Single-photon-triggered quantum entanglement between two qubits or at least 2,000 identical qubits
Phys. Rev. A 112, 032441 – Published 30 September, 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/t5mb-lg4t
Abstract
In this paper, we primarily investigate the generation of quantum entanglement triggered by a single photon between two qubits or multiple qubits and analyze the impact of decoherence of the light field. In the model of single-photon interaction with two qubits, we first study the effect of the initial excited-state weight of the qubits on the entanglement triggered by a single photon. We find that the greater the initial excited-state weight, the smaller the maximum quantum entanglement triggered by the single photon between the two qubits. Specifically, when both qubits are in the excited state, a single photon cannot trigger quantum entanglement between the two qubits. We then examine the impact of the initial coherence of the two qubits on the entanglement triggered by a single photon, and find that a single photon can trigger the maximum quantum entanglement between two qubits when both qubits initially have maximum coherence. In the model of single-photon interaction with multiple qubits, in the limit of a large number of qubits, we find that when the initial excited-state weight of each qubit is larger than the ground-state weight, or when all qubits are initially in the ground state, a single photon cannot trigger quantum entanglement between any two qubits in the multiqubit system. Interestingly, we find that a single photon can trigger quantum entanglement between any two qubits from at least 2000 qubits. Moreover, in this limit, the maximum quantum entanglement between any two qubits in the multiqubit system triggered by a single photon changes with the initial-state parameters and almost no longer depends on the number of qubits. Finally, we discuss the effect of decoherence of the light field, and we find that a higher decoherence strength of the light field weakens the generation of quantum entanglement between qubits in both the single-photon interaction with two qubits and the single-photon interaction with multiple qubits models. However, interestingly, the initial coherence of the qubits can resist the impact of decoherence, especially when the two nonidentical qubits, both having maximum coherence, can maintain the maximum quantum entanglement between the two qubits at 0.5 even as the decoherence strength of the light field increases.
