Influence of atmospheric turbulence on optical communications using orbital angular momentum for encoding

2012/04/30 by Mehul Malik, Malcolm O'Sullivan, Malcolm N. O’Sullivan +6 · 324 citations
Computer Science · Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Angular momentum #Atmospheric turbulence #Channel (broadcasting) #Channel capacity #Computational physics #Computer science #Free-space optical communication #Mechanics #Optical Wireless Communication Technologies #Optical communication #Optics #Orbital Angular Momentum in Optics #Phase (matter) #Photon #Physics #Quantum #Quantum Information and Cryptography #Quantum channel #Quantum information #Quantum key distribution #Quantum mechanics #Telecommunications #Turbulence #physics.optics #quant-ph

paper · pdf · open access · doi:10.1364/oe.20.013195

published in Optics Express 20(12), 13195 (Optica Publishing Group) · 6 pages, 5 figures

openalex publication_date 2012/05/25 · arxiv created 2012/06/04 · arxiv updated 2012/08/16 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

We describe an experimental implementation of a free-space 11-dimensional communication system using orbital angular momentum (OAM) modes. This system has a maximum measured OAM channel capacity of 2.12 bits/photon. The effects of Kolmogorov thin-phase turbulence on the OAM channel capacity are quantified. We find that increasing the turbulence leads to a degradation of the channel capacity. We are able to mitigate the effects of turbulence by increasing the spacing between detected OAM modes. This study has implications for high-dimensional quantum key distribution (QKD) systems. We describe the sort of QKD system that could be built using our current technology.

Citations

• Experimental quantum cryptography with qutrits
• Entanglement-based quantum communication over 144 km

Cited by

• A Candidate Framework for Free-Space Quantum Key Distribution based on Geometrical-Configuration Modulation
• Democratising Optical Orbital Angular Momentum: a Set of Cost-Effective Tools
• Multiplexing scheme for simplified entanglement-based large-alphabet quantum key distribution
• Generative machine learning for robust free-space communication
• Tighter spots of light with superposed orbital-angular-momentum beams
• Non-Markovian evolution of photonic quantum states in atmospheric turbulence
• Identifying orbital angular momentum of light in quantum wells
• Universal entanglement decay of photonic-orbital-angular-momentum qubit states in atmospheric turbulence
• Dephasing in coherent communication with weak signal states
• Free-space communication through turbulence: a comparison of plane-wave and orbital-angular-momentum encodings
• Robust and Efficient High-Dimensional Quantum State Tomography

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• Investigating the Performance of Adaptive Optics on Different Bases of Spatial Modes in Turbulent Channels
• Turbulence Mitigation Scheme for Optical Communications using Orbital Angular Momentum Multiplexing Based on Channel Coding and Wavefront Correction
• Transport of Orbital-Angular-Momentum Entanglement through a Turbulent Atmosphere