No Arabic abstract
Quantum no-cloning, the impossibility of perfectly cloning an arbitrary unknown quantum state, is one of the most fundamental limitations due to the laws of quantum mechanics, which underpin the physical security of quantum key distribution. Quantum physics does allow, however, approximate cloning with either imperfect state fidelity and/or probabilistic success. Whereas approximate quantum cloning of single-particle states has been tested previously, experimental cloning of quantum entanglement -- a highly non-classical correlation -- remained unexplored. Based on a multiphoton linear optics platform, we demonstrate quantum cloning of two photon entangled states for the first time. Remarkably our results show that one maximally entangled photon pair can be broadcast into two entangled pairs, both with state fidelities above 50%. Our results are a key step towards cloning of complex quantum systems, and are likely to provide new insights into quantum entanglement.
We have found a quantum cloning machine that optimally duplicates the entanglement of a pair of $d$-dimensional quantum systems. It maximizes the entanglement of formation contained in the two copies of any maximally-entangled input state, while preserving the separability of unentangled input states. Moreover, it cannot increase the entanglement of formation of all isotropic states. For large $d$, the entanglement of formation of each clone tends to one half the entanglement of the input state, which corresponds to a classical behavior. Finally, we investigate a local entanglement cloner, which yields entangled clones with one fourth the input entanglement in the large-$d$ limit.
We investigate the optimal distribution of quantum information over multipartite systems in asymmetric settings. We introduce cloning transformations that take $N$ identical replicas of a pure state in any dimension as input, and yield a collection of clones with non-identical fidelities. As an example, if the clones are partitioned into a set of $M_A$ clones with fidelity $F^A$ and another set of $M_B$ clones with fidelity $F^B$, the trade-off between these fidelities is analyzed, and particular cases of optimal $N to M_A+M_B$ cloning machines are exhibited. We also present an optimal $1 to 1+1+1$ cloning machine, which is the first known example of a tripartite fully asymmetric cloner. Finally, it is shown how these cloning machines can be optically realized.
We study machines that take N identical replicas of a pure qudit state as input and output a set of M_A clones of a given fidelity and another set of $M_B$ clones of another fidelity. The trade-off between these two fidelities is investigated, and numerous examples of optimal N -> M_A+M_B cloning machines are exhibited using a generic method. A generalisation to more than two sets of clones is also discussed. Finally, an optical implementation of some such machines is proposed. This paper is an extended version of [xxx.arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0411179].
Coherence and entanglement are the two most crucial resources for various quantum information processing tasks. Here, we study the interplay of coherence and entanglement under the action of different three qubit quantum cloning operations. Considering certain well-known quantum cloning machines (input state independent and dependent), we provide examples of coherent and incoherent operations performed by them. We show that both the output entanglement and coherence could vanish under incoherent cloning operations. Coherent cloning operations on the other hand, could be used to construct a universal and optimal coherence machine. It is also shown that under coherent cloning operations the output two qubit entanglement could be maximal even if the input coherence is negligible. Also it is possible to generate a fixed amount of entanglement independent of the nature of the input state.
It is well known that it is impossible to clone an arbitrary quantum state. However, this inability does not lead directly to no-cloning of quantum coherence. Here, we show that it is impossible to clone the coherence of an arbitrary quantum state which is a stronger statement than the no-cloning of quantum state. In particular, with ancillary system as machine state, we show that it is impossible to clone the coherence of states whose coherence is greater than the coherence of the known states on which the transformations are defined. Also, we characterize the class of states for which coherence cloning will be possible for a given choice of machine. Furthermore, we find the maximum range of states whose coherence can be cloned perfectly. The impossibility proof also holds when we do not include machine states.