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Optomechanical quantum teleportation

Nature Photonics volume 15, pages 817–821 (2021)Cite this article

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Abstract

Quantum teleportation, the faithful transfer of an unknown input state onto a remote quantum system1, is a key component in long-distance quantum communication protocols2 and distributed quantum computing3,4. At the same time, high-frequency nano-optomechanical systems5 hold great promise as nodes in a future quantum network6, operating on-chip at low-loss optical telecom wavelengths with long mechanical lifetimes. Recent demonstrations include entanglement between two resonators7, a quantum memory8 and microwave-to-optics transduction9,10,11. Despite these successes, quantum teleportation of an optical input state onto a long-lived optomechanical memory is an outstanding challenge. Here we demonstrate quantum teleportation of a polarization-encoded optical input state onto the joint state of a pair of nanomechanical resonators. Our protocol also allows to store and retrieve an arbitrary qubit state onto a dual-rail encoded optomechanical quantum memory. This work demonstrates the full functionality of a single quantum repeater node and presents a key milestone towards applications of optomechanical systems as quantum network nodes.

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Fig. 1: Teleportation protocol and experimental setup.
Fig. 2: EPR source characterization.
Fig. 3: Experimental quantum teleportation.

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Data availability

Source data for the plots are available via Zenodo at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5079912.

Code availability

The QuTiP code used for the simulations in the Supplementary Information is available at https://github.com/GroeblacherLab/Optomechanical_Quantum_Teleportation.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank K. Hammerer and R. Stockill for valuable discussions. This work is supported by the Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter (FOM) Projectruimte grant (16PR1054), the European Research Council (ERC StG Strong-Q, 676842 and ERC CoG Q-ECHOS, 101001005) and by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO/OCW), as part of the Frontiers of Nanoscience programme, as well as through Vidi (680-47-541/994) and Vrij Programma (680-92-18-04) grants. R.B. and T.P.M.A. acknowledge funding from the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (2019/01402-1, 2016/18308-0, 2018/15580-6 and 2018/25339-4) and from the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (Finance Code 001). B.H. also acknowledges funding from the European Union under a Marie Skłodowska-Curie COFUND fellowship.

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Niccolò Fiaschi, Bas Hensen.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kavli Institute of Nanoscience, Department of Quantum Nanoscience, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands

    Niccolò Fiaschi, Bas Hensen, Andreas Wallucks, Rodrigo Benevides, Jie Li & Simon Gröblacher

  2. Photonics Research Center, Applied Physics Department, Gleb Wataghin Physics Institute, University of Campinas – UNICAMP, Campinas, Brazil

    Rodrigo Benevides & Thiago P. Mayer Alegre

  3. Zhejiang Province Key Laboratory of Quantum Technology and Device, Department of Physics, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Jie Li

Authors
  1. Niccolò Fiaschi
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  2. Bas Hensen
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  3. Andreas Wallucks
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  4. Rodrigo Benevides
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  5. Jie Li
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  6. Thiago P. Mayer Alegre
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  7. Simon Gröblacher
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Contributions

N.F., B.H., A.W., J.L. and S.G. devised and planned the experiment. R.B. and B.H. fabricated the sample, and N.F., B.H., R.B. and A.W. built the setup and performed the measurements. B.H. developed the code for the simulations. N.F., B.H. and S.G. analysed the data and wrote the manuscript with input from all authors. T.P.M.A. and S.G. supervised the project.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Simon Gröblacher.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Peer review information Nature Photonics thanks the anonymous reviewers for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Sections 1–8, Figs. 1–7 and Table 1.

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Fiaschi, N., Hensen, B., Wallucks, A. et al. Optomechanical quantum teleportation. Nat. Photon. 15, 817–821 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-021-00866-z

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