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arXiv:1405.1939 · Physical Review A

Challenging preconceptions about Bell tests with photon pairs

Valentina Caprara Vivoli, Pavel Sekatski, Jean-Daniel Bancal, Charles Ci Wen Lim, Bradley Christensen, Anthony Martin, Rob Thew, Hugo Zbinden, Nicolas Gisin, Nicolas Sangouard

Published Jan 14, 2015• 32 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Motivated by very recent experiments, we consider a scenario ``\`a la Bell'' in which two protagonists test the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality using a photon-pair source based on spontaneous parametric down conversion and imperfect photon detectors. The conventional wisdom says that (i) if the detectors have unit efficiency, the CHSH violation can reach its maximum quantum value of $2\sqrt{2}$. To obtain the maximal possible violation, it suffices that the source emits (ii) maximally entangled photon pairs (iii) in two well-defined single modes. Through a nonperturabive calculation of nonlocal correlations, we show that none of these statements are true. By providing the optimal pump parameters, measurement settings and state structure for any detection efficiency and dark count probability, our results give the recipe to close all the loopholes in a Bell test using photon pairs.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.91.012107

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Motivated by very recent experiments, we consider a scenario ```a la Bell'' in which two protagonists test the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality using a photon-pair source based on spontaneous parametric down conversion and imperfect photon detectors. The conventional wisdom says that (i) if the detectors have unit efficiency, the CHSH violation can reach its maximum quantum value of 222\sqrt{2}22​. To obtain the maximal possible violation, it suffices that the source emits (ii) maximally entangled photon pairs (iii) in two well-defined single modes. Through a nonperturabive calculation of nonlocal correlations, we show that none of these statements are true. By providing the optimal pump parameters, measurement settings and state structure for any detection efficiency and dark count probability, our results give the recipe to close all the loopholes in a Bell test using photon pairs.
We theoretically and experimentally investigate the optimal conditions for the Bell experiment using spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) sources. In theory, we show that a relatively large average photon number (typically $\ensuremath{\sim}0.5$) is desirable to observe the maximum violation of the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality. Moreover, we show that the violation converges to 0.27 in the limit of large average photon number. In experiment, we perform the Bell experiment without postselection using polarization-entangled photon pairs at 1550-nm telecommunication wavelength generated from SPDC sources. While the violation of the CHSH inequality is not directly observed due to the overall detection efficiencies of our system, the experimental values agree well with those obtained by the theory with experimental imperfections. Furthermore, in the range of small average photon numbers ($\ensuremath{\le}0.1$), we propose and demonstrate a method to estimate the ideal CHSH value intrinsically contained in the tested state from the lossy experimental data without assuming the input quantum state.
We investigate quantum nonlocality of a single-photon entangled state under feasible measurement techniques consisting of on-off and homodyne detections along with unitary operations of displacement and squeezing. We test for a potential violation of the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality, in which each of the bipartite party has a freedom to choose between two measurement settings, with each measurement yielding a binary outcome. We find that single-photon quantum nonlocality can be detected when two or less of the four total measurements are carried out by homodyne detection. The largest violation of the CHSH inequality is obtained when all four measurements are squeezed-and-displaced on-off detections. We test the robustness of violations against imperfections in on-off detectors and single-photon sources, finding that the squeezed-and-displaced measurement schemes perform better than the displacement-only measurement schemes.
Nonlocality is a fascinating and counterintuitive aspect of nature, revealed by the violation of a Bell inequality. The standard and easiest configuration in which Bell inequalities can be measured has been proposed by Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH). However, alternative nonlocality tests can also be carried out. In particular, Bell inequalities requiring multiple measurement settings can provide deeper fundamental insights about quantum nonlocality, as well as offering advantages in the presence of noise and detection inefficiency. In this paper we show how these nonlocality tests can be performed using a commercially available source of entangled photon pairs. We report the violation of a series of these nonlocality tests (I3322{I}_{3322}I3322​, I4422{I}_{4422}I4422​, and chained inequalities). With the violation of the chained inequality with 4 settings per side we put an upper limit at 0.49 on the local content of the states prepared by the source (instead of 0.63 attainable with CHSH). We also quantify the amount of true randomness that has been created during our experiment (assuming fair sampling of the detected events).
It is well-known that in certain scenarios weakly entangled states can generate stronger nonlocal effects than their maximally entangled counterparts. In this paper, we consider violations of the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality when one party has inefficient detectors, a scenario known as an asymmetric Bell experiment. For any fixed detection efficiency, we derive a simple upper bound on the entanglement needed to violate the inequality by more than some specified amount $\ensuremath{\kappa}\ensuremath{\ge}0$. When $\ensuremath{\kappa}=0$, the amount of entanglement in all states violating the inequality goes to zero as the detection efficiency approaches 5050%50 from above. We finally consider the scenario in which detection inefficiency arises for only one choice of local measurement. In this case, it is shown that the CHSH inequality can always be violated for any nonzero detection efficiency and any choice of noncommuting measurements.
We study nonlocality tests in which each party performs photodetection and homodyne measurements. The results of such measurements are dichotomized and a Clauser–Horne–Shimony–Holt inequality is used. We prove that in this scenario the maximal violation is attainable and fully characterize the set of maximally violating states. If we restrict our search to states composed of at most 2, 4 and 6 photons per mode, we find critical photodetection efficiencies of 0.48, 0.36 and 0.29. We also found an entangled variation of the famous cat states that has critical efficiency 0.32. These values are well within the limit of current photodetector technology, which suggests the present approach as a road for a loophole-free Bell experiment.
Witnessing continuous-variable Bell nonlocality is a challenging endeavor, but Bell himself showed how one might demonstrate this nonlocality. Although Bell nearly showed a violation using the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH) inequality with sign-binned position-momentum statistics of entangled pairs of particles measured at different times, his demonstration is subject to approximations not realizable in a laboratory setting. Moreover, he does not give a quantitative estimation of the maximum achievable violation for the wave function he considers. In this article, we show how his strategy can be reimagined using the transverse positions and momenta of entangled photon pairs measured at different propagation distances, and we find that the maximum achievable violation for the state he considers is actually very small relative to the upper limit of 222\sqrt{2}22​. Although Bell's wave function does not produce a large violation of the CHSH inequality, other states may yet do so.