Method and system for sharing quantum entanglement between distant nodes without quantum memories

An arrangement for a distributed quantum-based communication system using entangled photons, comprising:

• a plurality of remote nodes (Nodes Ai and Nodes Bi) each without a quantum memory;
• and
• a central entangling node (Node C) disposed between each of Nodes Ai and Nodes Bi, wherein Nodes Ai and Bi are in both quantum communication and classical communication with Node C and in photon entanglement therebetween,
• the central node comprising:
• a controller;
• a first and second pair of broadband photon generators each adapted to generate photon pair sets at:
• i) random times within time-bins assigned by the controller, and ii) random frequency bins, wherein one photon of each entangled photon pair set is transmitted to an associated remote node (Node Ai) and another photon of the photon pair set is transmitted to another remote node (Node Bi) over the associated quantum channels;
• and
• a multiplexed Bell-state analyzer configured to receive another photon of the pair sets of photons and adapted to perform Bell-state measurements between the received photons, wherein if the received photons arrive at about same time having about same frequency, then the received photons are marked as being entangled and thus identified as belonging to an associated time-bin, wherein the controller is configured to communicated the associated time-bins to the associated remote nodes (Node Ai and Node Bi) over the associated classical channels, thereby entangling their associated photons;
• wherein each Node Ai and the corresponding Node Bi include a tunable delay configured to delay arriving photons at each of said Node Ai and Bi by at least a delay time tmi constituting difference in arrival time between photons over the quantum channel and data over the classical channel, wherein a time-bin is a predetermined duration of time periodically repeated by the controller to synchronize photon generation and detection and each quantum channel dedicated to a frequency bin probabilistically contains a photon during each time-bin.