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

Two-stage PPLN parametric amplification for higher conversion efficiency

Anup R. Pandey, Joseph W. Haus, Peter Powers

Published Feb 8, 2007• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present a numerical model of a multi-crystal approach that increases the quantum efficiency of a parametric amplifier. Here is a two-crystal approach where the second stage crystal uses the signal energy from the first stage to amplify the desired idler wavelength. The numerical model allows for arbitrary input beam profiles and it can accommodate multiple crystals and optical elements. In this study a pair of PPLN crystals was modeled leading to more than double the idler output energy. The maximum M2 value for the output idler beam calculated was 5.2.

DOI
10.1117/12.700473

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We present a numerical model of a multi-crystal approach that increases the quantum efficiency of a parametric amplifier. Here is a two-crystal approach where the second stage crystal uses the signal energy from the first stage to amplify the desired idler wavelength. The numerical model allows for arbitrary input beam profiles and it can accommodate multiple crystals and optical elements. In this study a pair of PPLN crystals was modeled leading to more than double the idler output energy. The maximum M2 value for the output idler beam calculated was 5.2.
Conversion efficiency is boosted by using tandem crystal optical parametric amplifier geometry. We have undertaken comprehensive numerical modeling of the optical systems, where the output beam for the first stage are calculated and then propagated to the second stage. As a concrete example periodically poled lithium niobate crystals are experimentally examined. The phase and amplitude information about the pump and signal beams were retrieved using the Fresnel phase retrieval method and used as input in the theory. This enabled real laboratory conditions to be modeled. Subsequently, the amplitude and phase of the complex pump and signal beam from the crystal was calculated and the results were validated by experiments. Non-collinear interactions in the second stage also yielded an efficient idler output over a broad range of temperatures. ZnGeP2 crystals were used in the numerical simulations with first and second stage amplification. We predicted an idler energy increase by a more than a factor of 3.
A two-stage periodically poled lithium niobate parametric amplifier is used to boost the idler wave energy by almost a factor of three near the degenerate wavelength of the second stage. For nondegenerate values, the idler wave energy is boosted by a factor of two. Our experimental results validate a numerical model that includes arbitrary beam profiles, beam walkoff, pump depletion, and optical elements between crystals. Experimental performance of the whole system was found to be much more stable over a wide range of temperatures due to noncollinear phase-matching conditions in the second stage.
A cascaded parametric amplifier consists of a first parametric amplifier, which amplifies an input signal and generates an idler, which is a copy of the signal, a signal processor, which controls the phases of the signal and idler, and a second parametric amplifier, which combines the signal and idler in a phase-sensitive manner. In this paper, cascaded parametric amplification is modeled and the conditions required to maximize the constructive-destructive extinction ratio are determined. The results show that a cascaded parametric amplifier can be operated as a filter: A desired signal-idler pair is amplified, whereas undesired signal-idler pairs are deamplified. For the desired signal and idler, the noise figures of the filtering process (input signal-to-noise ratio divided by the output ratios) are only slightly higher than those of the copying process: Signal-processing functionality can be achieved with only a minor degradation in signal quality.
We investigate the theory of the process in which an idler photon emitted spontaneously from a nonlinear crystal in the process of parametric downconversion serves as idler input to a second downconverter. The signal photon from this second crystal is then detected in coincidence with the signal photon from the first crystal, which provides the time reference. We show that the first idler photon can induce a stimulated downconversion in the second crystal, which serves as a photon amplifier, and we calculate the ratio of the stimulated to the spontaneous emission probability.
We propose an optical scheme, employing optical parametric down-converters interlaced with nonlinear sign gates (NSGs), that completely converts an n-photon Fock-state pump to n signal-idler photon pairs when the down-converters' crystal lengths are chosen appropriately. The proof of this assertion relies on amplitude amplification, analogous to that employed in Grover search, applied to the full quantum dynamics of single-mode parametric down-conversion. When we require that all Grover iterations use the same crystal, and account for potential experimental limitations on crystal-length precision, our optimized conversion efficiencies reach unity for 1≤n≤5, after which they decrease monotonically for n values up to 50, which is the upper limit of our numerical dynamics evaluations. Nevertheless, our conversion efficiencies remain higher than those for a conventional (no NSGs) down-converter.