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Physical Review A

Two-center interferometry and decoherence effects

James M. Feagin

Published Feb 10, 2006• 8 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We analyze reduced fringe visibilities and decoherence effects in two-center interference experiments involving photon scattering and trapped-ion and atom interferometry. We introduce an impulse approximation to analyze the resulting photon-atom momentum entanglement. We find that the simple decoherence due to photon scattering of double-humped center-of-mass states of a single trapped ion strongly resembles that observed in atom interferometry.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.73.022108

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We analyze reduced fringe visibilities and decoherence effects in two-center interference experiments involving photon scattering and trapped-ion and atom interferometry. We introduce an impulse approximation to analyze the resulting photon-atom momentum entanglement. We find that the simple decoherence due to photon scattering of double-humped center-of-mass states of a single trapped ion strongly resembles that observed in atom interferometry.
The coherence effects induced by external photons coupled to matter waves inside a Mach–Zehnder three-grating interferometer are analyzed. Alternatively to atom–photon entanglement scenarios, the model considered here only relies on the atomic wavefunction and the momentum shift induced in it by the photon scattering events. A functional dependence is thus found between the observables, namely the fringe visibility and the phase shift, and the transversal momentum transfer distribution. Good quantitative agreement is found when comparing the results obtained from our model with the experimental data.
We have observed interference fringes, like those in Young’s classic experiment, in the laser light scattered by two trapped atoms. The interference fringes are present only in one polarization of the scattered light. The polarization dependence is related to the complementarity principle, which forbids the simultaneous observation of wave-like and particle-like aspects of light. The interference fringes are due to processes in which a single photon scatters from two atoms. We describe methods which might be used to observe other interference eects due to two photons scattering from two atoms.
The distinguishing of the multiphoton quantum interference effect from the classical one forms one of the most important issues in modern quantum mechanics and experimental quantum optics. For a long time, the two-photon interference (TPI) of correlated photons has been recognized as a pure quantum effect that cannot be simulated with classical lights. In the meantime, experiments have been carried out to investigate the classical analogues of the TPI. In this study, we conduct TPI experiments with uncorrelated photons with different center frequencies from a luminescent light source, and we compare our results with the previous ones of correlated photons. The observed TPI fringe can be expressed in the form of three phase terms related to the individual single-photon and two-photon states, and the fringe pattern is strongly affected by the two single-photon-interference fringes and also by their visibilities. With the exception of essential differences such as valid and accidental coincidence events within a given resolving time and the two-photon spectral bandwidth, the interference phenomenon itself exhibits the same features for both correlated and uncorrelated photons in the single-photon counting regime.
A scheme for entangling distant atoms is realized, as proposed in the seminal paper by [C. Cabrillo et al., Phys. Rev. A 59, 1025 (1999)]. The protocol is based on quantum interference and detection of a single photon scattered from two effectively one meter distant laser cooled and trapped atomic ions. The detection of a single photon heralds entanglement of two internal states of the trapped ions with high rate and with a fidelity limited mostly by atomic motion. Control of the entangled state phase is demonstrated by changing the path length of the single-photon interferometer.