Generation and confirmation of a (100 x 100)-dimensional entangled quantum system.

Entangled quantum systems have properties that have fundamentally overthrown the classical worldview. Increasing the complexity of entangled states by expanding their dimensionality allows the implementation of novel fundamental tests of nature, and moreover also enables genuinely new protocols for quantum information processing. Here we present the creation of a (100 × 100)-dimensional entangled quantum system, using spatial modes of photons. For its verification we develop a novel nonlinear criterion which infers entanglement dimensionality of a global state by using only information about its subspace correlations. This allows very practical experimental implementation as well as highly efficient extraction of entanglement dimensionality information. Applications in quantum cryptography and other protocols are very promising.