Sample-Efficient Adaptive Calibration of Quantum Networks Using Bayesian Optimization
All physical systems employed for quantum information tasks must act as unbiased carriers of encoded quantum states. Ensuring such indistinguishability of information carriers is a major challenge in many quantum information applications, including advanced quantum communication protocols. For photons, the workhorses of quantum communication networks, it is difficult to obtain and maintain their indistinguishability because of environment-induced transformations and loss imparted by communication channels, especially in noisy scenarios. Conventional strategies to mitigate these transformations often require hardware or software overhead that is restrictive (e.g., adding noise), infeasible (e.g., on a satellite), or time-consuming for deployed networks. In this work we propose and develop resource-efficient Bayesian optimization techniques to rapidly and adaptively calibrate the indistinguishability of individual photons for quantum networks using only information derived from their measurement. To experimentally validate our approach, we demonstrate the optimization of Hong-Ou-Mandel interference between two photons-a central task in quantum networking- finding rapid, efficient, and reliable convergence towards maximal photon indistinguishability in the presence of high loss and shot noise. We expect our resource-optimized and experimentally friendly methodology will allow fast and reliable calibration of indistinguishable quanta, a necessary task in distributed quantum computing, communications, and sensing, as well as for fundamental investigations.