  • Yichen Zhang
  • Zhengyu Li
  • Song Yu
  • Hong Guo
Article
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Accepted:

Abstract

We propose a method to improve the performance of two-way continuous-variable quantum key distribution protocol by virtual photon subtraction. The virtual photon subtraction implemented via non-Gaussian post-selection not only enhances the entanglement of two-mode squeezed vacuum state but also has advantages in simplifying physical operation and promoting efficiency. In two-way protocol, virtual photon subtraction could be applied on two sources independently. Numerical simulations show that the optimal performance of renovated two-way protocol is obtained with photon subtraction only used by Alice. The transmission distance and tolerable excess noise are improved by using the virtual photon subtraction with appropriate parameters. Moreover, the tolerable excess noise maintains a high value with the increase in distance so that the robustness of two-way continuous-variable quantum key distribution system is significantly improved, especially at long transmission distance.

Keywords

Continuous-variable quantum key distribution Two-way protocol Virtual photon subtraction Tolerable excess noise 
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Notes

Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) under Grant 2014CB340102, in part by the National Natural Science Foundation under Grants 61225003, 61531003, 61427813, 61401036, 61471051.

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 2017

Authors and Affiliations

  • Yijia Zhao
    • 1
  • Yichen Zhang
    • 1
  • Zhengyu Li
    • 2
  • Song Yu
    • 1
  • Hong Guo
    • 2
  1. 1.State Key Laboratory of Information Photonics and Optical CommunicationsBeijing University of Posts and TelecommunicationsBeijingChina
  2. 2.State Key Laboratory of Advanced Optical Communication Systems and Networks, Center for Computational Science and Engineering and Center for Quantum Information Technology, School of Electronics Engineering and Computer SciencePeking UniversityBeijingChina

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