We demonstrate the numerical and experimental realization of optimized optical traveling-wave antennas made of low-loss dielectric materials. These antennas exhibit highly directive radiation patterns and our studies reveal that this nature comes from two dominant guided TE modes excited in the waveguide-like director of the antenna, in addition to the leaky modes. The optimized antennas possess a broadband nature and have a nearunity radiation efficiency at an operational wavelength of 780 nm. Compared to the previously studied plasmonic antennas for photon emission, our all-dielectric approach demonstrates a new class of highly directional, low-loss, and broadband optical antennas.
Recent achievements in the area of integrated quantum optics and quantum information processing have shown impressive progress for the implementation of linear circuits based on monolithic waveguide structures. Most experiments are based on χ(3) -media, such as glas, silicon-on insulator or silica-on-silicon. In these platforms the implementation of highly efficient sources, frequency converters and fast active phase shifters and modulators pose severe challenges. The use of advanced waveguides structures, which harness a χ(2) –non-linearity, allows for the realization various devices with multiple functionalities. These include single- and multi-channel sources with high brightness, quantum frequency conversion with tailored spectral-temporal properties, and circuits comprising degenerate pair generation in orthogonal polarization, linear elements, and active elements such as polarization rotators or an electro-optically controllable time delay. Here we present our latest progress for the implementation of integrated devices based on χ(2) –media for quantum circuits and quantum communication systems.
Two important challenges in quantum photonics are to generate useful states with high fidelity, and to detect them and verify their properties. Particularly valuable states are single photons and entangled photon pairs in well-defined optical modes, as they can be used in many quantum information protocols or used to build up more complex states. For sources, we employ integrated nonlinear optics (waveguides in lithium niobite and potassium titanyl phosphate) to maximize brightness and go beyond what is possible in bulk optics, showing simultaneously high state fidelity, heralding efficiency, and spectral purity across three experiments: first we show record heralding efficiency in a fully-fibered heralded single-photon source, and use it to probe the tradeoff between spectral purity and heralding efficiency in non-engineered sources. With an engineered source, we then herald up to 50 photons in a nonclassical state. The last source is for polarization-entangled photon pairs, with brightness of 3.5 million pairs/s·mW, fidelity to a Bell state of 96%, heralding efficiency of 43%, and HOM interference visibility of 82%.
Once a complex state is constructed, it must also be verified. For this we employ a time-multiplexed detector consisting of a fibre loop and a single-photon detector. Surprisingly, we are able to extract information even in the saturation regime of the detector. We use the click statistics of the time-multiplexed detector to verify the non-classicality of quantum light, and we use its extremely high dynamic range (123 dB) to measure a macroscopic power level with a single-photon detector. Eliminating calibrated attenuators with this approach will allow direct standardization of quantum and classical optical power levels.
Superconducting detectors are now well-established tools for low-light optics, and in particular quantum optics, boasting high-eciency, fast response and low noise. Similarly, lithium niobate is an important platform for integrated optics given its high second-order nonlinearity, used for high-speed electro-optic modulation and polarization conversion, as well as frequency conversion and sources of quantum light. Combining these technologies addresses the requirements for a single platform capable of generating, manipulating and measuring quantum light in many degrees of freedom, in a compact and potentially scalable manner. We will report on progress integrating tungsten transition-edge sensors (TESs) and amorphous tungsten silicide superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) on titanium in-diused lithium niobate waveguides. e travelling-wave design couples the evanescent eld from the waveguides into the superconducting absorber. We will report on simulations and measurements of the absorption, which we can characterize at room temperature prior to cooling down the devices. Independently, we show how the detectors respond to ood illumination, normally incident on the devices, demonstrating their functionality.
In the aim of access the high angular resolution for mid infrared observations, our team propose to include non linear processes on each arm of an interferometer. This project called ALOHA is now adapted for the L band detection, specially at 3.39 μm. Our team has previously published the first contrast measured in laboratory with such an up-conversion interferometer. The fringe contrast we measured was closed to the theoretical maximum at 100%. In a second step, we investigated the stability of the instrument over several months. The residual drifts are mainly due to the non real-time photometry monitoring.
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