A group of Chinese scientists have accomplished the first distribution of three-dimensional orbital angular momentum (OAM) entanglement via a 1-km-long few-mode optical fiber, which provided a possibility for the realization of long-distance and high-dimensional quantum information tasks using spatial pattern reuse technology in the future.

(Image: University of Science and Technology of China)

The research, published in the Optica journal on March 12, describes how the scientists from University of Science and Technology of China, Jinan University and Sun Yat-sen University successfully transport one photon of a three-dimensional OAM entangled photon pair through the fiber using an actively stabilizing phase precompensation technique.

High-dimensional entanglement has demonstrated its potential for increasing channel capacity and resistance to noise in quantum information processing. Sponsored by China’s Ministry of Science and Technology, National Natural Science Foundation of China, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Anhui provincial government, the results from the research made a significant step towards future OAM-based high-dimensional long-distance quantum communication.

(Compiled by Cheng Weidan)