Today’s society is based on fast information exchange done via optical communication in fibers. However, not only does the current structure of our network consume tremendous amounts of energy, the data transfer is fundamentally insecure. Therefore, we urgently need a future network with increased energy efficiency while allowing for secure data communication. The solution lies in quantum physics, which makes it possible to encode information on a single-photon. This allows for totally secure communication due to the no-cloning theorem. Security of data and protection against eavesdropping is of crucial importance for our society, in which personal data and identity theft as well as cyber-attacks threatens the integrity and sovereignty of whole countries. Quantum Repeaters using On-demand Photonic Entanglement (QuROPE) will develop the missing crucial technology to bring quantum communication to market, making secure communication finally reality.

The objectives of QuROPE are to develop a hybrid quantum repeater architecture based on dissimilar quantum systems and to test its performances in real-word applications. The envisioned implementation is based on two disruptive technologies that will be pioneered during the project: (i) Near-ideal quantum-dot-based sources of entangled photon pairs that will simultaneously feature high brightness, near-unity degree of entanglement and indistinguishability, wavelength-tuneability, and on-demand operation. (ii) Efficient and broad-band quantum memories that will be specifically designed and engineered to store and retrieve polarization-entangled photons from quantum dots. Different quantum dot-quantum memory systems will be combined to develop near-infrared and telecom-based quantum repeaters, which will then be tested using both free-space and fiber-based quantum key distribution protocols based on entanglement. This will be performed in the elementary quantum-network infrastructure available in the consortium – a major breakthrough that will open the path towards future large-scale implementation of secure quantum communication.

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