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Frontiers in Optics

Optimal Measure for the Polarization Estimation of Light with Arbitrary Photon Statistics

Lu Zhang, Kam Wai Clifford Chan, Pramode K. Verma

Published Jan 1, 2016• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present an optimal measure for the estimation of the polarization of light with arbitrary photon statistics. The success probability and the mean fidelity are calculated, and comparisons against an adaptive measurement are made.
DOI
10.1364/fio.2016.jw4a.35

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A universal and optimal method for the polarimetry of light with arbitrary photon statistics is presented. The method is based on the continuous maximum-likelihood positive operator-valued measure (ML-POVM) for pure polarization states over the surface of the Bloch sphere. The success probability and the mean fidelity are used as the figures of merit to show its performance. The POVM is found to attain the collective bound of polarization estimation with respect to the mean fidelity. As demonstrations, explicit results for the NNN photon Fock state, the phase-randomized coherent state (Poisson distribution), and the thermal light are obtained. It is found that the estimation performances for the Fock state and the Poisson distribution are almost identical, while that for the thermal light is much worse. This suggests that thermal light leaks less information to an eavesdropper and hence could potentially provide more security in polarization-encoded quantum communication protocols than a single-mode laser beam as customarily considered. Finally, comparisons against an optimal adaptive measurement with classical communications are made to show the better and more stable performance of the continuous ML-POVM.