We present a protocol for homodyne adaptive optical phase estimation with squeezed vacuum states. The protocol utilizes the complete detection record of the homo-dyne, and approaches the quantum limit for a wide range of phases.
Phase estimation plays a central role in communications, sensing, and information processing. Quantum correlated states, such as squeezed states, enable phase estimation beyond the shot-noise limit, and in principle approach the ultimate quantum limit in precision, when paired with optimal quantum measurements. However, physical realizations of optimal quantum measurements for optical phase estimation with quantum-correlated states are still unknown. Here we address this problem by introducing an adaptive Gaussian measurement strategy for optical phase estimation with squeezed vacuum states that, by construction, approaches the quantum limit in precision. This strategy builds from a comprehensive set of locally optimal POVMs through rotations and homodyne measurements and uses the Adaptive Quantum State Estimation framework for optimizing the adaptive measurement process, which, under certain regularity conditions, guarantees asymptotic optimality for this quantum parameter estimation problem. As a result, the adaptive phase estimation strategy based on locally-optimal homodyne measurements achieves the quantum limit within the phase interval of [ 0 , π / 2 ) . Furthermore, we generalize this strategy by including heterodyne measurements, enabling phase estimation across the full range of phases from [ 0 , π ) , where squeezed vacuum allows for unambiguous phase encoding. Remarkably, for this phase interval, which is the maximum range of phases that can be encoded in squeezed vacuum, this estimation strategy maintains an asymptotic quantum-optimal performance, representing a significant advancement in quantum metrology.
The modern scientific method is critically dependent on precision measurements of physical parameters. A classic example is the measurement of the optical phase enabled by optical interferometry, where the error on the measured phase is conventionally bounded by the so-called Heisenberg limit. To achieve phase estimation at the Heisenberg limit, it has been common to consider protocols based on highly complex N00N states of light. However, despite decades of research and several experimental explorations, there has been no demonstration of deterministic phase estimation with N00N states reaching the Heisenberg limit or even surpassing the shot noise limit. Here we use a deterministic phase estimation scheme based on a source of Gaussian squeezed vacuum states and high-efficiency homodyne detection to obtain phase estimates with an extreme sensitivity that significantly surpasses the shot noise limit and even beats the conventional Heisenberg limit as well as the performance of a pure N00N state protocol. Using a high-efficiency setup with a total loss of about 11%, we achieve a Fisher information of 15.8(6) rad^{-2} per photon-a significant increase in performance compared to state of the art and beyond an ideal six photon N00N state scheme. This work represents an important achievement in quantum metrology, and it opens the door to future quantum sensing technologies for the interrogation of light-sensitive biological systems.
A proposed phase-estimation protocol based on measuring the parity of a two-mode squeezed-vacuum state at the output of a Mach-Zehnder interferometer shows that the Cram\'er-Rao sensitivity is sub-Heisenberg [P. M. Anisimov et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 103602 (2010)]. However, these measurements are problematic, making it unclear if this sensitivity can be obtained with a finite number of measurements. This sensitivity is only for a phase near zero, and in this region there is a problem with ambiguity because measurements cannot distinguish the sign of the phase. Here, we consider a finite number of parity measurements and show that an adaptive technique gives a highly accurate phase estimate regardless of the phase. We show that the Heisenberg limit is reachable, where the number of trials needed for mean photon number n=1 is approximately 100. We show that the Cram\'er-Rao sensitivity can be achieved approximately, and the estimation is unambiguous in the interval ($\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\pi}/2,\ensuremath{\pi}/2$).
The measurement problem for the optical phase has been traditionally attacked for noiseless schemes or in the presence of amplitude or detection noise. Here we address the estimation of phase in the presence of phase diffusion and evaluate the ultimate quantum limits to precision for phase-shifted Gaussian states. We look for the optimal detection scheme and derive approximate scaling laws for the quantum Fisher information and the optimal squeezing fraction in terms of the total energy and the amount of noise. We also find that homodyne detection is a nearly optimal detection scheme in the limit of very small and large noise.