Entanglement can Completely Defeat Quantum Noise

Abstract

We describe two quantum channels that individually cannot send any classical information without some chance of decoding error. But together a single use of each channel can send quantum information perfectly reliably. This proves that the zero-error classical capacity exhibits superactivation, the extreme form of the superadditivity phenomenon in which entangled inputs allow communication over zerocapacity channels. But our result is stronger still, as it even allows zero-error quantum communication when the two channels are combined. Thus our result shows a new remarkable way in which entanglement across two systems can be used to resist noise, in this case perfectly. We also show a new form of superactivation by entanglement shared between sender and receiver.