Distributed Quantum Sensor Detecting Ultrafine Dust Realized with Domestic Technology

The Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST, President Seokjin Yoon) announced on the 15th that Dr. Hyangtaek Lim's team from the Quantum Information Research Division, in collaboration with leading domestic and international research institutions such as Chung-Ang University, the Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science, the Agency for Defense Development, and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the United States, has succeeded in implementing a distributed quantum sensor capable of measuring multiple spatially distributed physical quantities with high precision beyond the standard quantum limit using minimal resources.

The KIST research team experimentally demonstrated that when the target to be measured is distributed over a wide area, a distributed quantum sensing system can measure phenomena with the highest precision achievable by quantum mechanics. The team experimentally generated a maximally entangled superposition state simultaneously existing in four spatially separated locations from a Bell state, which is a quantum entangled state, and applied it to reach the Heisenberg limit, the ultimate precision limit in quantum mechanics. They proposed a new protocol that enables the implementation of a distributed quantum sensing network even when the number of photons is smaller than the target to be measured, and experimentally verified it.

KIST explained that since they proposed a protocol capable of measuring multiple spatially distributed physical quantities with precision beyond the standard quantum limit using minimal resources, it is expected to be utilized as a distributed quantum sensing technology for industrialization.

A representative application area is ultra-fine cancer diagnosis. If the distance between cells is considered as shortened to the distance between Seoul and Busan, it can also be used for ultra-fine cancer detection and diagnosis. KIST also explained that it can be applied to battery defect measurement, earthquake detection, global time synchronization, and magnetic field measurement.

Dr. Hyangtaek Lim of KIST stated, "We hope to secure core foundational technology for distributed quantum sensing that enables measurements beyond the standard quantum limit and expand it into practical technologies such as global time synchronization and ultra-fine cancer detection."

This research achievement was published on January 11 in the international academic journal Nature Communications (IF: 16.6, JCR(%) 7.5%).

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