On the effects of self- and cross-phase modulation on photon purity for four-wave mixing photon-pair sources

We consider the effect of self-phase modulation and cross-phase modulation on the joint spectral amplitude of photon pairs generated by spontaneous four-wave mixing. In particular, the purity of a heralded photon from a pair is considered, in the context of schemes that aim to maximise the purity and minimise correlation in the joint spectral amplitude using birefringent phase-matching and short pump pulses. We find that non-linear phase modulation effects will be detrimental, and will limit the quantum interference visibility that can be achieved at a given generation rate. An approximate expression for the joint spectral amplitude with phase modulation is found by considering the group velocity walk-off between each photon and the pump, but neglecting the group-velocity dispersion at each wavelength. The group-velocity dispersion can also be included with a numerical calculation, and it is shown that it only has a small effect on the purity for the realistic parameters considered.Comment: 11 pages, 10 figure

Shape-preserving and unidirectional frequency conversion using four-wave mixing Bragg scattering

In this work, we investigate the properties of four-wave mixing Bragg scattering in a configuration that employs orthogonally polarized pumps in a birefringent waveguide. This configuration enables a large signal conversion bandwidth, and allows strongly unidirectional frequency conversion as undesired Bragg-scattering processes are suppressed by waveguide birefringence. Moreover, we show that this form of four-wave mixing Bragg scattering preserves the (arbitrary) signal pulse shape, even when driven by pulsed pumps.Comment: 11 pages + refs, 5 figure

Fluctuating Hydrodynamics and the Rayleigh-Plateau Instability

The Rayleigh-Plateau instability occurs when surface tension makes a fluid column become unstable to small perturbations. At nanometer scales, thermal fluctuations are comparable to surface energy densities. Consequently, at these scales, thermal fluctuations play a significant role in the dynamics of the instability. These microscopic effects have previously been investigated numerically using particle-based simulations, such as molecular dynamics, and stochastic partial differential equation based hydrodynamic models, such as stochastic lubrication theory. In this paper we present an incompressible fluctuating hydrodynamics model with a diffuse-interface formulation for binary fluid mixtures designed for the study of stochastic interfacial phenomena. An efficient numerical algorithm is outlined and validated in numerical simulations of stable equilibrium interfaces. We present results from simulations of the Rayleigh-Plateau instability for long cylinders pinching into droplets for Ohnesorge numbers of Oh = 0.5 and 5.0. Both stochastic and perturbed deterministic simulations are analyzed and ensemble results show significant differences in the temporal evolution of the minimum radius near pinching. Short cylinders, with lengths less than their circumference, were also investigated. As previously observed in molecular dynamics simulations, we find that thermal fluctuations cause these to pinch in cases where a perturbed cylinder would be stable deterministically. Finally we show that the fluctuating hydrodynamics model can be applied to study a broader range of surface-tension driven phenomena

Nonlinearity-induced spectral lattice with optically tunable long-range complex hopping

We suggest and realize experimentally quantum walks on a spectral photonic lattice with optically tunable long-range and complex hopping coefficients facilitated by nonlinear parametric interactions, enabling asymmetric frequency shaping and Talbot effect with arbitrary periodicity.The authors acknowledge financial support from the Australian Research Council

Intrinsically narrowband pair photon generation in microstructured fibres

In this paper we study the tailoring of photon spectral properties generated by four-wave mixing in a birefringent photonic crystal fibre (PCF). The aim is to produce intrinsically narrow-band photons and hence to achieve high non-classical interference visibility and generate high fidelity entanglement without any requirement for spectral filtering, leading to high effective detection efficiencies. We show unfiltered Hong-Ou-Mandel interference visibilities of 77% between photons from the same PCF, and 80% between separate sources. We compare results from modelling the PCF to these experiments and analyse photon purities.Comment: 23 pages, 17 figures, Comments Welcom

Synthetic photonic lattice for single-shot reconstruction of frequency combs

We formulate theoretically and demonstrate experimentally an all-optical method for reconstruction of the amplitude, phase and coherence of frequency combs from a single-shot measurement of the spectral intensity. Our approach exploits synthetic frequency lattices with pump-induced spectral short- and long-range couplings between different signal components across a broad bandwidth of of hundreds GHz in a single nonlinear fiber. When combined with ultra-fast signal conversion techniques, this approach has the potential to provide real-time measurement of pulse-to-pulse variations in the spectral phase and coherence properties of exotic light sources.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure

Multidimensional synthetic chiral-tube lattices via nonlinear frequency conversion

Geometrical dimensionality plays a fundamentally important role in the topological effects arising in discrete lattices. While direct experiments are limited by three spatial dimensions, the research topic of synthetic dimensions implemented by the frequency degree of freedom in photonics is rapidly advancing. The manipulation of light in such artificial lattices is typically realized through electro-optic modulation, yet their operating bandwidth imposes practical constraints on the range of interactions between different frequency components. Here we propose and experimentally realize all-optical synthetic dimensions involving specially tailored simultaneous short- and long-range interactions between discrete spectral lines mediated by frequency conversion in a nonlinear waveguide. We realize triangular chiral-tube lattices in three-dimensional space and explore their four-dimensional generalization. We implement a synthetic gauge field with nonzero magnetic flux and observe the associated multidimensional dynamics of frequency combs, all within one physical spatial port. We anticipate that our method will provide a new means for the fundamental study of high-dimensional physics and act as an important step towards using topological effects in optical devices operating in the time and frequency domains.Comment: 20 pages, 6 figure