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arXiv:2510.09392 · Science Advances

Two-photon induced coherence without induced emission

Dong-Gil Im, Seung-Yeun Yoo, Chung-Hyun Lee, Jongheon Suh, Yoon-Ho Kim

Published Nov 21, 2025• 1 citation
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

At the heart of recent advances in quantum imaging and spectroscopy with undetected photons is the quantum optical effect known as induced coherence without induced emission. This quantum interference effect has enabled access to challenging wavelength regimes for imaging and spectroscopic applications. However, the potential of undetected photon quantum metrology, particularly the enhanced phase sensitivity offered by Fock or N00N states, has not yet been realized, as prior work focused only on single-photon phenomena. Here, we report the observation of two-photon induced coherence without induced emission. Using a two-photon Fock state, we establish quantum coherence between pairs of two-photon spontaneous emission amplitudes, resulting in a doubling of interferometric phase modulation. Specifically, we show that a phase shift [Formula: see text] applied to undetected 1016-nanometer photons leads to a [Formula: see text] modulation in the detection of 632-nanometer photons. This demonstrates genuine two-photon induced coherence without induced emission and opens possibilities for quantum-enhanced phase measurements using multiphoton coherence without detecting the modulated photons.

DOI
10.1126/sciadv.adx2038

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At the heart of recent advances in quantum imaging and spectroscopy with undetected photons is the quantum optical effect known as induced coherence without induced emission. This quantum interference effect has enabled access to challenging wavelength regimes for imaging and spectroscopic applications. However, the potential of undetected photon quantum metrology, particularly the enhanced phase sensitivity offered by Fock or N00N states, has not yet been realized, as prior work focused only on single-photon phenomena. Here, we report the observation of two-photon induced coherence without induced emission. Using a two-photon Fock state, we establish quantum coherence between pairs of two-photon spontaneous emission amplitudes, resulting in a doubling of interferometric phase modulation. Specifically, we show that a phase shift [Formula: see text] applied to undetected 1016-nanometer photons leads to a [Formula: see text] modulation in the detection of 632-nanometer photons. This demonstrates genuine two-photon induced coherence without induced emission and opens possibilities for quantum-enhanced phase measurements using multiphoton coherence without detecting the modulated photons.
We present a tutorial on the phenomenon of induced coherence without induced emission, and specifically its application to imaging and metrology. It is based on a striking effect where two nonlinear crystals, by sharing a coherent pump and one or two output beams, can induce coherence between the other two output beams. This can be thought of as a type of quantum-erasure effect, where the “welcher-weg” (which-way), or in this case, “which-source,” information is erased when the shared beams are aligned. With the correct geometry, this effect can allow an object to be imaged using only photons that have never interacted with the object—in other words, the image is formed using undetected photons. Interest in this and related setups has been accelerating in recent years due to a number of desirable properties, mostly centered around the fact that the fields for detection and imaging (since separate) may have different optical properties, entailing significant advantages for various applications. The purpose of this tutorial is to introduce researchers to this area of research, to provide practical tools for setting up experiments as well as understanding the underlying theory, and also to provide a comprehensive overview of the sub-field as a whole.
Interference of two beams produced at separate biphoton sources was first observed more than two decades ago. The phenomenon, often called ``induced coherence without induced emission,'' has recently gained attention after its applications to imaging, spectroscopy, and measuring biphoton correlations have been discovered. The sources used in the corresponding experiments are nonlinear crystals pumped by laser light. The use of a laser pump makes the occurrence of induced (stimulated) emission unavoidable, and the effect of stimulated emission can be observed in the joint detection rate of the two beams. This fact raises the question whether the stimulated emission also plays a role in inducing the coherence. Here we investigate a case in which the crystals are pumped with a single-photon Fock state. We find that coherence is induced even though the possibility of stimulated emission is now fully ruled out. Furthermore, the joint detection rate of the two beams becomes ideally zero. Our results rule out any classical or semiclassical explanation of the phenomenon and also suggest that it is, in principle, possible to perform similar experiments with fermions, for which stimulated emission is strictly forbidden.
Interference of two beams produced at separate biphoton sources was first observed more than two decades ago. The phenomenon, often called coherence without induced emission, has recently gained attention after its applications to imaging, spectroscopy, and measuring biphoton correlations have been discovered. The sources used in the corresponding experiments are nonlinear crystals pumped by laser light. The use of a laser pump makes the occurrence of induced (stimulated) emission unavoidable and the effect of stimulated emission can be observed in the joint detection rate of the two beams. This fact raises the question whether the stimulated emission also lays a role in inducing the coherence. Here we investigate a case in which the crystals are pumped with a single-photon Fock state. We find that coherence is induced even though the possibility of stimulated emission is now fully ruled out. Furthermore, the joint detection rate of the two beams becomes ideally zero and does no longer change with the pump power. We illustrate our results by numerical simulations and by comparisons with experimental findings. Our results rule out any classical or semi-classical explanation of the phenomenon and also imply that similar experiments can be performed with fermions, for which stimulated emission is strictly forbidden.
Path-entangled multi-photon states allow optical phase-sensing beyond the shot-noise limit, provided that an efficient parity measurement can be implemented. Realizing this experimentally is technologically demanding, as it requires coincident single-photon detection proportional to the number of photons involved, which represents a severe challenge for achieving a practical quantum advantage over classical methods. Here, we exploit advanced quantum state engineering based on superposing two photon-pair creation events to realize a new approach that bypasses this issue. In particular, optical phase shifts are probed with a two-photon quantum state whose information is subsequently effectively transferred to a single-photon state. Notably, without any multiphoton detection, we infer phase shifts by measuring the average intensity of the single-photon beam on a photodiode, in analogy to standard classical measurements. Importantly, our approach maintains the quantum advantage: twice as many interference fringes are observed for the same phase shift, corresponding to N = 2 path-entangled photons. Our results demonstrate that the advantages of quantum-enhanced phase sensing can be fully exploited in standard intensity measurements, paving the way toward resource-efficient and practical quantum optical metrology.
Abstract Quantum interferometry based on induced-coherence phenomena has demonstrated the possibility of undetected-photon measurements. Perturbation in the optical path of probe photons can be detected by interference signals generated by quantum mechanically correlated twin photons propagating through a different path, possibly at a different wavelength. To the best of our knowledge, this work demonstrates for the first time a hybrid-type induced-coherence interferometer that incorporates a Mach–Zehnder-type interferometer for near-visible photons and a Michelson-type interferometer for infrared (IR) photons, based on double-pass-pumped spontaneous parametric down-conversion. This configuration enables IR optical measurements via the detection of near-visible photons and provides methods for optimizing the quality of measurements by identifying photon pairs of different origins. We theoretically identify that the induced-coherence interference visibility is approximately the same as the heralding efficiency between twin photons along the relevant spatial modes, and experimentally maximize the visibility by setting up a common reference spatial mode for IR photons. Applications to both time-domain and frequency-domain quantum optical induced-coherence tomography for three-dimensional test structures are demonstrated. The results prove the feasibility of practical undetected-photon sensing and imaging techniques based on the presented structure.
Quantum imaging with undetected photons relies on the principle of induced coherence without induced emission and uses two sources of photon pairs with a signal- and an idler photon. Each pair shares strong quantum correlations in both position and momentum, which allows us to image an object illuminated with idler photons by just measuring signal photons that never interact with the object. In this work, we theoretically investigate the transverse resolution of this nonlocal imaging scheme through a general formalism that treats propagating photons beyond the commonly used paraxial approximation. We hereby prove that the resolution of quantum imaging with undetected photons is fundamentally diffraction limited to the longer wavelength of the signal and idler pairs. Moreover, we conclude that this result is also valid for other nonlocal two-photon imaging schemes.