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Optica Acta International Journal of Optics

Photoelectron Counting-Semiclassical and Population Monitoring Approaches

Terence J. Shepherd

Published Dec 1, 1984• 17 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The semiclassical formalism for integrated statistics in photoelectron counting is compared with a method of population monitoring for a single-mode cavity field evolving according to an arbitrary Markov process. Equations governing the exact integrated statistics in the two approaches are shown to be identical up to a single-photon loss process associated with the photodetection. Specific examples are provided, illustrating the relation of these methods to explicitly second-quantized formulations.

DOI
10.1080/713821458

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The external photodetection of cavity radiation is considered as a continuous quantum measurement in the sense of Srinivas and Davies [Opt. Acta 28, 981 (1981)]. It is analyzed in terms of three elementary processes: the no-leak process, the one-leak-undetected process, and the one-leak-detected process. The first two form a no-count process and the last one, a one-count process. Superoperators for these elementary processes are postulated, following the examples of Srinivas and Davies. The superoperators for the one-count process, the no-count process, the m-count process, and the nonreferring process are then derived based on the postulates. The following implications of these superoperators are found: (1) the change of average photon number due to the one-count process is identical to the well-known Q parameter introduced by Mandel [Opt. Lett. 4, 205 (1979)]; (2) the no-count process is governed by a pseudomaster equation; (3) The probability for the m-count process is the Poisson transform of the initial P function of the cavity radiation; and (4) the nonreferring measurement process is governed by a master equation.

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Physical Review A•Apr 1, 1990•95 citations
The semiclassical formalism for integrated statistics in photoelectron counting is compared with a method of population monitoring for a single-mode cavity field evolving according to an arbitrary Markov process. Equations governing the exact integrated statistics in the two approaches are shown to be identical up to a single-photon loss process associated with the photodetection. Specific examples are provided, illustrating the relation of these methods to explicitly second-quantized formulations.
One can attempt to derive some information of the field from the measured random properties of the photoelectron process: this is the object of photodetection theory developed first for classical fields. This chapter presents a review of photodetection theory, quantum theory and population monitoring model. It discusses two interesting applications to photostatistics. The photodetection equation is used to classify quantum and classical fields. The chapter presents an example of collective antibunching of photons. The double random character of the photodetection process prevents a simple correspondence between the statistical properties of the intensity and the statistics of the photocounts. However it is more instructive to connect the photoelectron process with the quantum nature of the electromagnetic field. Although the problem of photodetection appears to be satisfactorily solved for free fields interacting only with the detector, a heuristic model permits evolution of the detected field during the detection process.
A model for photodetection is presented which permits evolution of the detected field during the detection process. The integrated univariate and bivariate statistics of the photocount are obtained exactly for detection of single-mode thermal, coherent and free-field cavity radiation. The scheme encompasses the results of three hitherto disparate photocounting models, and demonstrates explicitly the relation between the univariate photon counting statistics and the photon statistics of the field. First-order photocount correlation functions are derived and compared with the corresponding cavity photon population correlations. Photocount antibunching is examined and found to be possible in this model.
A non-markovian model of the detection of cavity photons is proposed. The cavity photons interact with the atoms of the detector in a two-stage process, while the evolution of the cavity photons is modelled, as usual, as a population process with constant rate parameters. The joint distribution of the cavity photons and the number of detected photoelectrons is studied. The results corresponding to the markovian model proposed by Shepherd are recovered by an appropriate limiting procedure. Some simple characteristics of the twofold counting statistics are also obtained. In particular, the memory effects of two-stage detection are shown to result in a depletion of bunching; the shape of the spectrum (in the time domain), while similar to that obtained using the Shepherd model, is depressed pointwise by a memory-dependent factor.
The external photodetection of cavity radiation is considered as a continuous quantum measurement in the sense of Srinivas and Davies [Opt. Acta 28, 981 (1981)]. It is analyzed in terms of three elementary processes: the no-leak process, the one-leak-undetected process, and the one-leak-detected process. The first two form a no-count process and the last one, a one-count process. Superoperators for these elementary processes are postulated, following the examples of Srinivas and Davies. The superoperators for the one-count process, the no-count process, the m-count process, and the nonreferring process are then derived based on the postulates. The following implications of these superoperators are found: (1) the change of average photon number due to the one-count process is identical to the well-known Q parameter introduced by Mandel [Opt. Lett. 4, 205 (1979)]; (2) the no-count process is governed by a pseudomaster equation; (3) The probability for the m-count process is the Poisson transform of the initial P function of the cavity radiation; and (4) the nonreferring measurement process is governed by a master equation.
We develop a quantum theory for continuous photodetection processes that describes nonunitary time development of the field under continuous measurement of photon number. Exact expressions are obtained for time evolutions of the photon-field density operator, average and variance of the photon number, and the Fano factor. These are applied to typical quantum states, i.e., number, coherent, thermal, and squeezed states. The continuous photodetection process is made up of two elementary processes in terms of the referring measurement process, that is, one-count and no-count processes. Just after the one-count process in which a photodetector registers one photoelectron, the average photon number 〈n(t)〉 of the remaining field is shown to increase for super-Poissonian states (e.g., thermal state) and decrease for sub-Poissonian states (e.g., number state); for the Poissonian state (e.g., coherent light), 〈n(t)〉 does not change. During the no-count process in which the photodetector registers no photoelectrons, on the other hand, 〈n(t)〉 decreases in time for all states except the number state. The physical origins for these results are clarified from the viewpoint of nonunitary state reduction by continuous measurement of photon number. Furthermore, we introduce a nonreferring measurement process in which the detector registers photocounts, but we discard all readout information. We discuss the difference in the way the photon field evolves in this process compared to the referring measurement process.