A Quantum Access Network Suitable for Internetworking Optical Network Units

Abstract

Quantum access networks allow a large number of users to access quantum networks, which can be regarded as an important part of the practical application for quantum communication. However, current quantum access networks have not considered as the peer-to-peer multimedia service between optical network units (ONUs) that have become the dominant service in the access networks. Thus, we propose a quantum access network that can support direct quantum and classical ONU-ONU communication by using an N:N splitter. In addition, we improve the efficiency of quantum key distribution (QKD) from both the physical and the data link layer. For the former, we analyze spontaneous Raman scattering (SRS) that is the main impairment source to QKD due to the co-propagation of the classical and quantum signal. Then, we propose a collision-avoiding scheme to reduce the influence of the SRS. For the latter, a dynamic time slot assignment protocol is proposed to reduce discarding secure keys greatly. The two methods are verified by simulations, and the results show that each method can effectively optimize QKD performance.