There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.

Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …

I and i

다중혈관 관상동맥 환자에서 y-문합을 이용하여 양쪽 내흉동맥만을 사용한 우회술의 조기 성적

On September 14, 2015 at 09:50:45 UTC the two detectors of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory simultaneously observed a transient gravitational-wave signal. The signal sweeps upwards in frequency from 35 to 250 Hz with a peak gravitational-wave strain of 1.0×10(-21). It matches the waveform predicted by general relativity for the inspiral and merger of a pair of black holes and the ringdown of the resulting single black hole. The signal was observed with a matched-filter signal-to-noise ratio of 24 and a false alarm rate estimated to be less than 1 event per 203,000 years, equivalent to a significance greater than 5.1σ. The source lies at a luminosity distance of 410(-180)(+160)  Mpc corresponding to a redshift z=0.09(-0.04)(+0.03). In the source frame, the initial black hole masses are 36(-4)(+5)M⊙ and 29(-4)(+4)M⊙, and the final black hole mass is 62(-4)(+4)M⊙, with 3.0(-0.5)(+0.5)M⊙c(2) radiated in gravitational waves. All uncertainties define 90% credible intervals. These observations demonstrate the existence of binary stellar-mass black hole systems. This is the first direct detection of gravitational waves and the first observation of a binary black hole merger.

/pdf/the-observation-of-gravitational-waves-from-a-binary-black-58srpupgg9.pdf

The Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger

We review the field of cavity optomechanics, which explores the interaction between electromagnetic radiation and nano- or micromechanical motion This review covers the basics of optical cavities and mechanical resonators, their mutual optomechanical interaction mediated by the radiation pressure force, the large variety of experimental systems which exhibit this interaction, optical measurements of mechanical motion, dynamical backaction amplification and cooling, nonlinear dynamics, multimode optomechanics, and proposals for future cavity quantum optomechanics experiments In addition, we describe the perspectives for fundamental quantum physics and for possible applications of optomechanical devices

Cavity Optomechanics

Quantum key distribution (QKD) is the first quantum information task to reach the level of mature technology, already fit for commercialization. It aims at the creation of a secret key between authorized partners connected by a quantum channel and a classical authenticated channel. The security of the key can in principle be guaranteed without putting any restriction on an eavesdropper's power. This article provides a concise up-to-date review of QKD, biased toward the practical side. Essential theoretical tools that have been developed to assess the security of the main experimental platforms are presented (discrete-variable, continuous-variable, and distributed-phase-reference protocols).

/pdf/the-security-of-practical-quantum-key-distribution-1qnjoq3c7p.pdf

The security of practical quantum key distribution

We consider the Braunstein-Kimble protocol for continuous variable teleportation and its application for the simulation of bosonic channels. We discuss the convergence properties of this protocol under various topologies (strong, uniform, and bounded-uniform) clarifying some typical misinterpretations in the literature. We then show that the teleportation simulation of an arbitrary single-mode Gaussian channel is uniformly convergent to the channel if and only if its noise matrix has full rank. The various forms of convergence are then discussed within adaptive protocols, where the simulation error must be propagated to the output of the protocol by means of a "peeling" argument, following techniques from PLOB [arXiv:1510.08863]. Finally, as an application of the peeling argument and the various topologies of convergence, we provide complete rigorous proofs for recently-claimed strong converse bounds for private communication over Gaussian channels.

Rebuttal of recent comments on: "Theory of channel simulation and bounds for private communication"

We consider the problem of quantum communication mediated by a passive optical refocusing system. The model captures the basic features of all those situations in which a signal is either refocused by a repeater for long-distance communication, or it is focused on a detector prior to the information decoding process. Introducing a general method for linear passive optical systems, we determine the conditions under which optical refocusing implies information transmission gain. Although the finite aperture of the repeater may cause loss of information, we show that the presence of the refocusing system can substantially enhance the rate of reliable communication with respect to the free-space propagation. We explicitly address the transferring of classical messages over the quantum channel, but the results can be easily extended to include the case of transferring quantum messages as well.

/pdf/enhanced-quantum-communication-via-optical-refocusing-1bkde3uj38.pdf

Enhanced quantum communication via optical refocusing

We show that the most general protocol of quantum communication between two end-points of a quantum network with arbitrary topology can be reduced to an ensemble of Choi matrices subject to local operations and classical communication. This is found by using a teleportation-based technique which applies to a wide range of quantum channels both in discrete- and continuous-variable settings, including lossy channels, quantum-limited amplifiers, dephasing and erasure channels. Thanks to this reduction, we compute the optimal rates (capacities) at which two end-points of a quantum network can transmit quantum information, distil entanglement, or distribute secret keys. These capacities are all bounded or equal to a single quantity, that we call the entanglement flux of the quantum network. As a particular case, we derive these optimal rates for the basic paradigm of a linear chain of quantum repeaters. Thus our results establish the ultimate rates for repeater-based and network-assisted quantum communications under the most relevant models of noise and decoherence.

Optimal Performance of a Quantum Network

Entanglement is a powerful tool for quantum sensing, and entangled states can greatly boost the discriminative power of protocols for quantum illumination, quantum metrology, or quantum reading. However, entangled state protocols generally require the retention of an idler state, to which the probes are entangled. Storing a quantum state is difficult and so technological limitations can make protocols requiring quantum memories impracticable. One alternative is idler-free protocols that utilize nonclassical sources but do not require any idler states to be stored. Here we apply such a protocol to the task of channel position finding. This involves finding a target channel in a sequence of background channels, and has many applications, including quantum sensing, quantum spectroscopy, and quantum reading.

/pdf/idler-free-channel-position-finding-1itb8eol2s.pdf

Idler-free channel position finding

The benefits of entanglement can outlast entanglement itself. In quantum illumination, entanglement is employed to better detect reflecting objects in environments so noisy that all entanglement is destroyed. Here, we show that quantum discord - a more resilient form of quantum correlations - explains the resilience of quantum illumination. We introduce a quantitative relation between the performance gain in quantum illumination and the amount of discord used to encode information about the presence or absence of a reflecting object. This highlights discord's role preserving the benefits of entanglement in entanglement breaking noise.

Stefano Pirandola

Papers

Rebuttal of recent comments on: "Theory of channel simulation and bounds for private communication"

Enhanced quantum communication via optical refocusing

Optimal Performance of a Quantum Network

Idler-free channel position finding

How Discord underlies the Noise Resilience of Quantum Illumination