The spectral interference law for a Mach-Zehnder interferometer is derived and is used to illustrate spectral changes arising by interference between beams having different degrees of correlation. The results are compared with those pertaining to Young's interference experiment.
We analyze the interference of individual photons in two overlapping Mach–Zehnder interferometers joined via a common beam splitter. We show how two kinds of interference effects—single-photon Mach–Zehnder interference and two-photon Hong–Ou–Mandel interference—interfere with one another, partially canceling each other out. This configuration illustrates how quantum effects can combine nontrivially and, moreover, emphasizes that quantum interference happens at measurement. This work can serve as a bridge to more advanced quantum mechanical concepts, such as testing the predictions of quantum mechanics vs local realism.
We investigate a Mach-Zehnder interferometer fed by two time-dependently driven single-particle sources, one of them placed in front of the interferometer, the other in the center of one of the arms. As long as the two sources are operated independently, the signal at the output of the interferometer shows an interference pattern, which we analyze in the spectral current, in the charge and energy currents, as well as in the charge current noise. The synchronization of the two sources in this specifically designed setup allows for collisions and absorptions of particles at different points of the interferometer, which have a strong impact on the detected signals. It introduces further relevant time scales and can even lead to a full suppression of the interference in some of the discussed quantities. The complementary interpretations of this phenomenon in terms of spectral properties and tunable two-particle effects (absorptions and quantum exchange effects) are put forward in this paper.
Abstract A re-visitation of the well known free space Mach-Zehnder interferometer is reported here. The coexistence between one-photon and two-photons interference from collinear color entangled photon pairs is investigated. Thisarises from an arbitrarily small unbalance in the arm transmittance. The tuning of such asymmetry is reflected in dramatic changes in the coincidence detection, revealing beatings between one particle and two particle interference patterns. In particular, the role of the losses and of the intrinsic phase imperfectness of the lossy beamsplitter are explored in a single-port excited Mach-Zehnder interferometer. This configuration is especially useful for quantum optics on a chip, where the guiding geometry forces photons to travel in the same spatial mode.