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Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics Europe & European Quantum Electronics Conference (CLEO/Europe-EQEC)

A Single-Photon Server with Just One Atom

M. Hijlkema, B. Weber, Holger Specht, S. C. Webster, Axel Kuhn, Gerhard Rempe

Published Jun 1, 2007• 8 citations
Publisher

Abstract

In this paper, we present an experiment in which a single neutral atom trapped in a cavity is used to generate single photons in a controlled way. The quality of these photons is such that they could be used for quantum information processing. Our setup could therefore operate as a single-photon server for such experiments. We prepare our system by loading85Rb atoms into a magneto-optical trap. From here, the atoms are transported by a dipole trap into the cavity.

DOI
10.1109/cleoe-iqec.2007.4386791

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A Single-Photon Server with Just One Atom

M. Hijlkema, B. Weber, Holger Specht +3 more

In this paper, we present an experiment in which a single neutral atom trapped in a cavity is used to generate single photons in a controlled way. The quality of these photons is such that they could be used for quantum information processing. Our setup could therefore operate as a single-photon server for such experiments. We prepare our system by loading85Rb atoms into a magneto-optical trap. From here, the atoms are transported by a dipole trap into the cavity.

Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics Europe & European Quantum Electronics Conference (CLEO/Europe-EQEC)•Jun 1, 2007•1 citation

Single photons from a single atom trapped in a high-finesse optical cavity

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arXiv:1302.2897•Physical Review A•Jun 4, 2013•66 citations
In this paper, we present an experiment in which a single neutral atom trapped in a cavity is used to generate single photons in a controlled way. The quality of these photons is such that they could be used for quantum information processing. Our setup could therefore operate as a single-photon server for such experiments. We prepare our system by loading85Rb atoms into a magneto-optical trap. From here, the atoms are transported by a dipole trap into the cavity.
In this thesis a single atom is trapped in the mode of a high-finesse cavity and used to generate single photons in a controlled way. Starting from a magneto-optical trap, rubidium atoms are loaded into an optical dipole-force trap and transported to the cavity. On arrival the atoms are trapped in another trap with a standing wave geometry and excited by a pump laser incident perpendicular to the cavity axis. With the help of cavity cooling forces, a single atom could then be selected and trapped for up to a minute. A sequence of laser pulses is applied to induce the emission of a stream of single photons from the atom. Up to 300000 photons could be generated from the same atom in this way. The single-photon character of the source is verified within a few seconds after which the photons can be distributed to an independent user while monitoring the presence of the atom.
Neutral atoms are ideal objects for the deterministic processing of quantum information. Entanglement operations have been performed by photon exchange or controlled collisions. Atom-photon interfaces were realized with single atoms in free space or strongly coupled to an optical cavity. A long standing challenge with neutral atoms, however, is to overcome the limited observation time. Without exception, quantum effects appeared only after ensemble averaging. Here we report on a single-photon source with one-and-only-one atom quasi permanently coupled to a high-finesse cavity. Quasi permanent refers to our ability to keep the atom long enough to, first, quantify the photon-emission statistics and, second, guarantee the subsequent performance as a single-photon server delivering up to 300,000 photons for up to 30 seconds. This is achieved by a unique combination of single-photon generation and atom cooling. Our scheme brings truly deterministic protocols of quantum information science with light and matter within reach.
Cavity quantum electrodynamics (cavity QED) describes electromagnetic fields in a confined space and the radiative properties of atoms in such fields. The simplest example of such system is a single atom interacting with one mode of a high-finesse resonator. Besides observation and exploration of fundamental quantum mechanical effects, this system bears a high potential for applications quantum information science such as, e.g., quantum logic gates, quantum communication and quantum teleportation. In this thesis I present an experiment on the deterministic coupling of a single neutral atom to the mode of a high-finesse optical resonator. In Chapter 1 I describe our basic techniques for trapping and observing single cesium atoms. As a source of single atoms we use a high-gradient magneto-optical trap, which captures the atoms from background gas in a vacuum chamber and cools them down to millikelvin temperatures. The atoms are then transferred without loss into a standing-wave dipole trap, which provides a conservative potential required for experiments on atomic coherence such as quantum information processing and metrology on trapped atoms. Moreover, shifting the standing-wave pattern allows us to deterministically transport the atoms (Chapter 2). In combination with non-destructive fluorescence imaging of individual trapped atoms, this enables us to control their position with submicrometer precision over several millimeters along the dipole trap. The cavity QED system can distinctly display quantum behaviour in the so-called strong coupling regime, i.e., when the coherent atom-cavity coupling rate dominates dissipation in the system. This sets the main requirements on the resonator's properties: small mode volume and high finesse. Chapter 3 is devoted to the manufacturing, assembling, and testing of an ultra-high finesse optical Fabry-Perot resonator, stabilized to the atomic transition. In Chapter 4 I present the transportation of single atoms into the cavity and their coupling to the cavity mode. The strong coupling manifests itself in a strong reduction of the cavity transmission probed by a weak external laser. The atoms remain trapped and coupled to the cavity mode for several seconds until we move them out of the cavity for final analysis of their number and position.
A single rubidium atom trapped within a high-finesse optical cavity is an efficient source of single photons. We theoretically and experimentally study single-photon generation using a vacuum stimulated Raman adiabatic passage. We experimentally achieve photon generation efficiencies of up to 34% and 56% on the D1{D}_{1}D1​ and D2{D}_{2}D2​ line, respectively. Output coupling with 89% results in record-high efficiencies for single photons in one spatiotemporally well-defined propagating mode. We demonstrate that the observed generation efficiencies are constant in a wide range of applied pump laser powers and virtual level detunings. This allows for independent control over the frequency and wave packet envelope of the photons without loss in efficiency. In combination with the long trapping time of the atom in the cavity, our system constitutes a significant advancement toward an on-demand, highly efficient single-photon source for quantum information processing tasks.