Abstract This review discusses how nanophotonic architectures—including plasmonic nanostructures, dielectric resonators, optical cavities, and multi-emitter assemblies—provide powerful platforms for engineering light–matter interactions and controlling decoherence, dissipation, and collective mode formation. Within the framework of open quantum systems, decoherence arises from the coupling of a quantum system to its environment, suppressing phase coherence and transforming quantum superpositions into effectively classical statistical mixtures. Rather than representing an unavoidable limitation, decoherence can be deliberately tailored through the design of structured photonic reservoirs. We examine how the spectral density, symmetry, and coupling topology of these reservoirs govern the emergence of preferred pointer states and collective excitations. In contrast to the far-field geometry of the canonical double-slit experiment, nanophotonic platforms operate in the near-field regime, where localized, collective, and hybridized excitations coexist and interact. We further discuss how nanoparticle dimers, cavity-coupled emitters, and exciton–plasmon systems function as nanoscale which-path discriminators, enabling environmentally driven selection and stabilization of robust eigenmodes, including subradiant states, dark modes, and symmetry-protected excitations. By viewing decoherence as a mechanism for basis selection rather than solely a source of quantum information loss, this review highlights emerging opportunities for quantum state preparation, mode engineering, photonic logic, and scalable light–matter interfaces, providing a unified perspective on harnessing engineered nanophotonic environments to direct quantum dynamics.
Abstract This review discusses how nanophotonic architectures—including plasmonic nanostructures, dielectric resonators, optical cavities, and multi-emitter assemblies—provide powerful platforms for engineering light–matter interactions and controlling decoherence, dissipation, and collective mode formation. Within the framework of open quantum systems, decoherence arises from the coupling of a quantum system to its environment, suppressing phase coherence and transforming quantum superpositions into effectively classical statistical mixtures. Rather than representing an unavoidable limitation, decoherence can be deliberately tailored through the design of structured photonic reservoirs. We examine how the spectral density, symmetry, and coupling topology of these reservoirs govern the emergence of preferred pointer states and collective excitations. In contrast to the far-field geometry of the canonical double-slit experiment, nanophotonic platforms operate in the near-field regime, where localized, collective, and hybridized excitations coexist and interact. We further discuss how nanoparticle dimers, cavity-coupled emitters, and exciton–plasmon systems function as nanoscale which-path discriminators, enabling environmentally driven selection and stabilization of robust eigenmodes, including subradiant states, dark modes, and symmetry-protected excitations. By viewing decoherence as a mechanism for basis selection rather than solely a source of quantum information loss, this review highlights emerging opportunities for quantum state preparation, mode engineering, photonic logic, and scalable light–matter interfaces, providing a unified perspective on harnessing engineered nanophotonic environments to direct quantum dynamics.
Abstract Quantum nanophotonics places nanoscale structuring in direct dialogue with photonic quantum information—compressing functionality to the few-nanometre, few-femtosecond frontier while retaining energy efficiency, speed and room-temperature operation. We highlight nanoplasmonic cavity-QED architectures in which extreme mode confinement delivers strong coupling under ambient conditions, enabling ultrafast single-photon emission and near-field multipartite entanglement using industry-grade near-field transducers that nanofocus guided light at practical efficiencies. We set these advances against the arc from early plasmonic cQED proposals and single-emitter Purcell studies to modern time-domain measurements that resolve sub-picosecond polariton/Rabi dynamics—establishing a clear route from concept to device. In parallel, we point to low-loss, high-index Mie resonators whose spectrally sharp electric and magnetic modes afford narrow-band coherent control, filtering and radiation-pattern engineering, and which naturally co-integrate in hybrid metal–dielectric stacks that combine ultrastrong local coupling with low-loss routing and storage. Finally, we discuss quantum nanoplasmonic coherent perfect absorption (qnCPA)—a waveguide-fed, non-perturbing protocol that selectively prepares and protects plasmon–emitter dressed states via dissipation-assisted, unidirectional feeding. Together with macroscopic QED and quantum quasinormal-mode quantization, which regularize open, lossy resonators and clarify when loss can be a resource, these developments chart robust, chip-scale routes to room-temperature quantum technologies.
The strong confined electromagnetic field in the micro/nano photonic structures brings new opportunities for the research of interaction between light and matter. By designing optical modes, light can be controlled to realize reversible or inreversible energy exchange between photons and emitters at the micro/nano scale. Here, we review the basic principles of the interaction between light and matter in cavity quantum electrodynamics and their recent advances in strong coupling based on micro/nano photonic structures such as plasmon nanostructures, whispering gallery resonators and photonic crystals. These works opening the research of quantum nanophotonics will have great influence on the on-chip quantum devices and quantum informations.
The preparation and control of quantum states lie at the heart of quantum information science (QIS). Recent advances in solid-state quantum emitters (QEs) and nanophotonics have transformed the landscape of quantum photonic technologies, enabling scalable generation of quantum states of light and matter. A new frontier in solid-state quantum photonics is the engineering of many-body interactions between QEs and photons to achieve robust coherence and controllable many-body entanglement. These entangled states, including photonic graph and cluster states, superradiant emission, and emergent quantum phases, are promising for quantum computation, sensing, and simulation. However, intrinsic inhomogeneities and decoherence in solid-state platforms pose significant challenges to realize such complex entangled states. This review provides an overview of the fundamental many-body interactions and dynamics at the light-matter interfaces of solid-state QEs, and discusses recent advances in mitigating decoherence and harnessing robust many-body coherence.
Abstract Quantum antennas couple localized quantum emitters to optical modes that can be collected, routed, and used in larger photonic systems. Their performance depends on photon delivery as well as single-photon purity, coherence, and indistinguishability. This Review connects the physics of light-matter interaction with the design of quantum-photonic interfaces. We compare semiconductor quantum dots, color centers, two-dimensional and molecular emitters, and examine plasmonic, dielectric, hybrid, cavity-coupled, and waveguideintegrated antenna architectures. We discuss how emitter position, dipole orientation, spectral matching, and material loss govern radiative enhancement and quenching, then assess performance through efficiency, brightness, photon statistics, and coupling to useful optical modes. Electromagnetic and quantum-optical modeling are considered alongside fabrication, deterministic emitter placement, and experimental characterization. We further examine how arrays and metasurfaces extend control to collective emission and quantum wavefronts, and survey applications in single-photon generation, communication, networking, computing, sensing, imaging, and ranging. Across these settings, rapid decay and strong local fields produce system-level gains only when useful photon delivery improves without compromising quantum-state quality. Low-loss design, spectral stabilization, reproducible integration, and complete photon-budget reporting emerge as priorities for scalable quantum-antenna platforms.
The preparation and control of quantum states lie at the heart of quantum information science (QIS). Recent advances in solid-state quantum emitters (QEs) and nanophotonics have transformed the landscape of quantum photonic technologies, enabling scalable generation of quantum states of light and matter. A new frontier in solid-state quantum photonics is the engineering of many-body interactions between QEs and photons to achieve robust coherence and controllable many-body entanglement. These entangled states, including photonic graph and cluster states, superradiant emission, and emergent quantum phases, are promising for quantum computation, sensing, and simulation. However, intrinsic inhomogeneities and decoherence in solid-state platforms pose significant challenges to realize such complex entangled states. This review provides an overview of the fundamental many-body interactions and dynamics at the light-matter interfaces of solid-state QEs, and discusses recent advances in mitigating decoherence and harnessing robust many-body coherence.
Attempting to implement quantum information related applications utilizing atoms and photons, as they naturally form quantum systems supporting superposition states, hybrid quantum plasmonic systems emerged in the past as a platform to study and engineer light-matter interaction. This platform combines the unrivaled electromagnetic field localization of surface plasmon polaritons, boosting the light-matter coupling rate, with the tremendous integration potential of truly nanoscale structures, and both the significant emission rates of nanoantennas and photonic transmission velocities. In this work, a classical description of surface plasmon polaritons is combined with a light-matter interaction model based on a cavity quantum electrodynamical formalism. The resulting composite semi-classical method, introduced and described in this thesis, provides efficient and versatile means to simulate the dynamical behavior of radiative atomic transitions coupled to plasmonic cavity modes in the weak incoherent coupling regime. Both the emission into the far field and various dissipation mechanisms are included by expanding the model to an open quantum system. The variety of light-matter interaction applications that can be modeled with the outlined method is indicated by the four different exemplary scenarios detailed in the application chapter of this thesis. The classical description of localized surface plasmon polaritons is benchmarked by reproducing the experimental measurements of the molecular fluorescence manipulation through optical nanoantennas in a collaborative effort with experimental partners. Furthermore, in the weak light-matter coupling regime, the potential of achieving a higher nanoantenna functionality and simultaneously realizing more elaborate quantum dynamics is revealed by the three remaining applications. Each pivotally involving a bimodal nanoantenna and demonstrating different quantum optical phenomena, the implementation of cavity radiation mode conversion, non-classical cavity emission statistics, and non-classical cavity emission properties is shown and described in the application chapter.