989 research outputs found
Chirped-pulse interferometry with finite frequency correlations
Chirped-pulse interferometry is a new interferometric technique encapsulating
the advantages of the quantum Hong-Ou-Mandel interferometer without the
drawbacks of using entangled photons. Both interferometers can exhibit
even-order dispersion cancellation which allows high resolution optical delay
measurements even in thick optical samples. In the present work, we show that
finite frequency correlations in chirped-pulse interferometry and
Hong-Ou-Mandel interferometry limit the degree of dispersion cancellation. Our
results are important considerations in designing practical devices based on
these technologies.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figure
Efficient Toffoli Gates Using Qudits
The simplest decomposition of a Toffoli gate acting on three qubits requires
{\em five} 2-qubit gates. If we restrict ourselves to controlled-sign (or
controlled-NOT) gates this number climbs to six. We show that the number of
controlled-sign gates required to implement a Toffoli gate can be reduced to
just {\em three} if one of the three quantum systems has a third state that is
accessible during the computation, i.e. is actually a qutrit. Such a
requirement is not unreasonable or even atypical since we often artificially
enforce a qubit structure on multilevel quantums systems (eg. atoms, photonic
polarization and spatial modes). We explore the implementation of these
techniques in optical quantum processing and show that linear optical circuits
could operate with much higher probabilities of success
Manipulating biphotonic qutrits
Quantum information carriers with higher dimension than the canonical qubit
offer significant advantages. However, manipulating such systems is extremely
difficult. We show how measurement induced non-linearities can be employed to
dramatically extend the range of possible transforms on biphotonic qutrits; the
three level quantum systems formed by the polarisation of two photons in the
same spatio-temporal mode. We fully characterise the biphoton-photon
entanglement that underpins our technique, thereby realising the first instance
of qubit-qutrit entanglement. We discuss an extension of our technique to
generate qutrit-qutrit entanglement and to manipulate any bosonic encoding of
quantum information.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Demonstration of a simple entangling optical gate and its use in Bell-state analysis
We demonstrate a new architecture for an optical entangling gate that is
significantly simpler than previous realisations, using partially-polarising
beamsplitters so that only a single optical mode-matching condition is
required. We demonstrate operation of a controlled-Z gate in both
continuous-wave and pulsed regimes of operation, fully characterising it in
each case using quantum process tomography. We also demonstrate a
fully-resolving, nondeterministic optical Bell-state analyser based on this
controlled-Z gate. This new architecture is ideally suited to guided optics
implementations of optical gates.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. v2: additional author, improved data and figures
(low res), some other minor changes. Accepted for publication in PR
A conditional-phase switch at the single-photon level
We present an experimental realization of a two-photon conditional-phase
switch, related to the ``-'' gate of quantum computation. This gate
relies on quantum interference between photon pairs, generating entanglement
between two optical modes through the process of spontaneous parametric
down-conversion (SPDC). The interference effect serves to enhance the effective
nonlinearity by many orders of magnitude, so it is significant at the quantum
(single-photon) level. By adjusting the relative optical phase between the
classical pump for SPDC and the pair of input modes, one can impress a large
phase shift on one beam which depends on the presence or absence of a single
photon in a control mode.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure
Quantum-inspired interferometry with chirped laser pulses
We introduce and implement an interferometric technique based on chirped
femtosecond laser pulses and nonlinear optics. The interference manifests as a
high-visibility (> 85%) phase-insensitive dip in the intensity of an optical
beam when the two interferometer arms are equal to within the coherence length
of the light. This signature is unique in classical interferometry, but is a
direct analogue to Hong-Ou-Mandel quantum interference. Our technique exhibits
all the metrological advantages of the quantum interferometer, but with signals
at least 10^7 times greater. In particular we demonstrate enhanced resolution,
robustness against loss, and automatic dispersion cancellation. Our
interferometer offers significant advantages over previous technologies, both
quantum and classical, in precision time delay measurements and biomedical
imaging.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure
VLBI observations of the Crab nebula pulsar
Observations were made at meter wave-lengths using very long base-line interferometry techniques. At 196.5 MHz no resolution of the pulsar are observed; all the pulse shapes observed with the interferometers are similar to single dish profiles, and all the power pulsates. At 111.5 MHz besides the pulsing power there is always a steady component, presumably due to interstellar scattering. The pulsar is slightly resolved at 111.5 MHz with an apparent angular diameter of 0.07 sec ? 0.01 sec. A 50 percent linear polarization of the time-averaged power is noted at 196.5 MHz; at 111.5 MHz, 20 percent of the total time-averaged power is polarized, 35 percent of the pulsing power is polarized, and the steady component is unpolarized
Experimental application of decoherence-free subspaces in a quantum-computing algorithm
For a practical quantum computer to operate, it will be essential to properly
manage decoherence. One important technique for doing this is the use of
"decoherence-free subspaces" (DFSs), which have recently been demonstrated.
Here we present the first use of DFSs to improve the performance of a quantum
algorithm. An optical implementation of the Deutsch-Jozsa algorithm can be made
insensitive to a particular class of phase noise by encoding information in the
appropriate subspaces; we observe a reduction of the error rate from 35% to
essentially its pre-noise value of 8%.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figures, submitted to PR
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