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Quantitative and optimal device-independent lower bounds on detection efficiency
Phys. Rev. A 114, 012404 – Published 1 July, 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/3xdr-w3z4
Abstract
This paper examines a quantitative and optimal lower bound on the detector efficiency in a (2,2,2) Bell experiment within a fully device-independent framework, whereby the detectors used in the experiment are uncharacterized. We provide a tight lower bound on the minimum efficiency required to observe a desired Bell-CHSH violation using the Navascués-Pironio-Acín hierarchy, confirming tightness up to four decimal places with numerical optimization over explicit quantum realizations. We then introduce the effect of dark counts and demonstrate how to quantify the minimum required efficiency to observe a desired Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) violation with an increasing dark count error. Finally, to obtain an analytical closed-form expression of the minimum efficiency, we consider the set of no-signaling behaviors that satisfy the Tsirelson bound, which are easier to characterize than the quantum set. Using such behaviors, we find a simple closed-form expression for a lower bound on the minimum efficiency which is monotonically increasing with the CHSH violation, though the analytically obtained lower bounds are meaningfully below the numerically tight lower bound.
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