Quantum imaging exploits the spatial correlations between photons to image object features with a higher resolution than a corresponding classical light source could achieve. Using a quantum correlated N-photon state, the method of optical centroid measurement (OCM) was shown to exhibit a resolution enhancement by improving the classical Rayleigh limit by a factor of 1/N. In this work, the theory of OCM is formulated within the framework of an imaging formalism and is implemented in an exemplary experiment by means of a conventional entangled photon pair source. The expected resolution enhancement of a factor of two is demonstrated. The here presented experiment allows for single-shot operation without scanning or iteration to reproduce the object in the image plane. Thereby, photon detection is performed with a newly developed integrated time-resolving detector array. Multi-photon interference effects responsible for the observed resolution enhancement are discussed and possible alternative implementation possibilities for higher photon number are proposed.
Quantum imaging exploits the spatial correlations between photons to image object features with a higher resolution than a corresponding classical light source could achieve. Using a quantum correlated N-photon state, the method of optical centroid measurement (OCM) was shown to exhibit a resolution enhancement by improving the classical Rayleigh limit by a factor of 1/N. In this work, the theory of OCM is formulated within the framework of an imaging formalism and is implemented in an exemplary experiment by means of a conventional entangled photon pair source. The expected resolution enhancement of a factor of two is demonstrated. The here presented experiment allows for single-shot operation without scanning or iteration to reproduce the object in the image plane. Thereby, photon detection is performed with a newly developed integrated time-resolving detector array. Multi-photon interference effects responsible for the observed resolution enhancement are discussed and possible alternative implementation possibilities for higher photon number are proposed.
Quantum imaging exploits the spatial correlations between photons to image object features with a higher resolution than a corresponding classical light source could achieve. Using a quantum correlated N-photon state, the method of optical centroid measurement (OCM) was shown to exhibit a resolution enhancement by improving the classical Rayleigh limit by a factor of 1/N. In this work, the theory of OCM is formulated within the framework of an imaging formalism and is implemented in an exemplary experiment by means of a conventional entangled photon pair source. The expected resolution enhancement of a factor of two is demonstrated. The here presented experiment allows for single-shot operation without scanning or iteration to reproduce the object in the image plane. Thereby, photon detection is performed with a newly developed integrated time-resolving detector array. Multi-photon interference effects responsible for the observed resolution enhancement are discussed and possible alternative implementation possibilities for higher photon number are proposed.
The method of optical centroid measurement (OCM) has shown to exhibit spatial super-resolution with enhancements at the Heisenberg limit in plane wave interference experiments. In this work, the OCM method is for the first time used in an imaging setting where actual object features are observed. The OCM result is rederived in a near-field imaging formalism for a general imaging system and in full 2-D treatment. Analogies to coherent and incoherent imaging are shown Moreover, coherent OCM imaging is experimentally implemented for photon number N = 2, where an experimental setup is presented which allows to generate the desired entangled two-photon state containing the super-resolved image. This state is then imaged by an imaging system with a finite resolution defined by its point spread function (PSF). The centroid measurement of the two-photon states delivers then an image with a width of the PSF reduced by a factor 2 corresponding to the Heisenberg limit. In the experiment, the object is illuminated by a continuous-wave pump laser centred at 405nm with an output power of 30mW. A 4-f lens system images the object to the state preparation output plane. In the far-field plane between the lenses, a 5mm long periodically poled KTiOPO4 non-linear crystal generates photon pairs at 810nm by type-0, frequency-degenerate and collinear spontaneous parametric down-conversion. This generated OCM state is then imaged by a single lens and detected in coincidence by a fully digital 2-D sensor array with single-photon sensitivity and per-pixel sub-nanosecond time resolution. The OCM state is spectrally filtered at 810nm. Its imaging capability is compared to classical light sources including spatially coherent, monochromatic illumination at 405nm and 810 nm, as well as spatially incoherent light at 810 nm. The former is implemented using collimated lasers, the latter is a thermal light source spectrally filtered at 810 nm. The PSF of the different light sources are compared at low numerical aperture by imaging a focal point of 25μm Gaussian waist radius.
Quantum lithography (QL) has been suggested as a means of achieving enhanced spatial resolution for optical imaging, but its realization has been held back by the low multiphoton detection rates of recording materials. Recently, an optical centroid measurement (OCM) procedure was proposed as a way to obtain spatial resolution enhancement identical to that of QL but with higher detection efficiency (M. Tsang, Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 253601 (2009)). Here we describe a variation of the OCM method with still higher detection efficiency based on the use of photon-number-resolving detection. We also report laboratory results for two-photon interference. We compare these results with those of the standard QL method based on multiphoton detection and show that the new method leads to superresolution but with higher detection efficiency.
The spatial resolution of an optical system is limited by diffraction. Various schemes have been proposed to achieve resolution enhancement by employing either a scanning source/detector configuration or a two-photon response of the object. Here, we experimentally demonstrate a full-field resolution-enhancing scheme, based on the centroid estimation of spatially quantum-correlated biphotons. Our standard-quantum-limited scheme is able to image a general non-fluorescing object, using low-energy and low-intensity infrared illumination (i.e., with <0.001 photon per pixel per frame at 710 nm), achieving 41% of the theoretically available resolution enhancement. Images of real-world objects are shown for visual comparison, in which the classically bound resolution is surpassed using our technically straightforward quantum-imaging scheme.
Quantum imaging can be defined as an area of quantum optics that investigates the ultimate performance limits of optical imaging allowed by the quantum nature of light. Quantum Imaging techniques possess a high potential for improving the performance in recording, storage, and readout of optical images beyond the limits set by the standard quantum level of fluctuations known as the shot noise. This talk aims at giving an overview of the fundamentals of Quantum Imaging as well as its most important directions. We shall discuss generation of the spatially multimode squeezed states of light be means of a travelling-wave optical parametric amplifier. We shall demonstrate that this kind of light allows us to reduce the spatial fluctuations of the photocurrent in a properly chosen homodyne detection scheme with a highly efficient CCD camera. It will be shown that using the amplified quadrature of the light wave in a travelling-wave optical parametric amplifier, one can perform noiseless amplification of optical images. We shall provide recent experimental results demonstrating a single-shot noiseless image amplification by a pulsed optical parametric amplifier. One of important experimental achievements of Quantum Imaging, coined in the literature as quantum laser pointer, is a precise measurement of position and transverse displacement of a laser beam with resolution beyond the limit imposed by the shot noise. We shall describe briefly the idea of the experiment in which the transverse displacement of a laser beam was measured with resolution of the order of Angstrom. The problem of precise measurement of transverse displacement of a light beam brings us to a more general question about the quantum limits of optical resolution. The classical resolution criterion, derived in the nineteen century by Abbe and Rayleigh, states that the resolution of an optical instrument is limited by diffraction and is related to the wavelength of the light used in the imaging scheme. However, it was for a long time recognised in the literature that in some cases when one has some a priori information about the object, one can improve the resolution beyond the Rayleigh limit using the so-called super-resolution techniques. As a final topic in this talk, we shall discuss the quantum limits of optical super-resolution. In particular, we shall formulate the standard quantum limit of super-resolution and demonstrate how one can go beyond this limit using specially designed multimode squeezed light.
High Resolution Image Download MS PowerPoint Slide The resolution of a classical imaging system is limited by diffraction. This limit can be overcome, for example, by implementing various forms of localization microscopy in which the center of a fluorescence distribution is estimated to an accuracy scaling with the square root of the number of detected photons, N . In quantum imaging the object can be illuminated using correlated photon-pairs, leading early work to suggest that a 2 improvement could be obtained as a result of averaging the position of N = 2 events. However, similar to quantum lithography, which relies upon quantum illumination using entangled photon-pairs and two-photon absorption, the minimum resolvable feature size is reduced by a factor of 2, not just 2 . Quantum imaging schemes can also lead to a factor of 2 improvement. By using a similar source of correlated photon-pairs to illuminate an object, a single-photon sensitive camera to detect the photon-pairs, and an image processing algorithm to record and sum the bisector positions of the transmitted photon-pairs, we realize a similar factor of ×2 improvement in image resolution, surpassing that of most earlier quantum imaging work.