photons tagged posts

Record-breaking photons at telecom wavelengths – on-demand

Record-breaking photons at telecom wavelengths — on demand
Nico Hauser (left) with other researchers from the Barz group, University of Stuttgart. Credit: Barz Group, University of Stuttgart / Ludmilla Parsyak

A team of researchers from the University of Stuttgart and the Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg led by Prof. Stefanie Barz (University of Stuttgart) has demonstrated a source of single photons that combines on-demand operation with record-high photon quality in the telecommunications C-band—a key step toward scalable photonic quantum computation and quantum communication. “The lack of a high-quality on-demand C-band photon source has been a major problem in quantum optics laboratories for over a decade—our new technology now removes this obstacle,” says Prof. Stefanie Barz.

The key: Identical photons on demand
In everyday ...

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Metasurfaces could be the next quantum information processors

In the race toward practical quantum computers and networks, photons hold intriguing possibilities as fast carriers of information at room temperature.

Photons are typically controlled and coaxed into quantum states via waveguides on extended microchips, or through bulky devices built from lenses, mirrors, and beam splitters. The photons become entangled—enabling them to encode and process quantum information in parallel—through complex networks of these optical components. But such systems are notoriously difficult to scale up due to the large numbers and imperfections of parts required to do any meaningful computation or networking.

Could all those optical components be collapsed into a single, flat, ultra-thin array of subwavelength elements that control light in the exac...

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A Trick of Light: UC Irvine researchers turn Silicon into Direct Bandgap Semiconductor

composite photograph of three male scientists.
UC Irvine’s Ara Apkarian, Distinguished Professor emeritus of chemistry; Dmitry Fishman, adjunct professor of chemistry; and Eric Potma, professor of chemistry, (from left) brought together decades of knowledge and experience on a project that resulted in the discovery of a new way light can interact with matter, specifically indirect semiconductors, like silicon, an important building block in computers, electronics and solar power systems. Their work will help to greatly improve the power, efficiency and usability of the second-most abundant element in Earth’s crust. UC Irvine

Discovery enables manufacturing of ultrathin solar panels, advanced optoelectronics

By creating a new way for light and matter to interact, researchers at the University of California, Irvine have enable...

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New Measurements Quantifying Qudits provide Glimpse of Quantum Future

The micro-ring resonator, shown here as a closed loop, generated high-dimensional photon pairs. Researchers examined these photons by manipulating the phases of different frequencies, or colors, of light and mixing frequencies, as shown by the crisscrossed multicolor lines. Credit: Yun-Yi Pai/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy
The micro-ring resonator, shown here as a closed loop, generated high-dimensional photon pairs. Researchers examined these photons by manipulating the phases of different frequencies, or colors, of light and mixing frequencies, as shown by the crisscrossed multicolor lines. Credit: Yun-Yi Pai/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy

Using existing experimental and computational resources, a multi-institutional team has developed an effective method for measuring high-dimensional qudits encoded in quantum frequency combs, which are a type of photon source, on a single optical chip.

Although the word “qudit” might look like a typo, this lesser-known cousin of the qubit, or quantum bit, can carry more information and is more resistant to noise — both of which are key qualities needed to improve the ...

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