Simple scheme for expanding a polarization-entangled W state by adding one photon

Yan-Xiao Gong, Xu-Bo Zou, Yun-Feng Huang, Guang-Can Guo

Published 2008-10-15Version 1

We propose a simple scheme for expanding a polarization-entangled W state. By mixing a single photon and one of the photons in an n-photon W state at a polarization-dependent beam splitter (PDBS), we can obtain an (n+1)-photon W state after post-selection. Our scheme also opens the door for generating n-photon W states using single photons and linear optics.