Abstract
Classical communication schemes exploiting wave modulation are the basis of our information era. Quantum information techniques with photons enable future secure data transfer in the dawn of decoding quantum computers. Here we demonstrate that also matter waves can be applied for secure data transfer. Our technique allows the transmission of a message by a quantum modulation of coherent electrons in a biprism interferometer. The data is encoded in the superposition state by a Wien filter introducing a longitudinal shift between separated matter wave packets. The transmission receiver is a delay line detector performing a dynamic contrast analysis of the fringe pattern. Our method relies on the Aharonov–Bohm effect but does not shift the phase. It is demonstrated that an eavesdropping attack will terminate the data transfer by disturbing the quantum state and introducing decoherence. Furthermore, we discuss the security limitations of the scheme due to the multi-particle aspect and propose the implementation of a key distribution protocol that can prevent active eavesdropping.
Highlights
We are living in the information age, and almost every aspect of our modern society depends on secure data transfer
We describe such an approach, where a message is transmitted by a non-trivial quantum modulation of an electronic matter wave
In our new communication scheme, we use this mechanism to switch between two states in the Wien filter for binary signal transmission
Summary
We are living in the information age, and almost every aspect of our modern society depends on secure data transfer. Classical communication schemes based on electromagnetic wave modulation are protected by complex mathematical encoding algorithms [1] Their vulnerability to decoding by potential future quantum computers [2] with Shor’s algorithm [3] spurred the field of quantum cryptography and quantum information science with photons [4,5,6,7]. Exploiting the unique quantum behavior of photons led to further major achievements in quantum optics [8], e.g. the violation of Bell inequality [9], quantum teleportation [10] or quantum computing [11]. These photonic schemes are based on quantum uncertainty and entanglement. Matter waves have yet not been exploited as carrier waves for the modulation and transmission of a signal, as it is common for classic electromagnetic data transfer
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