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Quantum Science and Technology

Simultaneous dual-band entangled photon pair generation using a silicon photonic microring resonator

Chaoxuan Ma, Shayan Mookherjea

Published Mar 22, 2018• 13 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Traditional entangled photon pair generation apparatus, such as periodically-poled nonlinear crystals or microstructured fibers, require special and complex device structures to permit spontaneous nonlinear interactions at different wavelengths to occur simultaneously. This makes it difficult to design a single device that can, for example, generate high-quality, high-brightness photon pairs at both the 1310 and 1550 nm wavelength bands. Such flexibility will be useful in reconfiguring quantum communications to co-exist with data and telecommunications networks in popular use today. We show that a simple, appropriately-designed silicon microring device can achieve this objective, and explain the design and measurements of photon pair generation including coincidences-to-accidentals ratio and Franson interferometry of energy–time entanglement.

DOI
10.1088/2058-9565/aab89a

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Traditional entangled photon pair generation apparatus, such as periodically-poled nonlinear crystals or microstructured fibers, require special and complex device structures to permit spontaneous nonlinear interactions at different wavelengths to occur simultaneously. This makes it difficult to design a single device that can, for example, generate high-quality, high-brightness photon pairs at both the 1310 and 1550 nm wavelength bands. Such flexibility will be useful in reconfiguring quantum communications to co-exist with data and telecommunications networks in popular use today. We show that a simple, appropriately-designed silicon microring device can achieve this objective, and explain the design and measurements of photon pair generation including coincidences-to-accidentals ratio and Franson interferometry of energy–time entanglement.
Entangled photon-pair sources are essential components for emerging quantum information-processing technologies. Among various platforms, on-chip microresonators offer strong potential due to their resonant enhancement and suitability for wafer-scale integration. In this study, we demonstrate ultrabright entangled photon-pair generation from high- Q silicon microring resonators. By optimizing the device geometry and coupling configuration to suppress sidewall scattering and selectively excite the fundamental mode, we achieve single-mode resonance with an intrinsic Q -factor of 1.26 × 10 6 using only standard fabrication processes available in CMOS foundries. The resulting high- Q resonator yields a record-high brightness coefficient of 3.9 × 10 9 Hz/GHz/mW 2 . At an on-chip pump power of 240 μW, we obtain a maximum brightness of 22.0 MHz/GHz and a maximum photon-pair generation rate of 9.19 MHz. At a low-pump power of 10 μW, Franson-type two-photon interference exhibits a visibility of 98.0 ± 0.2%, confirming high-quality time–energy entanglement. These results show that narrow bandwidth and high generation rate can be achieved simultaneously in CMOS-compatible silicon photonic sources, thereby advancing their use in quantum repeaters and scalable quantum networks.
Compact, efficient, high-quality and scalable non-classical photon sources are one of the most critical building blocks for quantum information processing and communications. Photon pair generation via spontaneous four wave mixing is being recognized as an attractive platform for quantum optics which is compatible with the rapidly-maturing classical integrated photonics technology using silicon wafers, which is adopted in industry for its low cost, high performance and scalability. Traditionally, the photon pairs generated from silicon photonic devices, however, have not compared favorably with traditional nonlinear crystals in terms of overall rate, quality and efficiency. This dissertation discusses the factors that affect the quality and efficiency of photon pair generation in silicon integrated photonic microrings, together with their design and characterization. Furthermore, we show how the microrings can be integrated with other photonic devices on the silicon-on-insulator platform, and using proof-of-concept experiments, discuss the feasibility of using these photon-pair sources with technology that is already present in, or will soon be present in, practical fiber-optic networks, such as integrated lasers and modulated classical data streams.
We report measurements of time-frequency entangled photon pairs and heralded single photons at 1550~nm wavelengths generated using a microring resonator pumped optically by a diode laser. Along with a high spectral brightness of pair generation, the conventional metrics used to describe performance, such as Coincidences-to-Accidentals Ratio (CAR), conditional self-correlation [g(2)(0)g^{(2)}(0)g(2)(0)], two-photon energy-time {F}ranson interferometric visibility etc. are shown to reach a high-performance regime not yet achieved by silicon photonics, and attained previously only by crystal, glass and fiber-based pair-generation devices.
We report photon pairs and heralded single photons generated at 1310 nm wavelengths using silicon photonics technology, demonstrating that comparable performance could be achieved when a silicon microring resonator was pumped either by a desktop laser instrument or by an electrically injected, room-temperature hybrid silicon laser. Measurements showed that 130 kilo-coincidence-counts per second pair rates could be generated, with coincidences-to-accidentals ratio approximately 100 at about 0.34 mW optical pump power and anti-bunching upon heralding with second-order intensity correlation g(2)(0) = 0.06 at about 0.9 mW optical pump power. These results suggest that hybrid silicon lasers, which are ultra-compact and wafer-scale manufacturable, could be used in place of packaged, stand-alone lasers for generating photon pairs at data communication wavelengths and enable large-scale, cost-effective manufacturing of integrated sources for quantum communications and computing.
Photon pair sources with the capability to tune the wavelength and correlation properties of the generated photons can be useful for quantum applications such as communication, sensing, and computing. Silicon devices based on the SOI (silicon-on-insulator) platform benefits from both tight modal confinement, due to high index contrast between core and cladding, and CMOS compatible manufacturing process, making it a suitable platform for such sources. In the present work, we discuss the possibility of using planar resonant silicon devices with bend radii of a few tens of microns as photon pair sources. We discuss that a silicon nanophotonic chip consisting of either a single microring or coupled microrings can be used to generate photon pairs around 1.55 um. We discuss that the photons are generated in multiple pairs of wavelengths and can be tuned over several nanometers, demonstrating the capability to generate wavelength division multiplexed photon pairs at freely chosen telecommunication-band wavelengths. Further on, we discuss the ease of control over the bi-photon spectrum of the generated photon pairs and its implication in controlling their correlation properties. Uncorrelated photon pairs can be used to herald a single photon, and correlated photon pairs can be used in various quantum applications such as communication and sensing. In the end, we discuss the design parameters of a single microring resonator based sources.
Entangled photon sources are fundamental building blocks for quantum communication and quantum networks. Recently, silicon carbide emerged as a promising material for integrated quantum devices since it is CMOS compatible with favorable mechanical, electrical and photonic properties. In this work, we report the progress on the entangled photon pair generation at the telecom wavelength (1550 nm), which is achieved by implementing the spontaneous four-wave mixing process in a compact silicon carbide microring resonator. We will present the design principle, experimental set-up, and results of this work.