Capacity estimation and verification of quantum channels with arbitrarily correlated errors.

The central figure of merit for quantum memories and quantum communication devices is their capacity to store and transmit quantum information. Here, we present a protocol that estimates a lower bound on a channel's quantum capacity, even when there are arbitrarily correlated errors. One application of these protocols is to test the performance of quantum repeaters for transmitting quantum information. Our protocol is easy to implement and comes in two versions. The first estimates the one-shot quantum capacity by preparing and measuring in two different bases, where all involved qubits are used as test qubits. The second verifies on-the-fly that a channel's one-shot quantum capacity exceeds a minimal tolerated value while storing or communicating data. We discuss the performance using simple examples, such as the dephasing channel for which our method is asymptotically optimal. Finally, we apply our method to a superconducting qubit in experiment.

Universality of quantum computation with cluster states and (X, Y)-plane measurements.

Measurement-based quantum computing (MBQC) is a model of quantum computation where quantum information is coherently processed by means of projective measurements on highly entangled states. Following the introduction of MBQC, cluster states have been studied extensively both from the theoretical and experimental point of view. Indeed, the study of MBQC was catalysed by the realisation that cluster states are universal for MBQC with (X, Y)-plane and Z measurements. Here we examine the question of whether the requirement for Z measurements can be dropped while maintaining universality. We answer this question in the affirmative by showing that universality is possible in this scenario.

Optimal blind quantum computation.

Blind quantum computation allows a client with limited quantum capabilities to interact with a remote quantum computer to perform an arbitrary quantum computation, while keeping the description of that computation hidden from the remote quantum computer. While a number of protocols have been proposed in recent years, little is currently understood about the resources necessary to accomplish the task. Here, we present general techniques for upper and lower bounding the quantum communication necessary to perform blind quantum computation, and use these techniques to establish concrete bounds for common choices of the client's quantum capabilities. Our results show that the universal blind quantum computation protocol of Broadbent, Fitzsimons, and Kashefi, comes within a factor of 8/3 of optimal when the client is restricted to preparing single qubits. However, we describe a generalization of this protocol which requires exponentially less quantum communication when the client has a more sophisticated device.