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Scientia Sinica Informationis

非平衡光纤干涉仪的相位稳定方法研究

Chuanrong Yang, Chenzhi Yuan, Yunru Fan, Ruiming Zhang, Jiarui Li, Guangwei Deng, Haizhi Song, You Wang, Lixing You, Qiang Zhou

Published Feb 1, 2022• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

By using photons to carry quantum information, optical quantum information technology plays an essential role in quantum communication, quantum metrology, and linear optical quantum computing. In recent years, the unbalanced fiber interferometer has been widely applied in preparing, manipulating, and measuring photon qubits. However, the unbalanced fiber interferometer based on fiber devices is sensitive to the environment's thermal, mechanical, and acoustic noise. Thus, phase stabilization based on feedback control is essential in utilizing an unbalanced fiber interferometer. The existing phase stabilization methods typically employ a reference laser combined with optoelectronic detection, thus introducing additional noise to photon qubits. In this paper, we propose and demonstrate a feedback control method to stabilize a phase in an unbalanced fiber interferometer by combining weak coherent reference light and single photon counting. Using theoretical analysis, we realized the phase stabilization of an unbalanced fiber Michelson interferometer with an arm-length difference of about 1 m. The results showed that the jitter of the stabilized phase is less than 0.042 rad, while the visibility of single-photon interference fringes is higher than 99%.

DOI
10.1360/ssi-2021-0410

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By using photons to carry quantum information, optical quantum information technology plays an essential role in quantum communication, quantum metrology, and linear optical quantum computing. In recent years, the unbalanced fiber interferometer has been widely applied in preparing, manipulating, and measuring photon qubits. However, the unbalanced fiber interferometer based on fiber devices is sensitive to the environment's thermal, mechanical, and acoustic noise. Thus, phase stabilization based on feedback control is essential in utilizing an unbalanced fiber interferometer. The existing phase stabilization methods typically employ a reference laser combined with optoelectronic detection, thus introducing additional noise to photon qubits. In this paper, we propose and demonstrate a feedback control method to stabilize a phase in an unbalanced fiber interferometer by combining weak coherent reference light and single photon counting. Using theoretical analysis, we realized the phase stabilization of an unbalanced fiber Michelson interferometer with an arm-length difference of about 1 m. The results showed that the jitter of the stabilized phase is less than 0.042 rad, while the visibility of single-photon interference fringes is higher than 99%.
We report on single-photon interference experiments in a Michelson-type interferometer built with two 6-km-long fiber spools, as well as on the active stabilization of the interferometer. A weak coherent light signal was (de-) multiplexed with a strong reference light using wavelength-division multiplexing technique, and real-time feedback control technique was applied for the reference light to actively stabilize the phase fluctuation in the long-armed fiber interferometer. The stabilized interferometer showed phase stability of 0.06 rad, which corresponds to an optical path length fluctuation of 15 nm between the 6-km-long interfering arms. The raw visibility obtained without subtracting noise counts in the single-photon interference experiment was more than 98% for stabilized conditions.
Optical interferometers are extensively used in fundamental physics studies, gravitational wave detection, quantum metrology, topological photonics, and quantum information processing. Fiber-based interferometers are compact, mechanically robust, and cheap, and thus are ubiquitously deployed. However, the optical phase in fiber interferometers is sensitive to ambient perturbation, resulting in compromised phase-sensing precision. Therefore, phase control, shifting, and stabilization of fiber interferometers are essential. Methods to create stable interference patterns and to lock a fiber interferometer at arbitrary phase have been shown, which however are sophisticated, bulky, and delicate, preventing wider application in harsh environments outside laboratories or in space. Here we demonstrate an innovative method for arbitrary-phase locking of fiber unbalanced Mach-Zehnder interferometers. Compared with existing methods, our method is much simpler. We showcase the preparation and characterization of a narrow-band, energy-time-entangled photon state generated in integrated nonlinear microresonators, where two-photon interference visibility reaches 0.993(6). Our method constitutes a critical building block for photonic quantum networks, and is useful to emerging single-photon interference in curved space-time that facilitates exploration of the interface of quantum mechanics and general relativity.
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The practical realization of long-distance entanglement-based quantum communication systems strongly rely on the observation of highly stable quantum interference between correlated single photons. This task must accompany active stabilization of the optical path lengths within the single-photon coherence length. Here, we provide two-step interferometer stabilization methods employing continuous optical length control and experimentally demonstrate two-photon quantum interference using an actively stabilized 6-km-long fiber-optic Hong-Ou-Mandel interferometer. The two-step active control techniques are applied for measuring highly stable two-photon interference fringes by scanning the optical path-length difference. The obtained two-photon interference visibilities with and without accidental subtraction are found to be approximately 90.7% and 65.4%, respectively.
We experimentally demonstrate stable and user-adjustable single-photon interference in a 1 km long fiber-optic Mach-Zehnder interferometer, using an active phase control system with the feedback provided by a classical laser. We are able to continuously tune the single-photon phase difference between the interferometer arms using a phase modulator, which is synchronized with the gate window of the single-photon detectors. The phase control system employs a piezoelectric fiber stretcher to stabilize the phase drift in the interferometer. A single-photon net visibility of 0.97 is obtained, yielding future possibilities for experimental realizations of quantum repeaters in optical fibers and violation of Bell's inequalities using genuine energy-time entanglement.