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arXiv:2307.04855 · ACS Photonics

Temporally Distilled High-Dimensional Biphotonic States from Thin Sources

Vitaliy Sultanov, Maria V. Chekhova

Published Dec 18, 2023• 11 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Generation of entangled photons through spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) from micro- and nanoscale sources offers unprecedented freedom in quantum state engineering, including the ability to generate two-photon states with high-dimensional hyperentanglement. However, as the source of SPDC gets smaller, the role of photoluminescence increases, which leads to the contamination of two-photon states with a thermal background. Here we propose and implement a solution to this problem: by using pulsed SPDC and time distillation, we increase the purity and the heralding efficiency of the photon pairs. In the experiment, we increased the purity of the two-photon states generated in a 7 μm film of lithium niobate from 0.002 to 0.99. With the higher purity we were able to observe and characterize different polarization states of photon pairs generated simultaneously due to relaxed phase matching. In particular, we showed the presence of orthogonally polarized photons that are potentially usable for the generation of polarization entanglement.

DOI
10.1021/acsphotonics.3c01169

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Generation of entangled photons through spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) from micro- and nanoscale sources offers unprecedented freedom in quantum state engineering, including the ability to generate two-photon states with high-dimensional hyperentanglement. However, as the source of SPDC gets smaller, the role of photoluminescence increases, which leads to the contamination of two-photon states with a thermal background. Here we propose and implement a solution to this problem: by using pulsed SPDC and time distillation, we increase the purity and the heralding efficiency of the photon pairs. In the experiment, we increased the purity of the two-photon states generated in a 7 μm film of lithium niobate from 0.002 to 0.99. With the higher purity we were able to observe and characterize different polarization states of photon pairs generated simultaneously due to relaxed phase matching. In particular, we showed the presence of orthogonally polarized photons that are potentially usable for the generation of polarization entanglement.
Polarization-entangled photon pairs are essential sources for photonic quantum information processing. However, generating entangled photon pairs with large detuning via spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) often requires complex configurations to compensate for phase matching. Here, we propose a simple and efficient scheme to generate polarization-entangled photon pairs based on type-0 SPDC in a thin-film lithium niobate waveguide with a single poling period. By utilizing the strong dispersion engineering capabilities of thin-film waveguides, we can achieve both degenerate and highly detuned entangled photon pairs. Furthermore, we demonstrate on-chip temporal compensation using an integrated waveguide structure. Our approach offers a compact and scalable solution for integrated quantum photonic circuits.
On-chip generation of high-purity single photons is essential for scalable photonic quantum technologies. Spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) is widely used to generate photon pairs for heralded single-photon sources, but intrinsic spectral correlations of the pairs often limit the purity and interference visibility of the heralded photons. Existing approaches to suppress these correlations rely on narrowband spectral filtering, which introduces loss, or exploiting different polarizations, which complicates on-chip integration. Here, we demonstrate a new strategy for generating spectrally separable photon pairs in thin-film lithium niobate nanophotonic circuits by harnessing higher-order spatial modes, with all interacting fields residing in the same polarization. Spectral separability is achieved by engineering group-velocity matching using higher-order transverse-electric modes, combined with a Gaussian-apodized poling profile to further suppress residual correlations inherent to standard periodic poling. Subsequent on-chip mode conversion with efficiency exceeding 95\% maps the higher-order mode to the fundamental mode and routes the photons into distinct output channels. The resulting heralded photons exhibit spectral purities exceeding 94\% inferred from joint-spectral intensity and 89\% from unheralded g(2)g^{(2)}g(2) measurement. This approach enables flexible spectral and temporal engineering of on-chip quantum light sources for quantum computing and quantum networking.
Thin-film spontaneous parametric down-conversion, due to the relaxed phase-matching condition, generates photon pairs that are extremely broadband in frequency and angle and highly entangled in time/frequency and position/momentum. Here we show that it also provides a very broad orbital angular momentum (OAM) spectrum, which, in contrast to the case of bulk crystals, is decoupled from the frequency spectrum. To demonstrate it experimentally, we generate photon pairs in a 7 μm7~μ\mathrm{m}7 μm-thick lithium niobate film and compare them with those from a 500 μm500~μ\mathrm{m}500 μm-thick periodically poled lithium niobate crystal under identical pump conditions. The thin-film source exhibits a substantially broader OAM spectrum, with the azimuthal Schmidt number almost 9 times larger than that of the bulk source. On this highly entangled state, we perform quantum-state tomography in selected two- and four-dimensional OAM subspaces, demonstrating high-purity maximally entangled states. These results highlight thin nonlinear films as a promising platform for high-dimensional quantum-state generation with weak spatial--spectral coupling.
Generation of hyperentangled photon pairs is investigated based on the lithium niobate straight waveguide. We propose to use the nonlinear optical process of spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) and a well-designed lithium niobate waveguide structure to generate a hyperentangled (in the polarization dimension and the energy-time dimension) two-photon state. By performing numerical simulations of the waveguide structure and calculating the possible polarization states, joint spectral amplitudes (JSA), and joint temporal amplitudes (JTA) of the generated photon pair, we show that the generated photon pair is indeed hyperentangled in both the polarization dimension and the energy-time dimension.
Quantum photonic technologies rely on the ability to generate, manipulate, and interfere indistinguishable single photons on a scalable platform. Among the various approaches, spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) remains one of the most widely used methods for generating entangled photon pairs and pure heralded single photons. However, most integrated SPDC sources relying on co-propagating geometries have a limited purity of heralded photons or require lossy filtering. Type-2 SPDC processes can produce pure separable photons but typically suffer from lower efficiency and added complexity due to polarization management. Here we show the first integrated counter-propagating photon-pair source on lithium niobate on insulator, where signal and idler photons are generated in opposite directions. The counter-propagating geometry leads to spectrally uncorrelated photon pairs without spectral filtering. The joint spectral intensity measurements and unheralded g (2) correlations yield purities of (92 ± 3)%. Interference between two independent sources achieves heralded visibilities of (71 ± 3)%, confirming the scalability of the platform. These results establish a new route towards integrated, high-purity, and tunable photon sources. The demonstrated counter-propagating geometry offers a scalable solution for quantum photonic networks.
We present a source of polarization entangled photon pairs based on spontaneous parametric downconversion engineered for frequency uncorrelated telecom photon generation. Our source provides photon pairs that display, simultaneously, the key properties for high-performance quantum information and fundamental quantum science tasks. Specifically, the source provides for high heralding efficiency, high quantum state purity and high entangled state fidelity at the same time. Among different tests we apply to our source we observe almost perfect non-classical interference between photons from independent sources with a visibility of (100 ± 5)%.