Super sensitivity and super resolution with quantum teleportation

Quantum correlations can be used to enhance the performance of various estimation tasks ranging from gravitational wave detection to biological imaging. In particular, there has been substantial work on quantum enhanced phase... [ view full abstract ]

Quantum correlations can be used to enhance the performance of various estimation tasks ranging from gravitational wave detection to biological imaging. In particular, there has been substantial work on quantum enhanced phase estimation since this is a core problem in many metrological tasks. The potential of using large entangled quantum states as ultra-sensitive probes has been studied both theoretically and demonstrated in proof-of-principle experiments but the scaling up of such approaches remains a daunting experimental task due to noise and imperfections. Other approaches based on multi-pass protocols have been pursued as potentially more feasible experimental schemes but demonstrations so far have required loading the probed system in between two mirrors together with fast optical switching which limits the flexibility and the efficiency of such approaches.

We propose a fundamentally new approach for multi-pass metrology based on quantum teleportation for realizing quantum enhanced phase estimation. Our approach enables both super resolution and super sensitivity in optical phase estimation. The essence of our proposal is to realize a multi-pass protocol by repeatedly teleporting the probe state back to interact with the probed system multiple times (see Fig 1). In this way, the need of physically redirecting the probe state and the need of large entangled probe states are circumvented. To experimentally demonstrate our proposal, we suggest an implementation based on continuous variable teleportation with two-mode squeezed vacuum states. Importantly, this implementation demonstrates that Heisenberg limited phase estimation can be obtained by means of coherent state probes and homodyne detection. Such resources are experimentally more feasible than single photons and photon counting, which has been considered for previous multi-pass protocols. We provide an analysis of the effect of expected experimental imperfections (see fig 2 and 3) and show that our proposal could be demonstrated with current technology.