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We provide several formulas that determine the optimal number of entangled bits (ebits) that a general entanglement-assisted quantum code requires. Our first theorem gives a formula that applies to an arbitrary entanglement-assisted block code. Corollaries of this theorem give formulas that apply to a code imported from two classical binary block codes, to a code imported from a classical quaternary block code, and to a continuous-variable entanglement-assisted quantum block code. Finally, we conjecture two formulas that apply to entanglement-assisted quantum convolutional codes.
We show how to protect a stream of quantum information from decoherence induced by a noisy quantum communication channel. We exploit preshared entanglement and a convolutional coding structure to develop a theory of entanglement-assisted quantum convolutional coding. Our construction produces a Calderbank-Shor-Steane (CSS) entanglement-assisted quantum convolutional code from two arbitrary classical binary convolutional codes. The rate and error-correcting properties of the classical convolutional codes directly determine the corresponding properties of the resulting entanglement-assisted quantum convolutional code. We explain how to encode our CSS entanglement-assisted quantum convolutional codes starting from a stream of information qubits, ancilla qubits, and shared entangled bits.
In this dissertation, I present a general method for studying quantum error correction codes (QECCs). This method not only provides us an intuitive way of understanding QECCs, but also leads to several extensions of standard QECCs, including the operator quantum error correction (OQECC), the entanglement-assisted quantum error correction (EAQECC). Furthermore, we can combine both OQECC and EAQECC into a unified formalism, the entanglement-assisted operator formalism. This provides great flexibility of designing QECCs for different applications. Finally, I show that the performance of quantum low-density parity-check codes will be largely improved using entanglement-assisted formalism.
Quantum error-correcting codes will be the ultimate enabler of a future quantum computing or quantum communication device. This theory forms the cornerstone of practical quantum information theory. We provide several contributions to the theory of quantum error correction--mainly to the theory of entanglement-assisted quantum error correction where the sender and receiver share entanglement in the form of entangled bits (ebits) before quantum communication begins. Our first contribution is an algorithm for encoding and decoding an entanglement-assisted quantum block code. We then give several formulas that determine the optimal number of ebits for an entanglement-assisted code. The major contribution of this thesis is the development of the theory of entanglement-assisted quantum convolutional coding. A convolutional code is one that has memory and acts on an incoming stream of qubits. We explicitly show how to encode and decode a stream of information qubits with the help of ancilla qubits and ebits. Our entanglement-assisted convolutional codes include those with a Calderbank-Shor-Steane structure and those with a more general structure. We then formulate convolutional protocols that correct errors in noisy entanglement. Our final contribution is a unification of the theory of quantum error correction--these unified convolutional codes exploit all of the known resources for quantum redundancy.
A fundamental problem in quantum information is to explore the roles of different quantum correlations in a quantum information procedure. Recent work [Phys. Rev. Lett., 107 (2011) 080401] shows that the protocol for assisted optimal state discrimination (AOSD) may be implemented successfully without entanglement, but with another correlation, quantum dissonance. However, both the original work and the extension to discrimination of $d$ states [Phys. Rev. A, 85 (2012) 022328] have only proved that entanglement can be absent in the case with equal a emph{priori} probabilities. By improving the protocol in [Sci. Rep., 3 (2013) 2134], we investigate this topic in a simple case to discriminate three nonorthogonal states of a qutrit, with positive real overlaps. In our procedure, the entanglement between the qutrit and an auxiliary qubit is found to be completely unnecessary. This result shows that the quantum dissonance may play as a key role in optimal state discrimination assisted by a qubit for more general cases.
We study experimentally the fundamental limits of sensitivity of an atomic radio-frequency magnetometer. First we apply an optimal sequence of state preparation, evolution, and the back-action evading measurement to achieve a nearly projection noise limited sensitivity. We furthermore experimentally demonstrate that Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) entanglement of atoms generated by a measurement enhances the sensitivity to pulsed magnetic fields. We demonstrate this quantum limited sensing in a magnetometer utilizing a truly macroscopic ensemble of 1.5*10^12 atoms which allows us to achieve sub-femtoTesla/sqrt(Hz) sensitivity.