IET Quantum Communication最新文献

{"title":"Soft Output M-Algorithm Based Quantum Data Detection for Polar Coded Wireless Quantum Optical Multipath Communications","authors":"Kushtrim Dini,&nbsp;Peter Jung","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70043","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1049/qtc2.70043","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Entanglement-based quantum communication schemes, such as quantum teleportation, rely on classical communication links, which introduce significant transmission overhead and limit the achievable quantum advantage. To address this issue, this work investigates a non–entanglement-based quantum communication concept. The proposed laser-based physical layer (PHY) model accommodates a multipath quantum channel and receiver impairments, including intersymbol interference (ISI) caused by multipath propagation, thermal background noise, decoherence, the absence of phase coherence between transmitter and receiver, photon-counting reception, dark counts and quantum efficiency. Because optimum full state sequence detection becomes increasingly complex with increasing channel memory, a reduced-complexity trellis-based, suboptimum yet practical sequence detection approach considering the <span></span><math>\u0000 <semantics>\u0000 <mrow>\u0000 <mrow>\u0000 <mi>M</mi>\u0000 </mrow>\u0000 </mrow>\u0000 <annotation> $M$</annotation>\u0000 </semantics></math>-algorithm is applied. By extending this algorithm to generate soft outputs, a soft-output <span></span><math>\u0000 <semantics>\u0000 <mrow>\u0000 <mrow>\u0000 <mi>M</mi>\u0000 </mrow>\u0000 </mrow>\u0000 <annotation> $M$</annotation>\u0000 </semantics></math>-algorithm (SOMA) is obtained, enabling improved channel decoding. Two SOMA variants are introduced: a straightforward ‘post-processing (PP)’-SOMA and a more advanced ‘simple rule (SR)’-SOMA. Results indicate that, particularly with SR-SOMA, the proposed concept substantially reduces transmission overhead while ensuring reliable reception performance. Furthermore, the integration of classical channel coding, such as 3GPP 5G/new radio (5G/NR) polar codes, enhances overall system robustness. The proposed architecture can operate as a stand-alone communication system without entanglement and may additionally convey the classical feed-forward information required by entanglement-based protocols.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70043","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149146689","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Optimal Quantum Control in Fermionic Stochastic Systems With Bounded Delay","authors":"Divyabala Kanagaraj,&nbsp;Durga Nagarajan","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70042","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1049/qtc2.70042","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This manuscript focuses on the study of optimal quantum control problem for the quantum stochastic model in noncommutative space. The existence and uniqueness of the quantum stochastic differential equation driven by a fermion Brownian motion with bounded delay in finite time interval are established by employing the noncommutative Burkholder–Gundy inequality, generalised Minkowski inequality and generalised Banach fixed-point theorem. The proposed system is formulated to control the quantum stochastic differential equation and to maximise the probability that the quantum state will reach the target state. By using the Pontryagin maximum principle, optimal quantum control theory is established for the proposed system. Furthermore, an application of the algorithm is presented through numerical simulations which validate the theoretical results.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-09-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70042","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148942930","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Adaptive Machine Learning-Enhanced Teleportation-Based Quantum Key Distribution","authors":"Kumar Sekhar Roy,&nbsp;Shweta Singh,&nbsp;Manish Kumar,&nbsp;SK Mahmudul Hassan","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70041","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1049/qtc2.70041","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Hybrid quantum networks will be the communication backbone of the future quantum internet, linking together heterogeneous discrete-variable (DV) and continuous-variable (CV) quantum systems. However, current quantum key distribution protocols assume a static basis and are not designed for dynamically changing hybrid quantum environments. This paper suggests an adaptive machine learning-assisted teleportation quantum key distribution framework that integrates the following steps into a quantum-classical architecture: hybrid DV–CV communication, quantum teleportation, adaptive basis selection and neural-assisted quantum error correction. Optimal measurement basis prediction, by means of a supervised multilayer perceptron (MLP), using six real-time channel descriptors, allows for intelligent protocol adaptation under heterogeneous channel conditions. The framework proposed was realized in Qiskit Aer and Scikit-learn and tested with 6000 different realisations of the different channels. The classification accuracy was 99.44% while the average inference latency was only 0.0011 ms per channel sample, making it possible to use the adaptive basis selector in real time. The teleportation fidelity of AMT-QKD was 0.899 at a representative channel noise level of 10%, with a quantum bit error rate (QBER) of 0.088, a secret key rate of 0.404 and an eavesdropper mutual information of only <span></span><math>\u0000 <semantics>\u0000 <mrow>\u0000 <mn>1.22</mn>\u0000 <mo>×</mo>\u0000 <mn>1</mn>\u0000 <msup>\u0000 <mn>0</mn>\u0000 <mrow>\u0000 <mo>−</mo>\u0000 <mn>4</mn>\u0000 </mrow>\u0000 </msup>\u0000 </mrow>\u0000 <annotation> $1.22times 1{0}^{-4}$</annotation>\u0000 </semantics></math>. They are shown to be more robust, have less information leakage, and be more secure in generating keys under realistic channel impairments when compared to other protocols, including BB84, Enhanced BB84, B92, BBM92, E91 and CV-QKD. The findings provide a robust framework for the deployment of AMT-QKD in secure communication in future hybrid quantum networks and quantum internet applications.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70041","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148753407","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Multifractality Analysis of Single-Qubit Quantum Circuit Outcomes for a Superconducting Quantum Computer","authors":"Mohammadreza Saghafi,&nbsp;Lamine Mili,&nbsp;Karlton Wirsing","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70037","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1049/qtc2.70037","url":null,"abstract":"<p>We present a multifractal analysis of time series data obtained by repeatedly running a single-qubit quantum circuit on IBM superconducting quantum computers in which the measurement outcomes are recorded as the number of zeros. We analyse empirical time series of repeated quantum circuit measurement outcomes from a superconducting NISQ processor, rather than eigenstates, wavefunctions or simulated quantum maps. We study shot-aggregated measurement statistics (number of zeros per run over time) as a stochastic process influenced by hardware drift and measurement noise. By applying advanced signal processing techniques, including the wavelet leader method, we uncover strong multifractal behaviour in the output data. This finding indicates that the temporal fluctuations inherent to quantum circuit outputs are not purely random but exhibit complex scaling properties across multiple time scales. The multifractal nature of the signal suggests the possibility of tailoring filtering strategies that specifically target these scaling features to effectively mitigate noise in quantum computations. Our results not only contribute to a deeper understanding of the dynamical properties of quantum systems under repeated measurement but also provide a promising avenue for improving noise reduction techniques in near-term quantum devices.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-07-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70037","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148615256","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Enhancing Medical Image Security Leveraging Quantum Key Distribution","authors":"Sudip Shrestha,&nbsp;Dilip Rai,&nbsp;Nanda Bikram Adhikari","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70040","DOIUrl":"10.1049/qtc2.70040","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The rapid development of healthcare system has increased the necessities for the secure medical image transmission. As quantum computers develop, classical cryptographic techniques become vulnerable to quantum attacks. This paper proposes QKD assisted quantum encryption for medical images. BB84 protocol is utilised to generate a secure shared key, which is further enhanced using Henon maps. The logistic map whose parameters are derived from the shared key is employed to generate the permutation sequence for pixel values. Medical images are encoded using the novel enhanced quantum representation (NEQR) and encrypted via quantum permutation and quantum XOR operations employing block-wise strategy. The proposed method was evaluated in both ideal and noisy quantum environments such as amplitude damping, depolarising, bit-flip and phase damping noise models. The experimental results show strong security performance on a benchmark and medical images with high entropy values, near zero-pixel correlation and resistance to differential attacks. Additionally, noise analysis shows that bit-flip and amplitude damping noises affect the image reconstruction more than phase damping and depolarising noise. Overall, the proposed framework provides a secure solution for medical image security.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-07-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70040","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148467511","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"BB84 Quantum Key Distribution in Software-Defined Networking Control Planes: End-to-End Integration, Security Analysis, and Performance Benchmarking","authors":"Raied Ibrahim,&nbsp;Ibrahim Khider,&nbsp;Salaheldin Edam,&nbsp;Ahmed Abdalgader,&nbsp;Mohamed Burai","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70039","DOIUrl":"10.1049/qtc2.70039","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Classical public-key cryptography used to secure Software-Defined Networking (SDN) control planes remains vulnerable to future cryptographically relevant quantum computers through Shor's algorithm, motivating the exploration of quantum-safe key establishment mechanisms. While Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) has been widely studied as a standalone technology, its direct integration into SDN control-plane protection remains insufficiently quantified from both architectural and operational perspectives. This paper presents a quantum-secure SDN control-plane framework in which BB84-based key generation, key lifecycle management, and quantum-authenticated flow-rule protection are integrated into the Ryu controller through a QBER-aware Key Management System (KMS) and OpenFlow 1.3 Experimenter extensions. Beyond implementation, the paper positions the design as a practical migration model for quantum-resilient SDN infrastructures and evaluates its security–performance trade-offs against a classical RSA + TLS baseline. The system is implemented using Ryu, Open vSwitch, and a software BB84 simulator in a Mininet testbed with up to 20 OpenFlow switches. All measurements are repeated over 30 independent trials with full statistical reporting, while QBER stability is assessed over 1000 runs. Results show that BB84 key generation latency averages 45.3 ms (<i>σ</i> = 3.2 ms), mean QBER remains at 4.8% with zero threshold violations, flow installation latency increases from 13.2 to 17.6 ms, controller CPU overhead is +3.8 percentage points, and throughput decreases from 8200 to 7580 pps under saturation. In addition, scalability follows a near-perfect linear trend (<i>R</i>² = 0.998), enabling projection to larger SDN deployments. These findings show that QKD-secured SDN control-plane protection is operationally feasible on commodity hardware with bounded and predictable overhead, while offering a practical blueprint for the gradual deployment of quantum-resilient networking infrastructure.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-07-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70039","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148467158","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"QuantumShield: A Unified Quantum Key Distribution-Software-Defined Networking Framework for Heterogeneous Internet of Things Security With Multi-Tiered Key Management and Adaptive Quantum Bit Error Rate-Based Attack Detection","authors":"Raied Ibrahim,&nbsp;Ibrahim Khider,&nbsp;Salaheldin Edam","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70038","DOIUrl":"10.1049/qtc2.70038","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Quantum computing is a serious threat to classical cryptographic systems, especially for Internet of things (IoT) networks that do not have a lot of resources and are meant to run for a long time. This paper presents QuantumShield, an integrated security framework that combines quantum key distribution (QKD) with software-defined networking (SDN) to achieve information-theoretic protection for IoT communications. The framework makes four core contributions: (1) an enhanced BB84 protocol (eBB84) with adaptive quantum bit error rate (QBER) thresholding, achieving 89.6% detection sensitivity at attack strength 0.3—a 37% improvement over the conventional fixed-threshold BB84 baseline (threshold = 0.11); (2) a hierarchical key management architecture integrating quantum-derived cryptographic keys with SDN flow control, supporting heterogeneous IoT devices through a three-tier security model; (3) a multiparameter attack detection mechanism that provides robust defence against eavesdropping (97.2% detection), man-in-the-middle attacks (96.7% detection and 0.4% false positives) and brute-force attempts that are computationally infeasible (10 years for classical and 10³ years for quantum systems) and (4) the proposed framework demonstrates improved control-plane security and scalable performance based on empirical evaluation in SDN-enabled IoT environments, without relying on theoretical asymptotic complexity claims, a key generation rate of 3.7 keys/s for 256-bit keys and only 8.2% throughput overhead. Unlike computational cryptography schemes, such as CP/PB-ABE, RSA or ECC, which rely on mathematical hardness assumptions and are vulnerable to quantum algorithms, such as Shor's and Grover's,QuantumShield, achieves information-theoretic security for <i>key establishment</i> via the eBB84 protocol, whereas message authentication and data-plane integrity rely on classical symmetric primitives (HMAC–SHA256 and AES-256) seeded with quantum-derived keys, providing computational security hardened against long-term key reuse. Extensive experimental validation confirms its practicality and robustness for mission-critical IoT deployments requiring quantum-resilient security in the postquantum era.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.8,"publicationDate":"2026-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70038","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148381151","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Centralised Key Management System Architecture for Topology-Aware and Quantum-Resilient Security in QKD-Integrated SDN Control Planes","authors":"Raied Ibrahim,&nbsp;Ibrahim Khider,&nbsp;Salaheldin Edam,&nbsp;Mohamed Burai","doi":"10.1049/qtc2.70035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1049/qtc2.70035","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Software-defined networking (SDN) consolidates network control at a centralised controller, making the southbound TLS-protected channel between the controller and OpenFlow switches the principal security boundary of the entire network. Classical public-key mechanisms underpinning this channel—RSA, ECDHE and X.509 certificate infrastructure—are fundamentally threatened by Shor's algorithm, which solves their underlying hard problems in polynomial quantum time. This paper presents the design, implementation and experimental evaluation of a <i>key management system</i> (KMS) serving as the central trust anchor in a fully quantum key distribution (QKD)-integrated SDN architecture. We formally characterise the KMS's two interdependent roles: (i) a <i>topology role</i>, mediating all BB84-derived quantum key material to every OpenFlow switch while enforcing hierarchical role-based access control (RBAC) and maintaining three distinct key-type domains; and (ii) a <i>security role</i>, operating a formally specified four-state lifecycle state machine with pre-emptive refresh that eliminates cryptographic downtime, AES-256-GCM key storage backed by a software keystore (extensible to HSM/TPM in production deployments) and a tamper-protected audit subsystem. The system is implemented entirely in Python 3.10 on the Ryu 4.34 SDN framework with Open vSwitch 2.17 and evaluated in a two-tier Mininet testbed comprising 12 OpenFlow switches, 24 hosts and dual redundant controllers. Over 30 statistically independent trials, full key synchronisation completes in 1.72 s for 12 switches at a sustained rate of 20.9 keys/s (<i>≈</i>144 ms per switch); automatic key refresh incurs a bounded transient CPU spike from 22% to 37%, resolving within 15 s; and dual-controller failover mediated by the KMS completes in 1.17 s on average with zero standing packet loss. Total performance overhead relative to classical RSA + TLS is 19%–33% across all measured metrics, establishing the practical deployability of the proposed KMS architecture for quantum-safe SDN control planes.</p>","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1049/qtc2.70035","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148174235","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"","authors":"","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148087926","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"","authors":"","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":100651,"journal":{"name":"IET Quantum Communication","volume":"7 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2026-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148077183","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}