High-fidelity spatial mode transmission through a 1-km-long multimode fiber via vectorial time reversal

The large number of spatial modes supported by standard multimode fibers is a promising platform for boosting the channel capacity of quantum and classical communications by orders of magnitude. However, the practical use of long multimode fibers is severely hampered by modal crosstalk and polarization mixing. To overcome these challenges, we develop and experimentally demonstrate a vectorial time reversal technique, which is accomplished by digitally pre-shaping the wavefront and polarization of the forward-propagating signal beam to be the phase conjugate of an auxiliary, backward-propagating probe beam. Here, we report an average modal fidelity above 80% for 210 Laguerre-Gauss and Hermite-Gauss modes by using vectorial time reversal over an unstabilized 1-km-long fiber. We also propose a practical and scalable spatial-mode-multiplexed quantum communication protocol over long multimode fibers to illustrate potential applications that can be enabled by our technique. The use of long multimode fibers for multiplexed quantum communication is hindered by modal crosstalk and polarisation mixing. Here, the authors use an auxiliary laser beam sent backwards from Bob to Alice, allowing her to pre-compensate for the spatial distortions and polarisation scrambling.

Automated summary

The use of long multimode fibers for multiplexed quantum communication is hindered by modal crosstalk and polarization mixing. The authors demonstrate a vectorial time reversal technique to achieve high modal fidelity for a large number of spatial modes, using an auxiliary beam sent backward to pre-compensate for spatial distortions and polarization scrambling.