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arXiv:0804.2135 · Review of Scientific Instruments

Sagnac-loop phase shifter with polarization-independent operation

Tien Tjuen Ng, Darwin Gosal, Antı́a Lamas-Linares, Christian Kurtsiefer

Published Jan 1, 2011• 6 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

A bulk-optics, polarization-independent phase shifter for photonic quantum information applications is demonstrated. The device is based on a transverse electro-optic modulator in a Sagnac-type loop containing Faraday rotators. This direction-dependent polarization rotation in the loop is combined with a Mach-Zehnder interferometer to form an optical switch with an on/off contrast of 96% and a switching time of 1.6 ns. We demonstrate that the device's operation maintains any arbitrary polarization state.

DOI
10.1063/1.3514984

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A bulk-optics, polarization-independent phase shifter for photonic quantum information applications is demonstrated. The device is based on a transverse electro-optic modulator in a Sagnac-type loop containing Faraday rotators. This direction-dependent polarization rotation in the loop is combined with a Mach-Zehnder interferometer to form an optical switch with an on/off contrast of 96% and a switching time of 1.6 ns. We demonstrate that the device's operation maintains any arbitrary polarization state.
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Abstract In photonic quantum applications, optical routers are required to handle single photons with low loss, high speed, and preservation of their quantum states. Single-photon routing with maintained polarization states is particularly important for utilizing them as qubits. Here, we demonstrate a polarization-maintaining electro-optic router compatible with single photons. Our custom electro-optic modulator is embedded in a configuration of a Mach–Zehnder interferometer, where each optical component achieves polarization-maintaining operation. We observe the performance of the router with 2%–4% loss, 20 dB switching extinction ratio, 2.9 ns rise time, and >99% polarization process fidelity to an ideal identity operation.
Dynamically routing single photons without disturbing their quantum state is an essential capability for photonic quantum information technology. Here, we experimentally demonstrate a heralded single-photon switch that combines low loss, strict polarization independence, and high process fidelity in a simple architecture based on a free-space Sagnac interferometer incorporating a single Pockels cell. The routing of the photon between two spatial output modes is governed solely by the phase modulation applied to the Pockels cell, and is therefore independent of the input polarization state, while the Sagnac geometry provides passive interferometric stability without active phase locking. Operating at the telecom wavelength of 1550 nm, the switch exhibits an insertion loss of approximately 0.4 dB and an average extinction ratio of 19.1 dB. Quantum process tomography yields process fidelities of 0.985 and 0.979 with respect to the ideal identity operation for the two output modes, demonstrating that the polarization information encoded in the single photons is preserved through the switch. These features make the device a practical building block for fundamental quantum optics experiments, photonic quantum information processing, and quantum networks at telecom wavelengths.
We propose an apparatus that realizes direct observation of nonlinear phase shifts induced by cross-phase modulation. The apparatus is based on a polarization-division Sagnac interferometer incorporating Faraday rotators, which, in principle, enables phase robustness, flexibility, and lossless operation. Here, we present the measurement of nonlinear phase shifts in a photonic crystal fiber, demonstrating the advantage of our system in its application to waveguide-type Kerr media. This apparatus is applicable to lossless all-optical phase gates and switches.
We experimentally demonstrate optical Mach-Zehnder interferometer utilizing displaced Sagnac configuration to enhance its phase stability. The interferometer with footprint of 27×40 cm offers individually accessible paths and shows phase deviation less than 0.4° during a 250 s long measurement. The phase drift, evaluated by means of Allan deviation, stays below 3° or 7 nm for 1.5 h without any active stabilization. The polarization insensitive design is verified by measuring interference visibility as a function of input polarization. For both interferometer's output ports and all tested polarization states the visibility stays above 93%. The discrepancy in visibility for horizontal and vertical polarization about 3.5% is caused mainly by undesired polarization dependence of splitting ratio of the beam splitter used. The presented interferometer device is suitable for quantum-information and other sensitive applications where active stabilization is complicated and common-mode interferometer is not an option as both the interferometer arms have to be accessible individually.
In this paper we show that an optical setup based on a polarizing Sagnac interferometer combined with a Dove prism can be used as a convenient general-purpose tool for the generation, detection and sorting of spin-orbit states of light. This device can work both in the classical and in the quantum single-photon regime, provides higher sorting efficiency and extinction ratio than usual hologram-fiber combinations, and shows much higher stability and ease of alignment than Mach-Zehnder interferometer setups. To demonstrate the full potential of this setup, we also report some demonstrative experiments of several possible applications of this setup.