Abstract
Graph states1,2,3—multipartite entangled states that can be represented by mathematical graphs—are important resources for quantum computation4, quantum error correction3, studies of multiparticle entanglement1 and fundamental tests of non-locality5,6,7 and decoherence8. Here, we demonstrate the experimental entanglement of six photons and engineering of multiqubit graph states9,10,11. We have created two important examples of graph states, a six-photon Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger state5, the largest photonic Schrödinger cat so far, and a six-photon cluster state2, a state-of-the-art ‘one-way quantum computer’4. With small modifications, our method allows us, in principle, to create various further graph states, and therefore could open the way to experimental tests of, for example, quantum algorithms4,12 or loss- and fault-tolerant one-way quantum computation13,14.
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Acknowledgements
We thank H. J. Briegel, D. Browne, L.-M. Duan, T. Rudolph and S. Yu for helpful discussions. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the Chinese Academy of Sciences. This work was also supported by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the Marie Curie Excellence Grant of the EU, the FWF, the DFG and EU (Scala, Olaqui, Prosecco, QICS, Quprodis).
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Lu, CY., Zhou, XQ., Gühne, O. et al. Experimental entanglement of six photons in graph states. Nature Phys 3, 91–95 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys507
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys507
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