We propose a quantum interferometric protocol that leverages spin-dependent spatial displacements to enable high-precision parameter estimation beyond classical limits. By inducing a unitary coupling between a particle's spin degree of freedom and its momentum, the protocol generates entanglement between spin states and spatial positions, resulting in coherent spatial superpositions. Interferometric reconstruction of the resulting phase differences enables Heisenberg-limited sensitivity for parameters encoded in the spin Hamiltonian. As a concrete application, we demonstrate the protocol's effectiveness in magnetic field sensing, where the field is transduced into spatial interference fringes. Quantum Fisher information analysis confirms sub-shot-noise scaling, and the protocol's feasibility is discussed for physical platforms including ultracold atoms and nitrogen-vacancy centers. Our framework provides a versatile approach to quantum metrology with potential extensions to multiparameter sensing and gravitational wave detection.
We propose a quantum interferometric protocol that leverages spin-dependent spatial displacements to enable high-precision parameter estimation beyond classical limits. By inducing a unitary coupling between a particle's spin degree of freedom and its momentum, the protocol generates entanglement between spin states and spatial positions, resulting in coherent spatial superpositions. Interferometric reconstruction of the resulting phase differences enables Heisenberg-limited sensitivity for parameters encoded in the spin Hamiltonian. As a concrete application, we demonstrate the protocol's effectiveness in magnetic field sensing, where the field is transduced into spatial interference fringes. Quantum Fisher information analysis confirms sub-shot-noise scaling, and the protocol's feasibility is discussed for physical platforms including ultracold atoms and nitrogen-vacancy centers. Our framework provides a versatile approach to quantum metrology with potential extensions to multiparameter sensing and gravitational wave detection.
We propose a quantum interferometric protocol that leverages spin-dependent spatial displacements to enable high-precision parameter estimation beyond classical limits. By inducing a unitary coupling between a particles spin degree of freedom and its momentum, the protocol generates entanglement between spin states and spatial positions, resulting in coherent spatial superpositions. Interferometric reconstruction of the resulting phase differences enables Heisenberg limited sensitivity for parameters encoded in the spin Hamiltonian. As a concrete application, we demonstrate the protocols effectiveness in magnetic field sensing, where the field is transduced into spatial interference fringes. Quantum Fisher information analysis confirms sub-shot-noise scaling, and the protocol's feasibility is discussed for physical platforms including ultracold atoms and nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers. Our framework provides a versatile approach to quantum metrology with potential extensions to multiparameter sensing and gravitational wave detection.
Quantum Sensors, like atom interferometers (AI), can be employed for high-precision measurements of inertial forces, including their application as gravimeters, gradiometers, accelerometers, and gyroscopes. Their measurement principle relies on ultracold atoms that are prepared in quantum-mechanical superposition states in external degrees of freedom. These states can be prepared by a momentum transfer of a Raman laser. Then the superposition state senses the effect of an inertial force, which induce a corresponding relative phase. The phase is read out by a final coupling which converts the interferometric phase into a atom number difference between the two states. The difference provides an estimate of the interferometric phase and the corresponding quantity of interest. The quantum mechanical noise of the atomic ensemble cause a fundamental uncertainty of this estimation, which I analyze for generic AIs. For small atomic densities, the quantum phase noise of the ensemble limits the interferometric sensitivity. For large densities, quantum number fluctuations generate density fluctuations, which generates phase noise. I show that these two competing effects result in an optimal atom number with a maximal interferometer resolution. Squeezed atomic samples allow for a reduction of the quantum noise of one quantity at the expense of an increased noise along of a conjugate quantity. Phase and number are such quantities which obey to a variant of Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. Neither phase nor number squeezing can improve the maximal interferometer resolution. As one main result of this thesis, I show how an optimal squeezing in between number and phase squeezing, allows for a fundamental improvement. I evaluate possible experimental paths to implement the proposed protocol. Concepts for a squeezing-enhanced operation of external-degree AIs have not yet been demonstrated. I propose and implement an atomic gravimeter, which is designed to accept spin-squeezed atomic states as input states. The interferometer is designed such that the interferometer couplings are performed in spin space, while the phase accumulation is performed in momentum states. For this interferometer, the squeezed input can be directly obtained from spin dynamics in spinor Bose-Einstein condensates. The main noise contributions in the experiment are analyzed, which results in a factor of 84 above the relevant quantum limit, preventing a squeezing enhancement so far. I outline a suppression of the main noise source, uncontrolled AC Stark shift on the squeezed mode and propose future important applications, including test of spontaneous collapse theories and an improvement of large-scale, high-precision gradiometers.
Entanglement is an important quantum resource to achieve high-sensitivity quantum metrology. However, the rapid decoherence of quantum entangled states, due to the unavoidable environmental noise, results in practically the unwanted sharp drop of the measurement sensitivity. To overcome such a difficulty, here we propose a spin-oscillator hybrid quantum interferometer to achieve the desirable precise estimation of the parameter encoded in the vibrations of the oscillator. Differing from the conventional two-mode quantum interferometers input by the two-mode NOON state or entangled coherent states, whose achievable sensitivities are strongly limited by the decoherence of the entangled vibrational states, we demonstrate that the present interferometer, input by a spin-dependent two-mode entangled state, possesses a manifest advantage; i.e., the measurement sensitivity of the estimated parameter is not influenced by the decoherence from the spin-oscillator entanglement. This is because, by applying a spin-oscillator disentangled operation, the information of the estimated parameter encoded originally in the vibrational degrees can be effectively transferred into the spin degree and then can be sensitively estimated by the precise spin-state population measurements. As consequence, the proposed hybrid quantum interferometer possesses manifest robustness against the particle losses of the vibrational modes. Interestingly, the achieved phase measurement sensitivity can still surpass the standard quantum limit obviously, even if a relatively large number of particle loss occurs in one of the two modes. The potential application of the proposed spin-oscillator hybrid quantum interferometer is also discussed.
We propose and analyze a quantum interferometry scheme based on a Raman-dressed Bose gas with spin-orbit coupling. In this system, the atom-light coupling mixes spin and momentum degrees of freedom, giving rise, in the low-energy regime, to an effective spinor condensate whose spin-mixing interaction can be tuned independently of the atomic density. This controllability enables a separation between state preparation and phase imprinting, and provides a natural route to echo-type protocols based on effective time reversal. Within this framework, critical regimes of the effective spinor Hamiltonian can be used to generate entanglement and enhance interferometric sensitivity beyond the standard quantum limit. In addition, the spin-momentum locking of the dressed modes gives access to spatial density modulations that provide an alternative readout of the interferometric phase. In particular, phase information can be extracted from the displacement of spin-orbit-induced density stripes even when conventional spin observables are insensitive within the effective spinor description. Our results identify Raman-dressed spinor gases as a flexible platform for nonlinear atomic interferometry, combining controllable spin-mixing dynamics with spatially resolved phase readout.
We present an enhanced entangled-quantum-clock protocol that incorporates a quantum phase estimation algorithm to directly estimate proper-time differences as an unknown phase. By employing highly entangled multi-clock states, the achievable uncertainty scales inversely with the total number of quantum clocks, achieving the Heisenberg limit O(1/N) while remaining completely immune to dynamical phase noise. Furthermore, we discuss the feasibility of utilizing this ultra-high precision protocol for gravitational wave detection, highlighting its potential for quantum-enhanced relativistic sensing and fundamental physics tests.
Quantum metrology offers the potential to surpass its classical counterpart, pushing the boundaries of measurement precision toward the ultimate Heisenberg limit. This enhanced precision is normally attained by utilizing large squeezed states or multiparticle entangled quantum states, both of which are often challenging to implement and prone to decoherence in real quantum devices. In this work, we present a versatile and on-demand protocol for deterministic parameter estimation that leverages two efficient state-transfer operations on a single bosonic mode. Specifically, we demonstrate this protocol in the context of phase estimation using the superposition of coherent states in the bosonic circuit quantum electrodynamics (cQED) platform. With low average photon numbers of only up to 1.76, we achieve quantum enhanced precision approaching the Heisenberg scaling, reaching a metrological gain of 7.5 ( 6 ) dB. Importantly, we show that the gain or sensitivity range can be further enhanced on the fly by tailoring the input states, with different superposition weights, based on specific system constraints. The realization of this versatile and efficient scheme affords a promising path toward practical quantum enhanced sensing, not only for bosonic cQED hardware but also readily extensible to other continuous-variable platforms.