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Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE

Dual-channel, single-photon upconversion detector near 1300 nm

Paulina S. Kuo, Jason S. Pelc, Oliver Slattery, M. M. Fejer, Xiao Hong Tang

Published Oct 15, 2012• 3 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Upconversion of 1.3-micron photons and detection using silicon avalanche photodiodes (Si APDs) can produce high photon detection efficiencies (PDEs) with low dark count rates. We demonstrate a novel two-channel device based on a phase-modulated, periodically poled LiNbO3 waveguide that mixes 1302-nm signal photons with two pump beams at 1556 and 1571 nm. Both channels showed high PDEs with very low dark counts. Using wavelength- to time-division multiplexing in this dual-channel device, we produced clock rates that exceed the timing-jitter-limited rates of a system based on one Si APD. Higher clock rates are of interest for improved quantum communication systems.

DOI
10.1117/12.946250

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Upconversion of 1.3-micron photons and detection using silicon avalanche photodiodes (Si APDs) can produce high photon detection efficiencies (PDEs) with low dark count rates. We demonstrate a novel two-channel device based on a phase-modulated, periodically poled LiNbO3 waveguide that mixes 1302-nm signal photons with two pump beams at 1556 and 1571 nm. Both channels showed high PDEs with very low dark counts. Using wavelength- to time-division multiplexing in this dual-channel device, we produced clock rates that exceed the timing-jitter-limited rates of a system based on one Si APD. Higher clock rates are of interest for improved quantum communication systems.
We demonstrate a two-channel, upconversion detector for counting 1300-nm-wavelength photons. By using two pumps near 1550 nm, photons near 1300 nm are converted to two spectrally distinct channels near 710 nm using sum-frequency generation (SFG) in a periodically poled LiNbO3 (PPLN) waveguide. We used spectral-conversion engineering to design the phase-modulated PPLN waveguide for simultaneous quasi-phasematching of two SFG processes. The two channels exhibit 31% and 25% full-system photon detection efficiency, and very low dark count rates (650 and 550 counts per second at a peak external conversion efficiency of 70%) through filtering using a volume Bragg grating. We investigate applications of the dual-channel upconversion detector as a frequency-shifting beamsplitter, and as a time-to-frequency converter to enable higher-data-rate quantum communications.
We demonstrate 1500 nm band single-photon detection with low dark-count noise and a potentially high efficiency, which may allow long distance and high-bit-rate quantum key distribution. By developing frequency upconversion devices based on periodically poled lithium niobate waveguides, which are specifically designed to use a pump wavelength longer than that of communication-band photons, we completely eliminate the dark-count noise caused by parasitic nonlinear processes in the waveguide. We observed an internal conversion efficiency as high as 40% and demonstrated scaling down to the single photon level while maintaining a background dark-count rate of 10(2)s(-1).
This paper describes the detection of single photons, which have been transmitted through standard fiber at the telecom wavelength of 1310 nm. Following transmission, the 1310-nm photon is up-converted to 710 nm in a periodical-poled LiNbO3 (PPLN) waveguide and then detected by a silicon-based avalanche photodiode (Si-APD). The overall detection efficiency of the detector is 20%. We have also characterized the sensitivity of the PPLN's efficiency to temperature and wavelength changes. We focused on the noise property of the up-conversion detector. Without classical channel co-propagation, the dark count rate is 2.2 kHz, which is lower than current up-conversion detectors by more than one order of magnitude. The up-conversion detector is then applied to a QKD system, which is characterized and is shown to have a very strong performance.
We present a device for two-stage frequency upconversion of single-photon-level signals in the 1.55 μm telecom band to the green spectral region with low excess noise, suitable for detection by low-timing-jitter silicon single-photon avalanche photodiodes (APDs). We achieve a net conversion efficiency of 87% and a system timing jitter below 70 ps FWHM, dominated by the jitter of the APD. Modifications of our device are suitable for downconversion of single photons from visible-wavelength quantum emitters into the telecom band.
Conventional single-photon detectors at communication wavelengths suffer from low quantum efficiencies and large dark counts. We present a single-photon detection system, operating at communication wavelengths, based on guided-wave frequency upconversion in a nonlinear crystal with an overall system detection efficiency (upconversion + detection) exceeding 46% at 1.56 microm. This system consists of a fiber-pigtailed reverse-proton-exchanged periodically poled LiNbO3 waveguide device in conjunction with a silicon-based single-photon counting module.