No Arabic abstract
We propose an approach to quantum phase estimation that can attain precision near the Heisenberg limit without requiring single-particle-resolved state detection. We show that the one-axis twisting interaction, well known for generating spin squeezing in atomic ensembles, can also amplify the output signal of an entanglement-enhanced interferometer to facilitate readout. Applying this interaction-based readout to oversqueezed, non-Gaussian states yields a Heisenberg scaling in phase sensitivity, which persists in the presence of detection noise as large as the quantum projection noise of an unentangled ensemble. Even in dissipative implementations -- e.g., employing light-mediated interactions in an optical cavity or Rydberg dressing -- the method significantly relaxes the detection resolution required for spectroscopy beyond the standard quantum limit.
The use of quantum resources can provide measurement precision beyond the shot-noise limit (SNL). The task of ab initio optical phase measurement---the estimation of a completely unknown phase---has been experimentally demonstrated with precision beyond the SNL, and even scaling like the ultimate bound, the Heisenberg limit (HL), but with an overhead factor. However, existing approaches have not been able---even in principle---to achieve the best possible precision, saturating the HL exactly. Here we demonstrate a scheme to achieve true HL phase measurement, using a combination of three techniques: entanglement, multiple samplings of the phase shift, and adaptive measurement. Our experimental demonstration of the scheme uses two photonic qubits, one double passed, so that, for a successful coincidence detection, the number of photon-passes is $N=3$. We achieve a precision that is within $4%$ of the HL, surpassing the best precision theoretically achievable with simpler techniques with $N=3$. This work represents a fundamental achievement of the ultimate limits of metrology, and the scheme can be extended to higher $N$ and other physical systems.
We present experimental and theoretical results showing the improved beam quality and reduced divergence of an atom laser produced by an optical Raman transition, compared to one produced by an RF transition. We show that Raman outcoupling can eliminate the diverging lens effect that the condensate has on the outcoupled atoms. This substantially improves the beam quality of the atom laser, and the improvement may be greater than a factor of ten for experiments with tight trapping potentials. We show that Raman outcoupling can produce atom lasers whose quality is only limited by the wavefunction shape of the condensate that produces them, typically a factor of 1.3 above the Heisenberg limit.
Single-photon pulses cannot be generated on demand, due to incompatible requirements of positive frequencies and positive times. Resulting states therefore contain small probabilities for multiphotons. We derive upper and lower bounds for the maximum fidelity of realizable states that approximate single-photon pulses. The bounds have implications for ultrafast optics; the maximum fidelity is low for pulses with few cycles or close to the onset, but increases rapidly as the pulse envelope varies more slowly. We also demonstrate strictly localized states that are close to single photons.
The interference between coherent and squeezed vacuum light can produce path entangled states with very high fidelities. We show that the phase sensitivity of the above interferometric scheme with parity detection saturates the quantum Cramer-Rao bound, which reaches the Heisenberg-limit when the coherent and squeezed vacuum light are mixed in roughly equal proportions. For the same interferometric scheme, we draw a detailed comparison between parity detection and a symmetric-logarithmic-derivative-based detection scheme suggested by Ono and Hofmann.
Using an analytically solvable model, we show that a qubit array-based detector allows to achieve the fundamental Heisenberg limit in detecting single photons. In case of superconducting qubits, this opens new opportunities for quantum sensing and communications in the important microwave range.