Single-photon device requirements for operating linear optics quantum computing outside the post-selection basis

Photonics is a promising architecture for the realisation of quantum information processing, since the two-photon interaction, or non-linearity, necessary to build logical gates can efficiently be realised by the use of interference with ancillary photons and detection 11. Knill , E , Laflamme , R and Milburn , GJ . 2001 . Nature , 409 : 46 – 52 .
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View all references. Although single-photon sources and detectors are pivotal in realisations of such systems, clear guidelines for the required performance of realistic systems are yet to be defined. We present our detailed numerical simulation of several quantum optics circuits including sources and detectors all represented in multi-dimensional Fock-spaces, which allows us to obtain experimentally realistic performance bounds for these devices. In addition, the single-photon source based on switched parametric down-conversion is studied, which in principle could reach the required performance. Three approaches for implementing the switching hierarchy of the photons are simulated, and their anticipated performance is obtained. Our results define the bar for the optical devices needed to achieve the first level of linear-optics quantum computing outside the coincidence basis.

Keywords

• linear optical quantum computing (LOQC),
• photon sources,
• single-photon detectors,
• quantum optics,
• quantum entanglement,
• numerical simulation of quantum optics