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SPIE Quantum Technologies for Defence and Security

Spatial and spectral peculiarities of spontaneous parametric down-conversion for classical and quantum spectroscopy

Jean-Michel Melkonian, Julien Le Gouët, Enguerran Belles, Jean-Baptiste Dherbecourt, Myriam Raybaut

Published Nov 15, 2024• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Spontaneous Parametric Down-conversion (SPDC) is now routinely used to generate photon pairs for imaging, spectroscopy, and quantum information and metrology. However, the peculiar spectro-spatial properties of SPDC beams are not always known from the largest audience: they can give rise to ring-like beams, depending on the temperature, the wavelengths and pump focusing. This has to be considered for imaging or long-range applications. We will show examples of such beams created in 532-pumped PPLN or PPKTP and 1064-nm-pumped PPLN crystals. With a simple model of noncolinear phase matching we will give physical insight into the phenomena and explain the role of the signal/idler group delay. We will also explain how aperiodic crystals could be useful.

DOI
10.1117/12.3031497

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Spontaneous Parametric Down-conversion (SPDC) is now routinely used to generate photon pairs for imaging, spectroscopy, and quantum information and metrology. However, the peculiar spectro-spatial properties of SPDC beams are not always known from the largest audience: they can give rise to ring-like beams, depending on the temperature, the wavelengths and pump focusing. This has to be considered for imaging or long-range applications. We will show examples of such beams created in 532-pumped PPLN or PPKTP and 1064-nm-pumped PPLN crystals. With a simple model of noncolinear phase matching we will give physical insight into the phenomena and explain the role of the signal/idler group delay. We will also explain how aperiodic crystals could be useful.
Photon pairs from spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) are important for a wide range of quantum optics experiments with spectral properties such as their bandwidths often being a crucial concern. Here we show the generic existence of particular phase-matching conditions in quasi-phase-matched KTP, MgO:LN, and SLT crystals that lead to ultra-broadband, widely nondegenerate photon pairs. It is based on the existence of group-velocity-matched, far apart wavelength pairs and, for 2 mm long crystals, results in SPDC bandwidths between 15 and 25 THz for photon pairs with the idler photon in the technologically relevant mid-IR range of 3-5 μm and the signal photon in the near-IR below 1100 nm. We experimentally demonstrate this type of broadband phase matching in ppKTP crystals for photon pairs centered at 800 and 3800 nm and measure a bandwidth of 15 THz. This novel method of generating broadband photon pairs will be highly beneficial for SPDC-based imaging, spectroscopy, refractometry, and optical coherence tomography with undetected mid-IR photons.
The Periodically Poled Potassium Titanyl Phosphate (PPKTP) is a type of non linear crystal that serves as a source of production of entangled pairs of photons. The produced pair of photons, known as the Signal and Idler photons, possess unique characteristics within their entanglement that allow the production of new technologies such as quantum cryptography and quantum teleportation. The creation of the Signal and Idler photons occur through a process named Spontaneous Parametric Down Conversion (SPDC), which occurs when the pump laser beam penetrates a non linear medium. SPDC follows conservation of momentum and energy, thus imposing phase matching conditions on the generated photon pairs. These conditions result in specific space and frequency correlations of the photons. The aim of this project is to characterize the entangled photon pairs in their spatial profile and frequency spectrum, known as the Joint Spectrum.
I investigate the properties of spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) involving collinear Gaussian spatial modes for the pump and the photon collection optics. Approximate analytical and numerical results are obtained for the peak spectral density, photon bandwidth, pair collection probability, heralding ratio, and spectral purity as a function of crystal length and beam-focusing parameters. I address the optimization of these properties individually as well as jointly, and find focusing conditions that simultaneously bring the pair collection probability, heralding ratio, and spectral purity to near-optimal values. These properties are also found to be nearly scale invariant, that is, ultimately independent of crystal length. The results obtained here are expected to be useful for designing SPDC sources with high performance in multiple categories for the next generation of SPDC applications.
The spectral properties of entangled photon pairs generated via quasi-phased matching in spontaneous parametric down-conversion are proposed and demonstrated experimentally.A general mathematical model for evaluating the spectral properties is developed to obtain the spectrum shape and range of down-converted photons.The model takes into account the effects of phase mismatching due to non-ideal pumping and the relationship between crystal periodic modulation function and the incidence angle of the pump beam.The spectrum curve shape is determined by the discrete Fourier transform of a Gaussian pump beam and the integration of parametric down-conversion generated by an individual plane wave.An experiment is carried out with a PPLN non-linear crystal and dispersing optics, which shows a good consistency in their spectral ranges and shapes with our model predictions within the spectrum of 600-633 nm.This therefore illustrates that both the simulation model and the experimental process are reasonable.This novel method has potential applications in high-accuracy calibration in the wide spectrum using correlated photons.
Spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) is one of the most important sources for entangled or correlated photon pairs, which are the foundation of the emerging fields of quantum-optical imaging and spectroscopy. Using periodically poled materials as an SPDC-source allows broad emission spectra in widely tunable wavelength ranges in an efficient and walk-off-free process. For applications that employ nonlinear interference setups, maximum interferometric contrast is only achieved when signal and idler modes are overlapped precisely in the second crystal. Thus, accurate knowledge of the spectral-angular characteristic of SPDC is crucial for designing such devices.
Spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) is a reliable and robust source of photons for quantum information applications. For applications that involve operations such as entanglement swapping or single-photon heralding, two-photon states are required to be factorable (uncorrelated) in their spectral and spatial degrees of freedom. We report the design and experimental characterization of an SPDC source that has been optimized for high spectral and spatial purity. The source is pumped by the 776 nm output of a mode-locked Ti:Sapphire laser and consists of a periodically-poled Potassium Titanyl Phosphate (PPKTP) crystal phase-matched for collinear type-II SPDC. The dispersive properties of PPKTP at these wavelengths is such that it is possible to minimize the spectral entanglement by matching the widths of the pump to the spectral phase-matching function. The spatial entanglement is minimized through careful control of the pump focus, yielding nearly single-mode emission. An advantage of this approach is that the emission rate into the collection modes is very high, resulting in a very bright SPDC source. We also report a scheme that employs the output of collinear sources such as these to produce polarization-entangled photon pairs. The scheme, which requires only simple polarization elements, can be scaled to N-photon GHZ states.