ASSOCIATED MAJORS:

1. ENGINEERING

• Aeronautical engineering
• Electrical engineering
• Mechanical engineering

1. NATURAL SCIENCES

• Physics

PROJECT TITLE:

Quantum Communication with continuous variables protocols with atmospheric propagating channel.

PROJECT SUMMARY. Description of activities and objectives:

Quantum key distribution (QKD) is the most mature Quantum technology. Indeed, some companies manufacture QKD devices. Through transmitted quantum signals and authenticated classical
communication, the non-classical correlations are distilled to obtain a final secret key. Under reasonable assumptions (e.g. no spy is inside the device itself) as little information as desired is leaked to the outside world. This security comes from the laws of physics and not from computational complexity assumptions. Thus, QKD is invulnerable to any advances in computational power, including quantum computation.

The student will participate in achieving the main objective of implementing and characterizing a QKD system based on a novel protocol. The main tasks will be:

 Modulation of the quantum transmitter. Modulation will be performed through the phase and amplitude of coherent states using a narrow linewidth laser and an IQ modulator. Different types of discrete modulation (BPSK, QAM, etc.,) will be tested in order to characterize the performance of the quantum QKD emitter.
 Demodulation and detection of the quantum states. Optical and electronic homodyne detection will be used in the receiver to recover the encrypted states by the transmitter.
 Characterization and optimization of optical tracking systems for quantum communication capable of correcting wavefront tilt aberrations caused by atmospheric turbulence.
(Depending on the arrival date the student will be focused on only one of the above tasks).

http://www.itefi.csic.es/