Dynamical entanglement purification using chains of atoms and optical cavities

Abstract

In the framework of cavity QED, we propose a practical scheme to purify dynamically a bipartite entangled state using short chains of atoms coupled to high-finesse optical cavities. In contrast to conventional entanglement purification protocols, we avoid controlled-NOT gates, thus reducing complicated pulse sequences and superfluous qubit operations. Our interaction scheme works in a deterministic way and, together with entanglement distribution and swapping, opens a route toward efficient quantum repeaters for long-distance quantum communication