{
  "abstract": "We present a method for characterizing depolarization in fiber channels carrying broadband polarization-encoded optical signals. Wavelength-dependent polarization mode dispersion maps each input polarization to a trajectory on the Poincaré sphere; we show that the singular value decomposition of the band-averaged rotation matrix yields, in closed form, the optimal input states, the associated mutually unbiased measurement bases, and the resulting projection error probabilities. The three singular values provide a compact, bandwidth-dependent channel signature that distinguishes first- from higher-order dispersion, and yield the bandwidth at which the worst-case error probability reaches 3% as a practical filtering budget. We perform a second-order analysis of the band average that treats the two higher-order mechanisms: variation of the differential group delay at a fixed principal-state axis and wander of that axis with wavelength. We characterize 12 deployed fiber links in Masdar City and demonstrate mitigation by concatenating two channels through a single polarization controller, a step towards nonlocal compensation. The analysis is implemented in an openly available Python library for fiber-channel characterization.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [],
  "article_type": null,
  "arxiv": "2607.03202",
  "author_total": 8,
  "authors": [
    {
      "name": "Vadim Rodimin"
    },
    {
      "name": "Konstantin Kravtsov"
    },
    {
      "name": "Rui Ming Chua"
    },
    {
      "name": "Xingjian Zhang"
    },
    {
      "name": "Aleksei Ponasenko"
    },
    {
      "name": "Yury Kurochkin"
    },
    {
      "name": "Alexander Ling"
    },
    {
      "name": "James A. Grieve"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/adn1qqv0jvxgc.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.48550/arxiv.2607.03202",
  "fulltext_url": null,
  "id": "adn1qqv0jvxgc",
  "issns": [],
  "landing_url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.03202",
  "language": null,
  "licence": "CC-BY-4.0",
  "licence_label": "CC BY 4.0",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": "CC0-1.0",
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "arxiv",
      "physics.optics"
    ],
    [
      "arxiv",
      "quant-ph"
    ],
    [
      "openalex",
      "1702|Quantum Information and Cryptography"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7167633035",
  "pdf_url": "https://arxiv.org/pdf/2607.03202",
  "pmcid": null,
  "pmid": null,
  "published": "2026-10-28",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/adn1qqv0jvxgc.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:36:22Z",
      "native_id": "2607.03202",
      "source": "arxiv",
      "url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.03202"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "physics",
      "origin": "arxiv:physics.optics",
      "subfield": "optics-photonics"
    },
    {
      "field": "physics",
      "origin": "arxiv:quant-ph",
      "subfield": "quantum"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Broadband characterization of polarization mode dispersion for quantum communication channels",
  "title_text": "Broadband characterization of polarization mode dispersion for quantum communication channels",
  "type": "preprint",
  "updated_at": "2026-11-01T12:20:44Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/adn1qqv0jvxgc",
  "venue": "arXiv",
  "versions": []
}