Classical simulation of linear optics subject to nonuniform losses

Understand

We present a comprehensive study of the impact of non-uniform, i.e.\ path-dependent, photonic losses on the computational complexity of linear-optical processes.

• Our main result states that, if each beam splitter in a network induces some loss probability, non-uniform network designs cannot circumvent the efficient classical simulations based on losses.
• To achieve our result we obtain new intermediate results that can be of independent interest.
• First, we show that, for any network of lossy beam-splitters, it is possible to extract a layer of non-uniform losses that depends on the network geometry.