Iterative tailoring of optical quantum states with homodyne measurements

Abstract: As they can travel long distances, free space optical quantum states are good candidates for carrying information in quantum information technology protocols. These states, however, are often complex to produce and require protocols whose success probability drops quickly with an increase of the mean photon number. Here we propose a new protocol for the generation and growth of arbitrary states, based on one by one coherent adjunctions of the simple state superposition $\alpha | 0 > +\beta | 1 >$. Due to the nature of the protocol, that allows for the use of quantum memories, it can outperform existing protocols.