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Journal of the Optical Society of America B

Squeezed vacuum from a monolithic optical parametric oscillator

Gerd Breitenbach, T. Müller, Silvania F. Pereira, J.-Ph. Poizat, Stephan Schiller, J. Mlynek

Published Nov 1, 1995• 130 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We have developed a stable, reliable source of continuous-wave squeezed vacuum at 1064 nm, using a subthreshold monolithic lithium niobate optical parametric oscillator. Quantum-noise reduction below the vacuum noise level in a bandwidth of 30 MHz with a maximum of 5.5 ± 0.2 dB at 2 MHz is demonstrated. The reconstruction of the Wigner function of a continuous-wave, strongly squeezed-vacuum state is obtained.

DOI
10.1364/josab.12.002304

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We have developed a stable, reliable source of continuous-wave squeezed vacuum at 1064 nm, using a subthreshold monolithic lithium niobate optical parametric oscillator. Quantum-noise reduction below the vacuum noise level in a bandwidth of 30 MHz with a maximum of 5.5 ± 0.2 dB at 2 MHz is demonstrated. The reconstruction of the Wigner function of a continuous-wave, strongly squeezed-vacuum state is obtained.
A compact and effcient source of amplitude-squeezed light is described. It employs a semi-monolithic degenerate MgO:LiNbO(3) optical parametric amplifier pumped by a frequency-doubled Nd:YAG laser at 532 nm. Injection-seeding of the amplifier by a 1064 nm wave permits active stabilization of the cavity length and stable operation. At a pump power of 380 mW, a maximum noise reduction of 6.5 dB in the amplitude fluctuations of the 0.2 mW 1064 nm wave was detected. The average detected noise reduction in continuous operation over 14 minutes was 6.2 dB. Taking the detection effciency into account, this corresponds to a squeezing of 7.2 dB in the emitted wave.
A frequency tunable source of squeezed light has been developed for application to a variety of problems in atomic physics. The basic experimental arrangement consists of a subthreshold optical parametric oscillator (OPO) that is pumped by the frequency-doubled output of a titanium-sapphire laser. Squeezed light with continuous tunability of 2 GHz has been generated with a directly observed nonclassical noise reduction of 5.0 dB relative to the vacuumstate limit in a balanced homodyne detector (5.2 dB when corrected for detector noise). Although our source is potentially broadly tunable over the noncritical phase-matching bandwidth of potassium niobate, current research has concentrated on operation at 852 nm for excitation of the D2 line of atomic cesium. Relative to the usual quantum limit associated with vacuumstate fluctuations, enhanced sensitivity is demonstrated for the detection of Doppler-free resonances in FM saturation spectroscopy, with an improvement of 3.1 dB directly observed and 3.8 dB after correction for detector noise.
We report generation and measurement of a squeezed vacuum from a semi-monolithic Fabry-Pérot optical parametric oscillator (OPO) up to 100 MHz at 1550 nm. The output coupler of the OPO is a flat surface of a nonlinear crystal with partially reflecting coating, which enables direct coupling with waveguide modules. Using the OPO, we observed 6.2dB of squeezing at 2 MHz and 3.0 dB of squeezing at 100 MHz. The OPO operates at the optimal wavelength to minimize propagation losses in silica waveguides and looks towards solving a bottleneck of downsizing these experiments: that of coupling between a squeezer and a waveguide.
We generate squeezed state of light at 860 nm with a monolithic optical parametric oscillator. The optical parametric oscillator consists of a periodically poled KTiOPO(4) crystal, both ends of which are spherically polished and mirror-coated. We achieve both phase matching and cavity resonance by controlling only the temperature of the crystal. We observe up to -8.0±0.2 dB of squeezing with the bandwidth of 142 MHz. Our technique makes it possible to drive many monolithic cavities simultaneously by a single laser. Hence our monolithic optical parametric oscillator is quite suitable to continuous-variable quantum information experiments where we need a large number of highly squeezed light beams.
With the recent detection of gravitational waves, non-classical light sources are likely to become an essential element of future detectors engaged in gravitational wave astronomy and cosmology. Operating a squeezed light source under high vacuum has the advantages of reducing optical losses and phase noise compared to techniques where the squeezed light is introduced from outside the vacuum. This will ultimately provide enhanced sensitivity for modern interferometric gravitational wave detectors that will soon become limited by quantum noise across much of the detection bandwidth. Here we describe the optomechanical design choices and construction techniques of a near monolithic glass optical parametric oscillator that has been operated under a vacuum of 10(-6) mbar. The optical parametric oscillator described here has been shown to produce 8.6 dB of quadrature squeezed light in the audio frequency band down to 10 Hz. This performance has been maintained for periods of around an hour and the system has been under vacuum continuously for several months without a degradation of this performance.
Squeezed vacuum states enable optical measurements below the quantum limit and hence are a valuable resource for applications in quantum metrology and also quantum communication. However, most available sources require high pump powers in the milliwatt range and large setups, which hinders real world applications. Furthermore, degenerate operation of such systems presents a challenge. Here, we use a compact crystalline whispering gallery mode resonator made of lithium niobate as a degenerate parametric oscillator. We demonstrate about 1.4 dB noise reduction below the shot noise level for only 300 μWμ\text{W}μW of pump power in degenerate single mode operation. Furthermore, we report a record pump threshold as low as 1.35 μWμ\text{W}μW. Our results show that the whispering gallery based approach presents a promising platform for a compact and efficient source for nonclassical light.